Realistically talking the Pittsburgh Pirates playoff possibilities have in all probability slipped away. Particularly after a 1-5 residence stand in opposition to the Arizona Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres that concluded on Thursday afternoon with one other crushing 7-6 loss to the latter, concluding a three-game sweep.
It isn’t simply that the Pirates have misplaced a bunch of video games to groups they’re chasing to fall to 4 video games out of a playoff spot with 4 groups standing between them. It’s the means they maintain shedding video games in gut-punch style, seemingly discovering new methods to grab defeat from the jaws of victory each day.
The most important offender continues to be a bullpen that retains blowing late leads.
It occurred once more on Thursday when nearer David Bednar blew his second consecutive save within the prime of the ninth inning, giving up three runs of their newest loss.
For the Pirates, it’s the eighth consecutive loss by which a aid pitcher has taken the loss on the stat sheet.
You need to go all the best way again to July 23 — a stretch of 13 video games — to seek out the final time a Pirates beginning pitcher was truly tagged with a loss. In that loss Paul Skenes allowed simply two runs whereas pitching into the ninth inning.
Stunningly, the Pirates have received simply 5 of these 13 video games because of collapse after collapse from their bullpen.
Colin Holderman alone has taken 4 of these losses, whereas Bednar and Aroldis Chapman have all contributed blown saves.
However whenever you dig even deeper into the defeats it turns into much more irritating for the Pirates and their followers. Let’s simply take this newest residence stand for example the place they received only one out of six video games.
In 4 of these 5 losses the Pirates had a win likelihood of 77% or greater within the seventh inning or later, together with back-to-back ninth inning leads. That merely cannot occur. Particularly in opposition to groups that you’re chasing within the standings.
When the 2024 season started the Pirates anticipated their bullpen to be one in all their largest strengths with the trio of Holderman, Chapman and Bednar being counted on to lock down leads and shorten video games. These three have been a wild disappointment.
Solely the Chicago White Sox have blown extra saves than the Pirates this season. It’s a full waste of what has been one of many league’s finest beginning rotations.
