MILWAUKEE -- Mitch Keller sure made it sound, at least initially, as if he'd convened some meeting of masterminds.
The most pivotal player the Pittsburgh Baseball Club will employ at any level of the organization in 2022 -- and I'm using the term pivotal in its precise sense, meaning he could pivot violently one way or the other -- had been a little peeved and a lot puzzled by how he'd pitched pretty well through two starts, only to see the same sagging results as the past. You know, four runs in each, not getting past the fourth inning ... all that.
And so it was that, after the Pirates' 4-2 loss to the Brewers on this Wednesday afternoon at American Family Field, after he'd put forth 5 1/3 fine innings of one run, four hits, seven Ks and no walks, and after all the postgame cameras and microphones had left his stall, he told me he'd been spending significant time in recent days talking about how he could fix this.
The advice he'd ultimately receive: If he'd already been blessed over the winter to have rediscovered the triple-digit fastball of his early 20s ... uh, hey, maybe try throwing it more often.
"I know, right?" Keller would elaborate with a small laugh. "Just use it. Just let it fly. I mean, when I was in the minors, there were times I'd throw 50 fastballs in a row, then one offspeed pitch. That's what I needed to do. Pound that. Get ahead. Feed off it. Build off it."
And who, I had to inquire, were these wise sages dispensing this brilliance?
"Well, there were a lot of people I've talked to," he'd reply, mentioning pitching coaches Oscar Marin and Justin Meccage, among others. "A lot of conversation."
OK, but who sealed the deal?
A brief hesitation followed, then a broadening smile, then this: "That was me."
It was him in more ways than one.
Through those first two starts, Keller used his fastball exactly 50% of the time, 77 of his 154 pitches. The slider was at 22%, the changeup 17% and the curveball 11%. And because he prioritized balance over just bulldogging batters, he'd get tagged for 13 hits and five walks over 7 2/3 innings.
Same Old Mitch. At least with the results.
In this start, he used his fastball 68% of the time, 51 of his 75 pitches. The slider fell to 17%, the curve to 8%, the change to 7%.
Not coincidentally, he threw 58 of those 75 pitches for strikes, he recorded 18 first-pitch strikes to his 20 batters, he topped out at 98.8 mph in velocity, he allowed only one hard-hit ball, and take a look at this:
BASEBALL SAVANT
Now, take a long look at this:
That, my friends, was the Same Old Mitch only if one's referring way back to spring training, where he had eyes bulging from sockets with every start.
Oh, and about that one hard-hit ball:
Rowdy Tellez does that sort of thing often, but it still wasn't simple. Andrew Knapp had called for a four-seamer on the inside corner, Keller fired away at 96.3 mph and, as Keller would acknowledge to me, "I missed it. It was off the plate." Still, no more than millimeters from where Knapp had set up.
"That's a good pitch," Derek Shelton would say. "It looked like Rowdy was looking for it and got it out front. That's a good pitch that a major-league hitter got to."
Of the overall outing, Shelton would say, "I thought Mitch threw the ball outstanding. It was it was as good as I've seen him pitch."
This is different. And Keller knows it, too:
"Yeah, it feels really good to finally get results," he'd say. "It's been since spring training and, I mean, I feel like I've been throwing the same stuff, with maybe a little bit different sequencing here. But yeah, to finally get the results is very relieving, and just finally got a good one. Now let's roll."
There's no roll that'd matter more this year. Imagine the impact of a front-line starter on this franchise's present and future.
GETTY
The Brewers' Brandon Woodruff pitches to Ke'Bryan Hayes in the first inning Wednesday in Milwaukee.
• Because it's the Pirates, and because this was Milwaukee, there's nothing they could conceivably do that the Brewers wouldn't do better.
So there, naturally, was Brandon Woodruff carrying a no-hitter into the sixth inning -- Daniel Vogelbach broke that up with a single -- and winding up with six scoreless innings, just that one hit, nine strikeouts, a walk ... and a second day of dominance, following reigning Cy Young winner Corbin Burnes' gem the previous night.
In fact, combined with Eric Lauer the night before that, the Milwaukee starters held the Pirates to three runs and 10 hits over 19 innings.
"They pitch well, and we knew that coming in," Shelton said.
It's why the Brewers are seen by many as a contender for the National League pennant.
