Pirates' season-worst losing streak can be directly blamed on Derek Shelton issue

At the time of their last win on Aug. 3, the Pittsburgh Pirates sat at third place in National League Central Division, two games over .500 and 2.5 games back of the final National League Wild Card spot.

A lot can change in nine days. The Pirates have now lost a season-high seven games in a row, putting them at five games below .500, five games back of the Wild Card spot and in last place the NL Central.

As if all that weren't bad enough, the fashion in which Pittsburgh suffered its seventh straight loss Sunday somehow made it worse.

Despite a not-fully-healthy Andrew McCutchen crushing two home runs in his return to the lineup to help the Pirates erase an early four-run deficit, their comeback effort fell short in a 6-5 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers in 10 innings.

Another big rally. Another blown lead. Another excruciating loss. The pattern is becoming all too familiar for the Pirates. They have now lost nine of their last 10, including back-to-back sweeps at the hands of the Dodgers and San Diego Padres.

In two of their three losses to the Padres during their most recent homestand, the Pirates held leads entering the ninth inning before David Bednar blew back-to-back saves. Bednar appeared to be on the pathway to redemption when he managed to pitch a scoreless ninth inning Sunday against the Dodgers before the Pirates took their late lead on a 10th-inning RBI single by Bryan Reynolds.

But the end result was no different than Bednar's previous outings. In the bottom of the 10th, he allowed a game-tying double to Kiké Hernández and eventually surrendered a game-winning, two-out single to Teoscar Hernández.

Pirates' season-worst losing streak can be directly blamed on management

Bednar's recent struggles are certainly cause for concern. But perhaps the bigger, more concerning, question is: Why was he pitching the 10th in the first place?

There are several possible explanations for the Pirates' concerning pattern of late, but manager Derek Shelton's bullpen management appears to be chief among them. With starter Bailey Falter covering only four innings against the Dodgers, the Pirates were forced to rely on Dennis Santana, Jalen Beeks, Kyle Nicolas and Aroldis Chapman before turning to Bednar to begin the ninth. Bednar got through the inning unscathed, but given his recent struggles, Shelton shouldn't have pressed his luck and sent him back out for the 10th.

Of course, Bednar isn't blameless in this scenario, but Shelton put him in a position to fail. Domingo Germán had thrown four innings on Friday, and Ben Heller had thrown two Saturday, so there were limited options remaining in the bullpen by the time Sunday's game went into extra innings. It was an avoidable situation, but one the Pirates keep finding themselves in thanks to Shelton's horrendous bullpen management.

Shelton's poor decision making has cost this team a staggering number of games. If he doesn't start learning from his mistakes, he will have no one to blame for the Pirates' late-season collapse but himself.

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