A starting rotation will ebb and flow over a 162-game season.
At any point, however, when a starter is pounding everything but the strike zone on a nightly basis, that can place unnecessary pressure on even the most potent of offenses.
Vince Velasquez put the Pirates in a hole which they could not climb out of -- and perhaps stepped into the wrong one himself, literally -- as the home opener after the home opener was dropped to the White Sox in a snowballing fashion, 11-5 at PNC Park Saturday night.
"It's frustrating as it is, starting off on a good note and then things just kind of collapsed," Velasquez said. "As frustrating as that is talking about it, and as much as we've been dominating -- we've been in cruise control and we've been playing some good baseball all around, I wanted to come into this series and win it underneath the fireworks. That would've been nice, but it was cut short for me. This is a frustrating feeling, but there's a lot of game left, and I'm pretty excited to turn things around here."
Velasquez pitched to a hyper-efficient first inning, in which he surrendered a single but got out of the frame by throwing 13 pitches and 11 for strikes. Over the next inning and two thirds, however, Velasquez just could not get out of his own way.
He had Oscar Colas at an 0-2 count with a runner on third and two outs in the top of the second, but Colas smoked an opposite-field single into left to score Andrew Vaughn and tie the game at 1, after the Pirates opened the scoring with a double from Andrew McCutchen and a single from Carlos Santana to score him in the bottom of the first.
Velasquez unraveled in the third, surrendering four runs on three hits while walking three before getting the hook from Derek Shelton with two outs. Velasquez rolled his right ankle on a delivery on the seventh straight ball he threw, which prompted Shelton and head athletic trainer Rafael Freitas out of the dugout. Velasquez remained in the game, but surrendered a two-RBI single to Yasmani Grandal and walked Colas before being pulled.
Velasquez had an X-Ray on the ankle, which came back negative.
Some of what he had to say:
"Just kind of the landing," Velasquez said. "Just landing in the wrong hole, and it just seemed like everything was kind of out of whack. I was playing the guessing game with myself on if I could land passively or aggressively, and that just changed up my slot a little bit with all of my pitches, so I was missing arm side, I was pulling everything, so this is not something that I'm proud of. I'm trying to go out there and try to compete as much as I possibly can, but I gave what I can, and unfortunately it just kind of spiraled. Again, that's the frustrating factor, but within the news as far as, X-Rays are fine. Nothing's broken. I'm ready to kind of get back in and see how it feels next bullpen."
This is another blip in a concerning trend in this early portion of the season for the Pirates, now 5-3. Rich Hill, Velasquez, and Sunday's starter, Johan Oviedo, have combined for a 9.43 ERA (22 earned runs in 21 innings) while surrendering 1.86 walks and hits per inning pitched.
Between the second and two-thirds of the third inning he worked on Saturday, Velasquez threw 62 pitches and 33 for strikes.
"Just lack of command after the first," Shelton said. "In the first he came out, he was really sharp, breaking ball was really good, and then he got away from being in the zone so I don't know what specifically led to it but I think that was the challenge we had and then just too many walks, four walks."
Shelton turned to five pitchers Saturday night, Velasquez included, and while Chase De Jong did a relatively nice job of suppressing the damage done by his starter, Rob Zastryzny and Duane Underwood Jr. were tagged for a combined five runs on six hits in 1.2 innings -- on a combined 36 pitches in the sixth and seventh innings.
This, naturally, put a strain on the Pirates' offense. On a night in which Mike Clevinger lasted into the sixth inning, he still gave up four runs on eight hits before the White Sox bullpen contingency of Joe Kelly, Aaron Bummer, Kendall Graveman, and Reynaldo Lopez shut the home team's offense down for 3.2 innings ...
... Except for one swing in the ninth.
A two-out, solo home run from McCutchen skimmed above the Clemente Wall for his first blast as a Pirate since Sept. 26, 2017.
MORE FROM THE GAME
• Vaughn, Gavin Sheets, and Grandal -- the fifth through seventh hitters in Pedro Grifol's lineup -- did a good chunk of the damage offensively for the White Sox. Vaughn scored four runs, singled twice, and walked twice, which led for the three to combine to go 5-for-6 at the plate with six runs scored. Grandal's two-run single in the third off of Velasquez gave the White Sox a 5-1 lead.