• It'd be hilarious if the Crew, based in this market that's two-thirds the size of Pittsburgh, somehow beats out the billion-dollar Dodgers. But I wouldn't bet on it. Whatever Los Angeles management needs or even wants, they can just go buy.
• Vogelbach's hit wasn't much. He skied it, basically. But the center fielder, Tyrone Taylor, was a mile back out of respect for Vogelbach's power and had to cover a ton of ground just to get close.
Woodruff shrugged it off.
"Well, I think you can kind of count on him," he'd say of his 2021 teammate. "It seems like, even when he was with us, like he's gonna take the first two pitches or until he gets to two strikes, but then he's so hard to strike out. And he's got such a good eye. You get 0-2, and you've still gotta make good pitches, because he's not gonna leave the zone. And that's credit to him."
Woodruff gave a nod toward Vogelbach after the hit.
"He's a great guy. Miss him."
• Ke'Bryan Hayes pulled the Pirates within two in the eighth with a two-out, two-run single off Devin Williams:
But that'd be it. Yoshi Tsutsugo was frozen by a Williams slider to strand two.
• Tsutsugo was a revelation upon arriving in Pittsburgh late last season, but he's looking a lot more like the player the Dodgers and Rays both gave up in 2020, slashing .194/.326/.520, and still waiting on his first extra-base hit.
“He’s taking good swings right now," Shelton spoke in Tsutsugo's defense. "That slider was painted. He’ll be fine. Just keep taking good swings.”
• Believe it or not, Reynolds hasn't been much better of late, 3 for his past 19 with 10 strikeouts. In this game, Woodruff had him buckling his knees repeatedly.
I asked Shelton if, while he won't exactly worry about Reynolds, something's off.
"Yeah, he looks a little bit off," Shelton replied. "He looks like he's a little bit in swing mode. You know, also, when you have the year he had ... he's getting executed."
Meaning he isn't seeing much to hit.
"Go back and look at the at-bats he had, and he didn't get a lot in the center of the plate. The two I think he got in the center of the plate today, he fouled straight back and took pretty good swings, But yeah, he's not high on my list of worries."
• Horrors, indeed: The Pirates are now 60-119 here since this place opened in 2001, and they've lost 20 of the past 25 since 2019. And I swear, I feel as if I've covered 20 times that amount over these two decades.
• Always finishing with a catch, as the youth coaches say, so here are two quality minutes of talking pitching with Chris Stratton:
Stratton entered this one in the eighth, faced only Hiura and retired him on a ball off the knob of the bat. Third scoreless appearance out of four. Good pitcher. Wholly under-appreciated, maybe more than anyone on the roster.
• Thanks for reading my baseball stuff. And I mean it when I say I've never been happier to be writing baseball.
DEJAN KOVACEVIC / DKPS
A panorama of American Family Field, before the game, from directly behind home plate.
THE ESSENTIALS
• Boxscore
• Live file
• Standings
• Statistics
• Schedule
• Scoreboard
THE HIGHLIGHTS
xxxxxxxx
THE INJURIES
• 10-day injured list: OF Anthony Alford (hand), LHP Sam Howard (back), RHP Duane Underwood (hamstring), RHP Max Kranick (forearm)
• 60-day injured list: OF Greg Allen (hamstring), RHP Blake Cederlind (UCL), RHP Nick Mears (elbow surgery)
THE LINEUPS
Shelton's card:
1. Daniel Vogelbach, DH
2. Brian Reynolds, CF
3. Ke'Bryan Hayes, 3B
4. Yoshi Tsutsugo, 1B
5. Ben Gamel, LF
6. Diego Castillo, 2B
7. Josh VanMeter, 2B
8. Kevin Newman, SS
9. Andrew Knapp, C
And for Counsell's Crew:
1. Kolten Wong, 2B
2. Willy Adames, SS
3. Christian Yelich, LF
4. Rowdy Tellez, 1B
5. Hunter Renfroe, RF
6. Omar Narvaez, C
7. Keston Hiura, DH
8. Jace Peterson, 3B
9. Tyrone Taylor, CF
THE SCHEDULE
The Pirates head down I-94 to Chicago for four with the Cubs, beginning Thursday at 7:40 p.m. Bryse Wilson will face righty Mark Leiter Jr. Alex Stumpf will take the rest of the trip.
THE CONTENT
Visit our team page for everything.
