DUNEDIN, Fla. -- The Pirates hit seven -- yes, seven -- home runs Friday in a 19-13 victory over the Blue Jays at TD Ballpark.
Kicking off the home run parade was Ke'Bryan Hayes, who uncorked a deep fly to left field in the second. While the wind was definitely blowing out and aided batters Friday, this one needed no assistance.
It was the type of homer he was clobbering during spring training a year ago. That was a special couple weeks for the Pirates' future third baseman. He batted .353 with three home runs and four doubles, exciting many who thought he was major-league ready.
He and Rick Eckstein did not spend a lot of time working on his mechanics that spring. In fairness, there wasn't much to work on. Per Hayes' account, Eckstein thought: "Holy crap. He's already got that."
But things changed once he went down to triple-A Indianapolis to start the season. Hayes struggled at the dish for most of the season, though he did hit better in August. Despite that late improvement, he did not get a call to the big leagues.
"I got away from it," Hayes was telling me. "Started doing a bunch of drills and started getting away from what I was doing in spring."
Early this spring, Hayes picked up where he left off last March. He was driving the ball, usually to the opposite field. His coaches noticed. When talking about Hayes' defense before the game, Derek Shelton made sure to cap his thought by also mentioning: "He's swinging the bat aggressively."
Those aggressive swings were resulting in some hard contact, but as spring went on, something was different. He wasn't pulling the ball, and he wasn't getting it in the air.
"I noticed that I was feeling late," Hayes said.
So during batting practice this week, he went to Eckstein and asked what he was doing wrong. After diving into the video, Eckstein noticed a few things that could be tweaked, the first being his gather. During his swing, he was jumping out of his backload too early.
"Whenever I would go, I would go like that," Hayes said, pantomiming his swing. When beginning to stride towards the imaginary pitcher, his back foot skipped forward a bit.
"I'd jump out of it too fast, instead of staying back." He did his swing again, this time waiting a bit longer and showing a more smooth transition from his load to his stride.
Hayes had an off-day Thursday, so he was able to spend the day working on this change with Eckstein. During that time, Eckstein told Hayes he didn't care where he hit any of these balls. He just wanted him to focus on his backside.
Needless to say, Hayes did a pretty good job staying back in that first at-bat. The result: A pulled fly ball that just so happened to go a mile.
"I really like him," Hayes said, smiling. "He's able to find stuff right away. I work for him for two days, and that happened today."
There is some more work to be done. Every few days, they will add another thing to work on. There's still plenty of spring remaining, and the mindset is, "if we tried to do all of it at once, your head will just be spinning."
But to get immediate gratification after a day working on the swing?
"To see it right in the first at-bat, see it working, it's a really good feeling."
• Yes, the Pirates hit seven home runs. Cole Tucker went to the opposite field for the second time in three days. Colin Moran pulled one to right, the third against Blue Jays' starter Chase Anderson.
Phillip Evans gave the Pirates the lead in the seventh, crushing a grand slam. Bligh Madris, Will Craig and Jared Oliva provided the insurance from there.
Besides Tucker, it was everyone's first home run this spring.
• Not to brag -- ok, I'll brag a little -- but I jokingly called the number of homers in this one. The Pirates hit seven and the Blue Jays four.
Wind is blowing out today in Dunedin, so don't be surprised if we see a home run or 11. #DKPS #Pirates
— Alex Stumpf (@AlexJStumpf) March 6, 2020
I'm playing the lottery.
• Chris Archer made his first start of the spring, striking out four over two scoreless innings. He walked one and allowed one ground ball single.
He mainly used his fastball and changeup, though he did mix in a couple sliders, the first resulting in a punchout of Randal Grichuk in the first.
Archer's fastball was sitting at 93-94 mph, about where it would normally be during a regular season start.
“I felt really good about what I accomplished today,” Archer said. “We talked about yesterday how it was going to be a lot of heaters. We mixed in some changeups. We had to make some pitches out of the stretch. It was an overall really good day.
"Most importantly, I walked away healthy. I’m really happy about that.”
• Shelton reiterated he is "not even close" to being ready to talk about who his opening day starter is, but assuming they stick on a five day schedule, it would line up to be either Archer or Joe Musgrove. Obviously they could push someone back to have them line up for that day, but at the moment, it looks like it is between those two.
Archer seems optimistic about potentially making that opening day start, and while Shelton likes that optimism, he isn't getting too far ahead.
"The way we're looking at it is we have to take how today goes, then how tomorrow goes, then how his next start goes and focus on that," Shelton said before the game.
• Musgrove supposed to go four innings Friday, accepting the bump to a relief appearance in order to accommodate Archer. He wasn't able to get out of his first inning though, being pulled after 37 pitches and seven runs allowed.
Most of those tallies came on a pair of wind-assisted homers, though he wasn't looking for an excuse.
“My execution wasn’t very good,” Musgrove said. “It’s good to get stuff like this out of the way in spring. I felt good today, but the execution wasn’t there."
Musgrove threw two simulated innings in order to make sure he got his full workload for the day.
• Edgar Santana and Blake Cederlind threw back-to-back 1-2-3 innings in the seventh and eighth, respectively. Santana struck out one, Cederlind two.
I wonder if I'm going to write that bullet again at some point in the regular season.
• This was the Pirates' highest scoring spring training game since they beat the Blue Jays 22-5 on Mar. 25, 2014.
• Who threw today:
Chris Archer: 2 IP, 1 H, 1 BB, 4 K
Joe Musgrove: 0.2 IP, 7 ER, 6 H, 1 K
Blake Weiman: 1.1 IP, 2 ER, 2 H, 2 BB
Geoff Hartlieb: 1.1 IP: 1 R, 1 H, 2 BB, 1 K
Williams Jerez: 0.2 IP, 1 K
Edgar Santana: 1 IP, 1 K
Blake Cederlind: 1 IP, 2 K
Nick Mears: 0.2 IP, 3 ER, 2 H, 1 BB, 1 K
Pedro Vasquez: 0.1 IP, 1 BB
