Pittsburgh Pirates: Takeaways From Frustrating Series Split in St. Louis

Their four-game series at Busch Stadium was there for the taking, but the Pittsburgh Pirates had to settle for a very frustrating series split

Typically when a Major League Baseball team plays a four-game series on the road against a team that is projected to be a division winner and they split that series it's considered a success. Well, it did not feel that way for the Pittsburgh Pirates in St. Louis.

The Piraes traveled to Busch Stadium for a four-game series agaisnt the Cardinals. After winning game one on Thursday night, a series victory was very much in play. Unfortunately, the Pirates let a winnable game on Friday slip away. They also let a game they absolutely should have won on Sunday slip away, leading to a series split.

Following the split, the Pirates are now 9-7 overall this season. This includes being 2-2-1 in their five series played. To be honest, this series split may have been more frustrating than either one of their series losses.

Before looking ahead to a trip to Denver to play the Rockies for the final three games of their road trip, we'll take a look back at their series in Busch Stadium. Let's take a look at some takeaways from the team's very frustrating series split in St. Louis.

Best series of the season for the starting pitching

Entering the season the expectation was that the Pirates could have a solid starting rotation, but a bullpen that would struggle. Well, so far in 2023 it has largely been the other way around. However, in this four-game trip to Busch Stadium the Pirate starting rotation turned in their best series of the season thus far.

It started with Vince Velasquez on Thursday night. After allowing 8 runs in 7.1 innings pitched across his first two starts, Velasquez bounced back to strikeout six Cardinal batters while firing 6 scoreless innings. He allowed just three hits, walked two, and generated 18 swings-and-misses which was the second-highest of his career.

Driven by a wicked slider, on Friday night Johan Oviedo shoved against his former club turning in arguably the best start of his MLB career. Oviedo allowed just seven baserunners while surrendering 1 run and striking out a career-high 10 batters in 7 innings pitched.

After being a bit snakebitten by some tough luck that led to him allowing a pair of 1st inning runs, Roansy Contreras settled in on Saturday to turn in a strong bounce back start after struggling against the Astros earlier in the week. Contreras pitched 6 innings, allowing just those 2 runs and striking out six batters. This included Contreras finishing strong by striking out the side in his final inning of work. Contreras did what starting pitchers with top of the rotation potential do on days when they do not have their best stuff, he battled and still turned in a strong start.

Mitch Keller had the worst start of the series, but still pitched well. Keller allowed 3 earned runs on seven hits, two walks, a home run, and three strikeouts. With the Pirates leading 3-1 with two outs in the bottom of the 6th, Keller allowed a game-tying 2-run home run to Lars Nootbaar. His outing was more than good enough for the Pirates to win, offensive struggles and Wil Crowe (more on him later) pooping the bed in the 10th inning did the team in.

Once you factor in Rich Hill's strong start in Wednesday's series finale against the Houston Astros and Keller's start last Tuesday, for the first time this season the Pirates have gone through the rotation one time with nothing but strong starts. It marks six straight starts of at least 6 innings pitched for Pirate starters, they've also allowed 3 earned runs or less in each of these starts. If the starting rotation can get into a groove, then the Pirates will be in a great spot to continue their strong start to the season and keep winning baseball games.

Bullpen depth is an issue, Wil Crowe should not be pitching in high-leverage situations

These two takeaways go together, so we'll put them together. So far this season the Pirate bullpen has far exceeded expectations. However, there are serious issues with the bullpen's depth and these depth issues are starting to shine.

Duane Underwood Jr. and Colin Holderman had to pitch in three of the four games in the series. This will likely render them unavailable for Monday night's game in Colorado. Lack of depth options also put Derek Shelton in a difficult position on Sunday.

With the Pirates leading 4-3 entering the bottom of the 10th inning, Shelton had three options to try and hold the lead. Wil Crowe, Yohan Ramirez who was just promoted on Sunday, or Rule 5 Draft rookie Jose Hernandez. Personally, due to how well he has pitched this season Hernandez would have been my choice. That said, it's understandable why Shelton went with Crowe.

Well, in what was definitely predictable, Crowe struggled. He issued a one out walk before allowing a gmae-tying ground rule double. After getting Jordan Walker to strikeout looking, Tommy Edman singled on a ground ball to center field to end the game.

Led by Bednar, Holderman, and Dauri Mortea, the back end of the Pirate bullpen appears to be pretty strong. Underwood Jr. also appears to be turning a corner and finding more consistency. However, after this group, the bullpen goes off a cliff. Ben Cherington failing to add more bullpen help this past offseason is already starting to bite this team.

As for Crowe, the idea of using him in high-leverage situations is one that needs to be scrapped immediately. Please, for the love of God, quit doing it. Crowe struggled in high-leverage situations last season and failed in his first high-leverage situation this season.

Last week, I wrote how it appeared that Shelton was moving away from using Crowe in high-leverage situations. His hands were somewhat tied on Sunday, but we saw why he had been moving away from doing this.

In his MLB career Crowe owns a 10.7% walk rate, just a 13.4% strikeout rate, a 2.22 HR/9, .340 opponent batting average against, and an opposing slugging percentage of .596 in high-leverage situations. Sunday afternoon, he struggled again in a high-leverage situation allowing 2 runs on two hits and two walks. It's time for Crowe pitching in high-leverage situations to end.

Wasted opportunities sink the Bucs

The two games the Pirates lost in this series were two games they easily could have won. Each game had a common theme - wasted opportunities by the Pirate offense.

Friday night's 3-0 loss saw the Pirates go 1-for-7 at the plate with runners in scoring position. The one hit they had was a base hit to right field by Mark Mathias, a base hit that ended with Canaan Smith-Njigba being thrown out at the plate. They ledt 8 runners on base in the loss.

Sunday afternoon was much of the same. Pittsburgh batters went a woeful 1-for-10 at the plate with RISP. This included a gold opportunity in the 7th inning with the game tied at 3 and bases load with just one out where they failed to score. 9 men were left on base in that loss.

Facing a team like the Cardinals you need to pounce when scoring chances present themselves. The Pirates failed to do this in both losses in this series, and that was a major factor in the team having to settle for a series split in a series they should have won.

Jordan Walker looks very average and the Cardinals remain very annoying

If you did not look at his stats or watch him play, based on how Cardinal fans have acted you would think outfielder Jordan Walker was the second coming of Jesus Christ. However, against the Pittsburgh Pirates, the so called rookie phenom looked very average.

In this series, Walker was 1-for-13 with six strikeouts. He often times looked overmatched at the plate. Walker also barely avoided defensive disaster in the outfield a few times. He is now hitting just .267/.302/.400 on the season with a 91 wRC+. Ok numbers, but he is not the phenom Cardinal fans like to make him out to be.

As for the Cardinals as a team, they are still really annoying. Bloop hits, weakly hit ground balls finding holes, their fans yelling "11 rings!" on Twitter, this organization and fan base are insufferable. There is not one single redeeming quality about that franchise. How about Oli Marmol getting ejected on Saturday for arguing balls and strikes when every missed call favored the Cardinals?

Arrogant. Entitled. Thinking that the baseball world revolves around them and that they're better than you. They are without a shadow of a doubt the most dislikable franchise in all of sports, and that was on full display in this series.