Archer, Holmes added to the injured list

The Pirates on Wednesday placed a pair of pitchers on the 10- day injured list — Chris Archer with right shoulder inflammation and Clay Holmes with left quadriceps discomfort.

Archer is obviously the more important of the two, and the Pirates need him to be OK for his own health and their own evaluation purposes.

Archer left his start Tuesday before the beginning of the second inning. On the fifth warmup pitch he threw, he felt something strange in his shoulder and removed himself from the game.

“As he went to warm up after the first half inning, something didn’t feel right for him, and he could no longer continue,” said Pirates director of sports medicine Todd Tomczyk, who described the inflammation as “general.”

Archer is 3- 9 this season with a 5.23 ERA, although he has been much better since the All- Star break. Excluding Tuesday, four of his seven starts have been quality starts.

Tomczyk said Archer will remain with the team and keep up his conditioning and arm care programs. The hope is that things change within 7- 10 days.

“There’s inflammation within the shoulder,” Tomczyk said. “Our doctors, at the initial stages of this, are optimistic that this is going to be short term.”

This causes issues for the Pirates involving Archer’s $ 8.25 million option and how many more starts the team will see before making a final decision.

The bet here is that they pick up it up. That price is very reasonable for a major league starting pitcher, which Archer definitely is.

And given the strides he has made in the second half, pitching more for strikeouts and less for contact, Archer has gotten back to being more like himself.

Until this.

“The inflammation, the doctors felt, required a period of rest,” Tomczyk said. “We’ll reassess in about 7- 10 days.”

Roster moves

With Archer and Holmes going on the IL, the Pirates recalled Dario Agrazal and Parker Markel from Class AAA Indianapolis.

Agrazal, 24, has made eight starts with the MLB club this season, going 2- 3 with a 4.29 ERA.

Agrazal started off great, pounding the strike zone and producing quality starts in four of his first five. But Agrazal’s last three starts left a lot to be desired. He lost all three, pitched 14 innings and had an 8.36 ERA while giving up seven home runs.

Agrazal was supposed to start Wednesday for the Indians in Game 2 of a doubleheader in Toledo.

Getting Agrazal back will help the Pirates evaluate someone who could be part of their rotation in 2020, assuming he can rediscover his early form.

To do that, Agrazal will need to stay out of the middle of the plate and tamp down the number of home runs allowed. That’s going to require better pitch execution and staying out of hitters’ counts.

“This is probably a big boost of adrenaline for him,” manager Clint Hurdle said. “We’ve seen some good here. He went down with a short list of areas that need improvement to be the most effective pitcher he can be up here. He’s aware of those. He’s going to get an opportunity to get plugged back in and throw some punches back at the league now.”

Holmes relieved Archer and wound up giving the Pirates 3⅔ innings of onerun ball. Hurdle called it Holmes’ best outing of the season by a long shot, but it apparently did not end well.

“That last pitch he threw, he felt some discomfort in his left quad,” Tomczyk said. “Came in [ Wednesday], reassessed him. Wasn’t able to go.”