Mitch Keller did the stopper thing, throwing a complete game shutout against Colorado to put an end to the Pirates’ seven-game losing streak. The 2-0 win marked the Pirates’ first complete game shutout since Trevor Williams threw one on July 23, 2018.
Colorado has been hitting very well in winning six of their last seven, but Keller came out with his best stuff. All he allowed on the day was three singles, a double and a walk. He fanned eight and threw 77 of 103 pitches for strikes.
Keller only got stronger as the game went along. He retired the last ten Colorado batters. In the seventh, eighth and ninth, he needed just nine, eight and seven pitches.
The Pirates’ offense, meanwhile, spent most of the game inventing new forms of ineptitude. In the first four innings, their only threat came with two on and nobody out in the third. Austin Hedges, botched a sacrifice attempt, producing a force at third that perfectly set up a double play grounder from Ke’Bryan Hayes.
The Pirates got two on again in the fifth, this time with one out, but Chris Owings struck out and Rodolfo Castro was caught stealing on the play. That was the Pirates’ second strike-’em-out, throw-’em-out double play of the game. They were 0-for-3 overall trying to steal off Elias Diaz.
The bumbling didn’t stop there. In the sixth, Hedges broke his 1-for-20 streak with a leadoff double. Hayes got an infield hit, with Hedges holding second despite the fact that nobody was covering third. Sure enough, Bryan Reynolds hit into a double play and, after a walk, Carlos Santana grounded out.
Finally, in the seventh, Castro followed a leadoff single by Connor Joe with a blast into the visiting bullpen. It was his fourth home run of the year and the Pirates’ first with anybody on base in nine days.
And that was all the scoring. In fact, nobody came close after that. The Pirates didn’t even get David Bednar up in the bullpen. Game time was 1:55.
