Kovacevic: The time's now to support Skenes, Jones, this entire rotation

DETROIT -- I mean, do something.

Like, anything?

Look, this isn't specific to the Pirates' doubleheader split with the Tigers on this cloudy Wednesday at Comerica Park, an 8-0 loss in Game 1 and a 10-2 bounceback in Game 2. And it certainly isn't specific to either of their twin wunderkind pitchers, Paul Skenes and Jared Jones, the former having fared well in the nightcap with a six-inning line of two runs, three hits, nine strikeouts and a walk, after the latter faced his first flawed start with a 4 1/3-inning line of seven runs, five earned, five hits, two strikeouts and two walks.

No, I'm thinking bigger. I'm thinking ... about how many of Major League Baseball's 30 teams are blessed at his pivotal position to this degree.

"Not many," Mitch Keller, very much in that same category of pitchers, would reply afterward when I brought it up. "Everyone's doing their part and going out there and competing really well. It's a fun competition between all of us, trying to be the best one. It's a lot of fun. And yeah, absolutely, I don't think many teams in baseball have what we have and what potential we even further have."

Yeah, that. I'm thinking that.

But I'm also thinking this: Can anyone at any level of the organization summon up any sense of the responsibility inherent in having not one but two young talents of this scope, plus a peak-of-his-career Keller, plus Bailey Falter as one of the sport's most prominent surprises this season, in the same rotation?

Seriously, can anyone at any level of the organization summon up so much as a semblance of the urgency that, anywhere else, would accompany a rotation that's logged 315 innings, fifth-most of any team in the majors, and registered quality starts in half -- 28 in 56 -- of their team's games?

Or, to really lay this out, how about acquiring a big-league or even big-time -- bat?

See, it's like this: Ever since that 9-3 start, these Pirates have won more than two in a row once, and that was a whopping three-game streak May 4-6 against the Rockies and Angels. That's it. They haven't swept anyone, they haven't sustained anything and, as a result, they're still stuck treadmilling through a 26-30 record.

The rotation's supposed to be the hardest part to acquire, right?

Especially when spending among the least, right?

So ... urgency?

Over the past weekend at PNC Park in meeting with media, Ben Cherington would muse of his team's status, “I really do believe that, maybe different than some years in the past that I’ve been here, the solution's here. I think we have the guys here to do it. We've just got to find those answers, get to more of a level of consistency. It’s just been a little bit one step up, one step back. We need to get past that.”

How? By waiting? By hoping?

Once more: Where's the urgency?

“We feel urgency," he'd say to that subject. "I think we have to feel urgency. This is the big leagues. “We're further along than we were three years ago. We all feel a sense of urgency. And I think the best way to channel that urgency is into improvement. Let’s just keep getting better because, with where we’re at, if we keep getting better day to day and month to month, then it’s going to add up to contention as soon as it can. I think there’s urgency, but we feel like what we can do with that urgency is focus on getting better.”

Say what?

Here, let me give some of that a translation try: Having to feel urgency because this is the big leagues means ... urgency comes from some external source? Being further along than they were three years ago means ... being further along than they were in the first full season of a rebuild? It's going to add up to contention as soon as it can means ... it'll get there when it gets there?

Go ahead, tell me I'm out of line. But tell me where. Tell me how.

More pointed, tell me what anyone anywhere could conceivably see related to this operation as a whole that'd convey urgency.

Hello?

I'll pound this point from now until there's either urgency or a change in management that brings urgency: The rebuild's over. It was over the moment Skenes climbed a mound inside our city limits. It was arguably over as soon as Jones made his own ascent in April, since it's not as if Skenes was about to sneak up on anyone.

Sure, it's been fun to see beyond beautiful to see Andrew McCutchen still asserting himself as this team's premier hitter at age 37:

That three-run home run in the third inning of Game 2 was part of a 3-for-4, four-RBI output and, rewinding back a bit, part of a 18-for-56, five-home-run heater spanning the past 16 games.

"Everything's just going right," he'd tell me after this. "The process is there every time I'm up, and I'm just following through."

It's been fun, too, to see Nick Gonzales show up the way a No. 7 overall pick should:

He's slashing .313/.375/.547 with three home runs and 16 RBIs since his promotion from Class AAA Indianapolis and, best of all given previous plunges, he's whiffing way less often, in terms of both individual pitches and strikeouts.

I asked him why that is, he smiled, shrugged and replied, "I have no idea. I'm just hitting, and I'm happy."

He's not alone. A half-decade deep, provided he keeps it up, it'd be about damned time a young hitter was delivered by this front office.

But let's not pretend this is enough. Even if Bryan Reynolds and Ke'Bryan Hayes revert to career norms, even if Oneil Cruz were to catapult the way everyone continues to expect, what's in-house won't carry this offense anywhere close to competing, much less contending in the Central Division. It just won't. Not when the roster's still lugging around the likes of Rowdy Tellez, 10 for his past 78, and Michael A. Taylor, 10 for his past 73, and Alika Williams, 13 for his 62, or Jared Triolo, 15 for his past 82.

This could get good. And I couldn't be convinced it'd take much. There isn't much hitting in the pipeline, unsurprisingly, but there appears to be more pitching, which is only the industry's most precious commodity. If 60-80 percent of the Pittsburgh rotation's booked for the next few years, one or more prospects could easily be deemed expendable, no matter how distasteful it might feel in the moment. And if that prospect brings a bona fide bat, one that Derek Shelton could slot into the middle of the order -- you know, where Shelton's been placing Edward Olivares of late -- then the order makes more sense and, optimally, more runs.

Know who does want to win?

Those pitchers do. I've experienced that with Keller for years, and I'm seeing it now with Skenes and Jones, as well.

I asked Skenes after this how much it meant to him to have the start he did after how sour Game 1 had gone for his teammates.

"It's everything," he'd tell me. "It's why you pitch. It's why you compete. All of us wanted to come away with this one."

Yep: 

And Jones ... I didn't even have to ask. Following Game 1, which he correctly called "the first really bad start I've had since I've been up here," he was borderline sullen and barely audible. But after this, he had one of the broadest smiles of anyone in the clubhouse, as if he'd just rebounded himself rather than his buddy Skenes.

That's really cool, both on and off the field. I haven't covered many youngsters who'd react that way.

Get with it, or get gone.

• Thanks for reading my baseball coverage. Headed home.