The rookies are here, but so are the growing pains in blowout loss

Liover Peguero was so excited to see Nick Gonzales again, he said he was going to kiss his forehead whenever he saw him.

The two infielders were double-play partners the past two seasons, but the duo had been split up ever since spring training. Gonzales advanced to Class AAA Indianapolis to start the year, while Peguero stayed in Class AA Altoona. When Peguero was promoted to Indianapolis, Gonzales had already gotten his call to the majors.

Peguero missed his friend, so he said whenever he saw him, Gonzales was going to get a smooch planted on him.

And Peguero followed through:

"It is Peggy. He will do that," Gonzales joked on the field before Monday's game against the Guardians. "If he says he's going to do it, he's going to do it. I should have taken him serious."

The vibes in the Pirates' clubhouse were immaculate coming into the game. After years of watching a potential core rise through the system, Peguero, Quinn Priester and Endy Rodríguez -- three of the organization's top prospects -- were all called up to the majors the same day. Mix in Gonzales, Henry Davis, Jared Triolo and Carmen Mlodzinski, who were already in the majors, and the Pirates have a young lineup ready to go.

Then came the game. Good vibes were extinguished, at least for the night.

In what had the potential to be one of the more uplifting days in months, the Pirates were thrashed by the Guardians, 11-0, at PNC Park Monday.  

At one point this season, the Pirates were 12 games over .500 (20-8). With the loss, they are now 12 games under .500 (41-53). Also with the loss, they have dropped to a tie for last place in the National League Central with the Cardinals.

And with no one to hide or other options than playing those young players right now, the Pirates need to get better production from those young players or be passed by the Cardinals in the standings. At one point this year, it looked like these young players were going to get their call to bolster a potential run before the playoffs or trade deadline. Now it looks like they're here in preparation of getting ready for 2024 and beyond.

"I mean, that's the way we're going to be moving forward, at least until we get healthy," Derek Shelton said. "We're going to have a lot of young guys on the field and there's going to be growing pains and there's going to be bumps and we just have to grind through them."

Growing pains are expected, especially when the bottom half of the lineup Monday consisted of all rookies, while the rotation also has two rookies (Osvaldo Bido being the other, and almost a third in Johan Oviedo, who is pitching in his first full big-league season).

"I thought we were going to see all of them," Shelton said before the game. "I don’t think we envisioned we were going to see all of them together at the same time.” 

Well, they're here, and they're green.

Rodríguez and Peguero both went hitless in their call up game, with the catcher striking out three times and the shortstop twice. The rookie-half of the lineup (which also included Davis, Triolo and Gonzales) combined to go 2-for-17 with a double and eight strikeouts on the night.

On the pitching side, Priester rolled through three perfect innings to start, getting eight ground ball outs. The second time through the order was bumpier, as he started falling behind in counts, resulting in three runs over the next two innings.

In the sixth, things went sideways. The Guardians would tally on four more runs against him while Priester struggled out of the stretch and got only one more out, with Andrés Giménez delivering the capper on the night. Rodríguez called for a fastball up, but Priester missed low on the target, allowing Giménez to turn on 92 mph heat and line it over the wall in right:

"Definitely need to work on that [the stretch], but there are a lot of things that are really controllable that I’ll be able to fix, get better at and be better the next one out," Priester said.

Priester said that first trip through the order helped give him some confidence to show that he does belong at this level. But as far as a first pitching line goes, seven earned runs over 5 1/3 with two strikeouts, seven hits, two walks and two home runs allowed is less than ideal.

"Ultimately I might have failed a little bit tonight, but those failures are gonna push me to get better," Priester said. "Give me things to work on, and I’ll get better at those things, for sure."

It's only the debut, even if it was far from what they wanted to do out of the gate. There are plenty of emotions that need to get processed through a game like this, like Rodríguez admitting he cried three times on his plane ride to Pittsburgh.

"I’m not a big crier," Rodríguez said before the game. "I can’t talk with anybody in that moment. I can’t express my emotions. I was thinking a lot in my mind. The cry comes, and I said, ‘I hate you. Stop that. You are not like that.’ "

So, come on. Do you really think one game is going to kill their enthusiasm?

"The future is here, man," Rodríguez said postgame. "I know we’re going to do something special with this team. At some point, we’re going to do the best job. I know we have a lot of younger players here and I think we have the talent. We’re going to do something special."

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THE HIGHLIGHTS

THE INJURIES

• 10-day injured list: 2B Ji Hwan Bae (ankle), 3B Ke'Bryan Hayes (lower back)

• 60-day injured list: SS Oneil Cruz (ankle), RHP Wil Crowe (shoulder), RHP JT Brubaker (elbow), LHP Jarlin Garcia (elbow), RHP Max Kranick (elbow), RHP Vince Velasquez (elbow)

THE LINEUPS

Shelton's card:

1. Jack Suwinski, CF
2. Bryan Reynolds, LF
3. Andrew McCutchen, DH
4. Carlos Santana,1B
5. Henry Davis, RF
6. Jared Triolo, 3B
7. Endy Rodríguez, C
8. Nick Gonzales, 2B
9. Liover Peguero, SS

And for Tito Francona's Guardians:

1. Steven Kwan, LF
2. Amed Rosario, SS
3. José Ramírez, 3B
4. Josh Naylor, 1B
5. Andrés Giménez, 2B
6. Josh Bell, DH
7. Will Brennan, CF
8. David Fry, RF
9. Bo Naylor, C

THE SCHEDULE

The middle contest of the three-game set will be Tuesday at 7:05 p.m, where Mitch Keller (9-4, 3.31) will take the bump against Logan Allen (3-2, 3.47). I'll have you covered.

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