Pirates, Brault blown away at Wrigley
Pitcher gives up 10 runs in 2⅔ innings
CHICAGO — The flags whipping around Wrigley Field foreshadowed what was to come, the sound of metal clanging and fabric snapping eventually replaced by the crack of the bat and cheers, again and again and again.
The Pirates made history Friday, though certainly the kind theyd soon would like to forget, as Steven Brault was shelled in a 17-8 loss to the Cubs. Brault became the first pitcher in baseball history to allow 10 earned runs and five home runs in a start of three or fewer innings.
Some of that was wind-aided. Some of it was not. All of it spoke to the lack of quality pitching that has been all-too-prevalent for the Pirates this season, an issue they must solve over the winter.
“Every mistake I made [Friday] was a home run,” Brault said. “That doesn’t happen very often. It was just their day. It’s a bummer, obviously. My stuff didn’t have quite the same crispness to it. But five home runs in 2⅔ innings ... I’ve never had anything like that happen to me before.”
The loss for the Pirates (65-83) came after they took three of four from the Giants in San Francisco and looked to have figured some things out on the mound.
Joe Musgrove gutted it out Thursday. Over the previous five games, Pirates relievers combined to allow two runs in 19⅓ innings of work while striking out 21 and allowing six hits in 64 at-bats (.094 average).
This version of the Pirates pitching staff looked nothing like that. Brault had a second consecutive rough start, and the bullpen fared worse, the five pitchers who took the mound here totaling 10 walks and giving up eight extra-base hits.
“It was lack of execution,” Pirates manager Clint Hurdle said. “They made us pay for every mistake over the plate, but the aggression kinda got stung out of us.
“I don’t know whether it was the wind, whether it was the crowd, whether it was the environment. I didn’t think we finished pitches the way we needed to to keep that offense down.”
The Pirates have allowed 10 or more runs 27 times this season in 148 games — 18.2 percent. The franchise record for games allowing double-digit runs is 28, which was set in 1930 (154-game season).
The game Friday put the Pirates team ERA at 5.10, which ranks them among Major League Baseball’s bottom-fifth. If that holds for the season, it would be the franchise’s worst such mark since 1953 (5.22).
After emerging as one of the feel-good stories of the season, pitching to a 2.71 ERA during a 13-start stretch, Brault now has coughed up 15 earned runs over his past two starts, when his fastball command has once again lacked. How does Brault move past this recent hiccup?
“It’s a challenge, obviously, but dwelling on it doesn’t help,” Brault said. “Obviously we all [dwell on it some]. We’re not robots. We’re going to think about it . ... But if you can’t move on, you’re never going to be able to last.”
Nicholas Castellanos, Wilsson Contreras (two), Nico Hoerner and Anthony Rizzo hit the Cubs home runs, the final one of those a grand slam that knocked Brault out of the game. Contreras’ two traveled 455 and 460 feet.
Brault had a few different pitches hit hard. In different sequences, too. But the common thread connecting them was what he said: A lack of crispness. Though a few were at the bottom of the zone, they were obviously extremely hittable.
That could’ve happened for a multitude of reasons, and it’s hard to say the wind wasn’t a factor. Even if it didn’t carry balls out of the park — most of them would’ve gone out anyway — Pirates pitchers were trying to be entirely too fine instead of just attacking hitters.
“We were trying not to make mistakes, trying not to give up stuff,” Hurdle said. “You can’t just continue to pitch behind in counts at this level on a day when the wind’s blowing out. We got what we deserved [Friday].”
The afternoon took a bit of a scary turn in the top of the fifth when Josh Bell came up a little lame running to second base on Jose Osuna’s force. Turns out he started experiencing left-groin discomfort and is considered day-to-day.
There were a couple bright spots, as Pablo Reyes and Kevin Newman collected two hits apiece. But how poorly the Pirates pitched, especially on a day where the wind conspired against them, turned out to be a hurdle too tough to overcome.
“You’re going to have days like this ... ,” Brault said.