BRADENTON, Fla. -- Joe Musgrove and Steven Brault weren't around for the Blackout, but they watched on TV, as did much of the nation. They saw Johnny Cueto drop the ball, Russell Martin whack that ball into PNC Park's bleachers, the whole deal.
"Loved it. Unbelievable," Musgrove was telling me Tuesday morning on this reporting date for pitchers and catchers at Pirate City. "To see that passion, that crowd, the look in all those people's eyes ... it made me really appreciate what that would be like, you know?"
He and Brault decided not to wait. In early December, these two best buds and fellow Southern Californians went for the full indoctrination. They made it to Heinz Field for Steelers vs. Chargers. Really yinzered it up, too. Head-to-toe gear, beers bent-elbow-hoisted to the chest, whooping it up. Then it was over to PPG Paints Arena for pucks. Pressed up against the glass for Penguins vs. Avalanche, pumping their fists -- and more brew -- for each of Patric Hornqvist's three goals.
I saw them at both events and had been meaning forever to ask about this. They didn't disappoint:
"Everyone in the city talks about how cool Pittsburgh is when it comes to sports, especially when it comes to playoffs," Musgrove would say. "That's our goal. It's to get there. We're all looking forward to getting that same experience."
"It's what you live for," Brault told me. "You want to compete at the highest level. You want to feel that energy. It's something we all crave. And when it happens again ... man."
I know, I know. I can't envision it, either.
Because it'll take a little extra.
Set aside that this blah, cloudy, steamy Tuesday morning marked nothing more than reporting day for the Pirates' pitchers and catchers. And that these guys ultimately will enter 2019 without an experienced shortstop, without their starting right fielder, without much power at the corners, without a meaningful offseason acquisition, without a front office that can draft and develop and, yeah, without an owner who cares beyond bending over to pick up his next nickel.
Set aside, too, that the team's clear strength should be its starting pitching, because even that, for all its encouraging progress in 2018, wound up middle-of-the-pack in most statistical categories:
Every bit as blah as the skies here.
Still, the four confirmed starters are the strength. That's not something anyone in this camp disputes, and it shouldn't be disputed on the outside, either: Jameson Taillon and Trevor Williams broke through with sub 3.20 ERAs and a matching 1.18 WHIP, or walks and hits per inning pitched. Musgrove's 3.99 ERA was markedly higher, but his WHIP was identical, and there were times he looked more dominant than any of them. Chris Archer, of course, comes with the pedigree of having been a bona fide ace in the mighty American League East.
As such, all of them will have to be what they've been in the past, with good health, with continued growth and ... with that little extra.
"I felt like, for the most part, our pitching staff was strong, and we take pride in that," Musgrove said. "Pitching is still what wins you games. And with our staff, the way our rotation and bullpen are set up, if we can get to the sixth, seventh inning with a lead, we're going to win a lot of games."
Right. The bullpen's backbone of Felipe Vazquez, Keone Kela, Kyle Crick and Richard Rodriguez might be among the National League's most imposing. In 2018, as Musgrove indicated, the Pirates were 67-6 when leading after six innings, 70-3 when leading after seven.
But that's not the little extra.
"We've got a lot of weapons," Musgrove continued. "And we've got them in a lot of different roles. There's versatility, too."
Yeah, still not it.
"We have an extremely confident staff, too. Maybe a little of that badass swagger mentality."
Bingo. I spoke with every member of this rotation over these first 48 hours of spring training, and that kept morphing into the common theme.
"Now, not everyone here necessarily shows it," Musgrove kept on. "I don't think we need to go out and try to prove that to anybody with a physical look, an emotional look. Because Jamo and Trevor take the more cerebral approach, slow their game down, pitch under control and don't show a whole lot. But the results, the way they go out and act like it's just another day at the yard ... that's the badass ... that's the swagger. That can be more intimidating than the guy who's out there screaming and pumping his chest. I think we've got a little bit of both."
