PITTSBURGH — As the Pirates have floundered through the month of June, setting precipitously on the ledge between kind-of in contention and completely out of contention, their on-field look has gone basically unchanged.
Yes, Austin Meadows is now usually patrolling one of the outfield spots, Michael Feliz has lost his grip on the eighth inning, and at least for the next couple of days, Corey Dickerson will be off attending to a family matter.
But for the most part, the 25-man roster, the starting nine, the rotation and the bullpen look basically the same as the group that has gotten the Pirates to a 36-37 record after 73 games.
On some levels, that makes sense, as external moves are notoriously tough to pull off early in the season, and there don’t appear to be many more prospects that are beating down the door for a call-up in Indianapolis.
It’s clear, now 45 percent of the way through the season, that the Pirates have a good but streaky lineup, average starting pitching, below average defense and a scary-at-times but still talented bullpen.
So what can be done to change any of that? Surprisingly, plenty, but I’ve narrowed it down to five things the Pirates could have, and I might say should have already tried.
PLAY FRANCISCO CERVELLI AT FIRST BASE
To say Josh Bell has struggled this season would be an understatement. Amongst MLB first basemen with a qualified number of plate appearances, he’s 20th with a 94 wRC+ and a .308 wOBA. He’s not hitting for much average (12th at.243) or any power (22nd with a .133 ISO), he’s still not particularly refined with the glove (20th with minus-5 DRS) and he’s a middling baserunner at 0.0 BsR. Taken in total, he’s the No. 20 first baseman with -0.1 WAR out of 24 qualified players.
Bell is still a young player at 25, and there’s no reason for the Pirates to give up on him at this point, but the lack of offense, at a premium offensive position, is one of the team’s most improvable areas so far.
Cervelli, meanwhile, is doing everything that Bell isn’t at the plate. He’s having a career year with a 140 wRC+, increasing his batting average and doubling his isolated power from a season ago.
He doesn’t have much experience at first base, but he does have some. He played two games there in the minors and five in the majors in 2014 with the New York Yankees and two games with the Pirates in 2016. But Pirates manager Clint Hurdle has said that the Pirates believe Cervelli could play at first if called upon.
Of course, Cervelli taking reps would reduce his impact behind the plate, but Elias Diaz is also having a terrific year as Cervelli’s understudy. At the plate, he has a 129 wRC+, and behind it, he’s gotten rave reviews for his improved game-calling this season.
Cutting down Bell’s playing time, keeping Cervelli’s constant while giving him some reps at a less physically demanding position and increasing Diaz’s playing time should be an easy win for the Pirates. If Bell puts things back together, it’s easy enough to undo, and it also provides the added bonus of showcasing Cervelli at a second position for a potential trade if things go poorly.
LET TYLER GLASNOW PITCH MEANINGFUL INNINGS
The Pirates bullpen has been a mess for most of the season, with the early part of it a total disaster in the spring and the back end melting down more recently. No one has pitched well enough to this point to unseat Felipe Vazquez as closer, despite his less-than-stellar performance.
The reliever with the best numbers is Richard Rodriguez, who is just coming off the disabled list. In the last 30 days, the reliever with the best numbers is Tyler Glasnow, who has 2.08 ERA and 3.44 FIP since May 20, both tops on the staff. But that’s actually a hair worse than his season-long 3.32 FIP.
I wrote in May that Glasnow’s success isn’t necessarily pushing him back toward the starting rotation. But he’s still more than capable of pitching multiple innings of relief. He’s even pretty tolerable at the plate, if need be, with a career .231 batting average.
Moving to the back end of the bullpen and higher leverage innings usually comes with a reduction to one inning at a time. But it doesn’t have to. Pitchers like Chad Green of the New York Yankees have established themselves as multi-inning, high-leverage relievers.
The third time through the order isn’t pretty for many starting pitchers around the league, but the Pirates have a few that have had an especially tough time. The third time through the order, Chad Kuhl has an .853 OPS against, compared to .771 overall. Ivan Nova has a .964 OPS against the third time through compared to .773 overall.
With those pitchers in particular, the Pirates should just be turning the ball over to Glasnow if the game is close and the third time of the order is looming. Let him pitch the sixth and seventh innings, and cut down the workload of the single-inning relievers that need to get to Vazquez.
Glasnow’s arm should have plenty of gas in the tank. He’s thrown just 40 innings so far this season, and is on pace to throw 89 after tossing 155.1 last season. If the extra work winds up to be too much, the Pirates could try Steven Brault or Richard Rodriguez in that role or …
FIND A ROLE FOR NICK KINGHAM
Nick Kingham has made six starts, and he has a 3.82 ERA, a 3.35 FIP, a 24.3 percent strikeout rate and just a 4.9 percent walk rate. Simply put, he’s one of the team’s best 12 pitchers. He’s probably in the top five.
It doesn’t particularly matter what they do with Kingham in the majors. Six-man rotation? Piggyback him with Kuhl or Nova? Work him out of the bullpen like Glasnow and Brault? Set-up man? Any of that would work. Kingham is a talented pitcher, he’s 26 years old, he has very little left to learn in Triple-A and could help the team win somewhere, somehow.
BRING UP A YOUNG MIDDLE INFIELDER
Jordy Mercer is the Pirates starting shortstop right now, but that’s probably not going to be the case for much longer. A free agent at the end of the season, there’s very little chance the team is going to pony up the cash to retain him and around these parts, players on expiring contracts have a long history of finding their way out of town before it even gets that far.
The Pirates probably won’t go outside the organization for Mercer’s eventual replacement, because they have a trio of upper-level middle infielders that all look like future big leaguers. Kevin Newman is a glove-first shortstop in Triple-A, Kevin Kramer is a more power-oriented second baseman in Indy that’s also played some shortstop, and Cole Tucker is the most well-rounded prospect of the bunch playing short in Altoona.
Some combination of those three is probably going to get the bulk of the playing at shortstop in 2019, but as of right now, none of the three has seen a Major League clubhouse. The Pirates need to figure out what they have and who fits where.
Mercer has been swinging a hot bat as of late, and probably deserves the lion’s share of the playing time, at least until he cools down. But it would probably benefit Kramer or Newman to come up at get some looks at the level in a part-time role.
The problem with that is that Sean Rodriguez, another free-agent-to-be, is occupying the team’s backup middle infield spot.
Rodriguez is a useful player. He’s one of the team’s best hitters against left-handed pitching and he plays at least acceptable defense at seven spots. But he hasn’t hit at the same level against righties since before his tragic 2017 car accident and it appears unlikely, at age 33, that it’s going to come back. The Pirates need to give one of their younger guys a shot.
LET AUSTIN MEADOWS LEAD OFF
Through the first 27 games of his career, Meadows is leading the team in wRC+ (149), wOBA (.391), slugging (.591) and isolated power (.269).
How long will that hot streak last? I have no idea. He’s certainly hitting better than I thought he could. As long as it lasts, though, giving the rookie the top spot makes a ton of sense. As the team’s hottest hitter, he could use the extra at-bats, and to be honest, with his speed and gap-to-gap hitting ability, he could stick in that spot for a while, anyway. May as well try it now.
It’s certainly a better option that continuing to roll out Josh Harrison at that spot. Harrison is currently ninth on the team in wRC+ and wOBA and his .330 on-base percentage is eighth and 17 points behind Meadows.
I’m not saying that the Pirates are five simple and mostly easy moves away from returning to contention, but they’re all also moves that help set the team up going forward if things don’t end up working out. When the goals of winning in 2018 and setting up 2019 align, that should be a no-brainer for the Pirates.