• On the date of his 37th birthday, Santana showed poise and how a veteran eye can be nearly unaffected when a game is going the completely opposite direction.
Santana went 3-for-4 with three singles, a walk drawn, and an RBI while hitting cleanup Saturday. Since April 1, he is batting .296 with a double, two homers, five RBIs, and he has drawn four walks compared to his six strikeouts.
"For me, I'm preparing every day, making the best to make it a good game and help out my team he more ways I can," Santana said. "I feel good. Swinging at my pitch, that's why I'm doing good contact the las couple of games."
Said Shelton: "This guy is a professional hitter. He knows what he's doing. The factor. The consistency of his at bats are always good but we're seeing him start to take really good swings."
• The bright spot from the Pirates' pitching staff from Saturday was Rule 5 reliever Jose Hernandez. He tossed two perfect innings on 21 pitches and 15 for strikes. In 3.1 innings this season, Hernandez has allowed one hit and has struck out three on 40 pitches and 31 for strikes.
"Really sharp," Shelton said. "Slider was really good. Fastball execution and velocity was really good and for what his third outing to go through that lineup with 20-21 pitches, that was impressive and that was definitely a highlight of the inning."
• Austin Hedges caught a bullpen session and hit in the cage Saturday and, per Shelton, "is trending in the right direction" after being placed on the 7-day concussion list Tuesday. Hedges has not recorded a hit and has walked once in nine plate appearances for the Pirates after signing as a free agent over the offseason.
"His vibrance -- if that's the right word -- has been outstanding," Shelton said pregame. "I mean, for a guy that's had a concussion, every day he gets better and he's more engaged. He's trending in the right direction. Again, with all of this it's how you are the next day, so we really have to monitor -- OK, he did this today, what's he going to do tomorrow? Tomorrow's going to be a day that's earlier in the day. It's a day game so then how is he going to be there? We just have to be mindful of that."
• Elsewhere on the injury front, Class AAA Indianapolis starter Mike Burrows left Saturday's game with an apparent injury after 1.2 innings. Manager Miguel Perez and an athletic trainer came out to check on Burrows before he was subsequently taken out. Burrows gave up a solo homer to his final batter before being pulled.
Shelton said prior to Saturday's game in Pittsburgh that he had learned of the injury, but specifics were still to be determined.
“Too soon to tell," Shelton said. "I just found out about it about 10 minutes ago.”
Burrows is the Pirates' No. 9 prospect, according to MLB Pipeline.
THE ESSENTIALS
• Boxscore
• Live file
• Standings
• Statistics
• Schedule
• Scoreboard
THE HIGHLIGHTS
THE INJURIES
• 7-day concussion injured list: C Austin Hedges
• 15-day injured list: RHP Robert Stephenson (elbow)
• 60-day injured list: RHP JT Brubaker (elbow), LHP Jarlin Garcia (elbow)
THE LINEUPS
Shelton's card:
1. Oneil Cruz, SS
2. Bryan Reynolds, LF
3. Andrew McCutchen, RF
4. Carlos Santana, 1B
5. Ji-Man Choi, DH
6. Ke'Bryan Hayes, 3B
7. Ji Hwan Bae, CF
8. Rodolfo Castro, 2B
9. Jason Delay, C
And for Grifol's White Sox:
1. Tim Anderson, SS
2. Luis Robert Jr., CF
3. Andrew Benintendi, LF
4. Yoan Moncada, 3B
5. Andrew Vaughn, 1B
6. Gavin Sheets, DH
7. Yasmani Grandal, C
8. Oscar Colas, RF
9. Elvis Andrus, 2B
THE SCHEDULE
The halfway mark of the Pirates' opening homestand and the series rubber match against the White Sox is Sunday, 1:35 p.m. Oviedo (0-0, 7.71 ERA) will face righty Michael Kopech (0-1, 13.50).
THE MULTIMEDIA
THE CONTENT
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