Pretty much nothing about this game suggested the Pirates would win: Matt Harvey was on the mound. Jeff Locke was opposing him. McCutchen, Kang, and Cervelli were all sitting. The Bucs had already won the series. This was an easy game to write off. Which means it was all upside.
Of course, you don’t win a game like that by normal means. You win it with Weird Baseball. Weird as in:
- Pedro Florimon drawing a walk.
- A tailor made double play ball being thrown into center because neither fielder was on the bag.
- Yoenis Cespedes making a horrendous throw home when one of his superhuman throws probably wasn’t even necessary.
- Pedro Florimon drawing another walk.
Oh, and Pedro homered again, his third bomb in six games. Polanco had another multi-hit game, as well.
The end result is that the Pirates ran J.A. Happ, Charlie Morton, and Jeff Locke out against a first-place team, and swept them. Granted, the Mets are known for their pitching, not their offense, but you really don’t need your back of the rotation guys to throw well against good-hitting teams. You need them to throw well against the bad-hitting ones, and occasionally give you a chance to win against the others. If they did more than that, they wouldn’t be back-of-the-rotation guys.
One whatever-the-opposite-of-a-silver-lining-is is that Locke went only 5.1 innings, which is the fifth consecutive start he’s failed to go six. And though it came after two extra-inning games (including a 14-inning affair the night before an afternoon game), the bullpen came through again, shutting the Mets down through the final 3.2. And I do mean shutting them down (not merely out): they retired all 11 batters they faced.
Here’s the final line on the bullpen this series:
16 IP, 1 ER, 6 hits, 2 BBs, 17 Ks.
That’s a 0.56 ERA and a 0.50 WHIP. Caminero, in particular, has now thrown 12.1 consecutive scoreless innings. Bastardo’s at 8.1. Blanton’s at 7.1. The rotation hasn’t been going deep into games, but the bullpen has more than covered for them.
The Pirates have won four in a row, and for the first time in awhile, both the Cubs and Cardinals lost, too. Wins are always good, but this was more encouraging than most.