That much was documented by Matt Sunday all summer long:
As Archer told me with a small smile, "We're not all cut from the same cloth, are we?"
"We've got a lot of different personalities, and it's important as you're maturing into the big leagues to maintain that," Williams would add. "But collectively, yeah, I think there's something to take from that. Last year, we were better than the year prior. We turned a lot of heads last year. We didn't compete for a world championship, but we made strides. We know that. And I think if we can carry that ... carry that swagger into this season, it's something we can all identify with."
"It's a great group of guys," Taillon said. "But what makes the group really special is that it's grown up together, gotten stronger together. There's no question we've fed off each other's successes, learned from each other along the way."
Archer came along last, arriving as the dramatic trade deadline acquisition last July. He'll be the old man, if you will, at 30.
“We’ve got the nucleus of what I feel was a very good pitching staff at the end of last season," he said. "We have a rotation that pitched consistently well, and I think we’re capable of even better. In fact, I know there's more there."
That's how the guy at the receiving end views it, too:
Francisco Cervelli's been glowing about this for months, including over the winter. His perspective means more than most, not just because he and Elias Diaz handle the staff where it matters most, but also Cervelli's had cause all through the offseason to worry about where he might be traded. And though neither he nor a big portion of the clubhouse was wild about losing Josh Harrison, Jordy Mercer and Ivan Nova, nor about seeing payroll whacked down to roughly $71 million -- another column for another day -- the one subject that immediately boosts the spirits is the pitching.
That's not being forced. It's rooted in the foundation of the baseball culture. As Clint Hurdle worded it for me, "Good pitching beats good hitting. That’s it. Good pitching beats good hitting. It always has. You look at the postseason, you’re going to face the best starters, the best relievers … and you’ve seen some magnificent teams get there and struggle. The game’s always been about pitching. And we have pitching.”
They do. I reminded Ray Searage of this, joking that I was working on a column that heaps all the pressure squarely on him. To which he gamely replied, "With these guys? I'm fine with it."
Again, I'll point back up to that graphic to remind that the process isn't complete. It can still go sideways. Or worse. But it's on a promising path, maybe even beyond the four confirmed starters.
Brault's been a strange case since his arrival, outright dominant in Class AAA and occasionally so in the majors but never piecing it together. He told me, "I worked like crazy this offseason, so much that it wasn't really an offseason," in studying video and adjusting mechanics. Some of that was with Musgrove, some with Searage, but all of it was aimed at raising and shortening a delivery Brault sounds certain caused him to lose fastball command for stretches.
"Everything goes off my fastball command," Brault told me. "You'll see."
If that works out, if Brault takes the open fifth starter's job -- and he's my bet -- expect him to more than fit in with the aforementioned attitude. He might actually personify it more than anyone.
"We're all so young still, but we all have the experience, we have that clout thingy," he added with that San Diego surfer-dude flair. "This is a rotation that's already done good things, and it's not going away. That's the scary thing about it. You know what I mean?"
Yep.
"So, if you look at the badass aspect of it, when teams come into our stadium, we want them thinking, 'Our pitching's gonna have to keep the runs down because we're going to have a tough time scoring against the Pirates.' That's the identity we want to have. We want people to be thinking about pitching being the strong point."
Don't forget Chad Kuhl, either. Kid was throwing fire before Tommy John surgery. He'll miss 2019, but he's a vibrant member of this circle, not to mention maybe their most emotional on the mound.
Kuhl threw for the first time Monday since the September procedure. Twenty-five simple tosses, but plenty enough to have him beaming.
"You have to be patient with this, but it's hard not to get excited about working my way back and, more than anything, being part of this group again," Kuhl told me, standing alongside Taillon, both visibly itching to get out to the field. "These guys, when you're around them, you can feel that energy they bring. I think people are going to see that for themselves this year. I really do."
With that Taillon took off, looked back over his shoulder and barked, "Let's go! Let's go get it! Starts right here!"
