In an all-around awful display of baseball, the Pirates lost to Detroit, 10-7, at LECOM Park. The pitching was bad, but the sort of dismal defensive display that’s been a hallmark of Derek Shelton’s teams didn’t help. The Pirates are now 3-8-2 on the spring.
Starter Rich Hill was fine. He should have gotten three scoreless innings, but he made the mistake of picking a runner off first with runners at the corners and two outs in the third. The Pirates naturally botched the rundown and let the runner on third “steal” home.
Five relievers followed Hill and every one except Osvaldo Bido gave up at least one run. The runs were all earned, but the Pirates committed three errors, two of which contributed to rallies. In particular, none of the pitchers other than Hill showed any familiarity with the strike zone. Excluding Hill, the Pirates threw only 74 of 141 pitches for strikes. Apparently they thought Oscar Marin wanted them to fill the Ozone.
Wil Crowe, Angel Perdomo and Colin Selby were especially bad. Crowe gave up two runs on a double, triple and home run. The triple was a grounder past Carlos Santana at first that a first baseman with a little agility might have gotten.
Like Jose Hernandez yesterday, Perdomo missed an opportunity to impress with Jarlin Garcia out. He threw a scoreless inning, but let the first two runners reach, with one scoring, in his second inning. That brought on Colin Selby, who got hammered for three runs of his own along with letting Perdomo’s second runner score.
Yohan Ramirez deserved better, although he struggled to throw strikes like all the others. He gave up a run with the help of Jack Suwinski, playing center, who lost yet another fly ball in the sun. The final run came off Nate Webb, who gave up two hits and a walk in the eighth.
The job competition, aside from the bullpen, showed a little progress. Ji-Hwan Bae, playing short, and Tucupita Marcano, at second, each went 2-for-3, with Marcano getting a double. They also each had defensive flubs, though. Canaan Smith-Njigba had a single, as did Malcom Nunez, who’s been reassigned to minor league camp. Ryan Vilade, who’s still on the roster, and Travis Swaggerty each went 0-for-2. Vilade, who’s still on the roster, is batting .133.
The guys who aren’t in the job hunt contributed a lot of the offense, which has been a pattern. Nick Gonzales singled both times up. He’s having a good spring, batting .357. Endy Rodriguez had a double in two times up. He has five hits on the spring, which is just two fewer than Austin Hedges, Jason Delay, Kevin Plawecki and Tyler Heineman combined.
The biggest hit was a three-run bomb by Drew Maggi in the ninth, which made the game look more competitive than it was. Maggi now leads the team in home runs with two.
