Good Heavens! An Actual Pirates Team!

 

It's so refreshing. Two straight years the Pirates have been basically a front for Paul Skenes's highlight reels and showcases for his agent, and now, finally, there's an actual baseball team to build around Skenes. Actual other ballplayers who can actually play well, and actual depth that can actually keep this team in the conversation for the next few months. Not that I figured it would never happen, but the fact that it hasn't in so long, and now we're here...is just really refreshing. There's actual things to talk about!

Bringing in Brandon Lowe, Jake Mangum, Ryan O'Hearn and Jhostynxon Garcia onto this team is some long-awaited wise thinking from management, cause they've all greatly improved this team's output. Brandon Lowe's having another phenomenal year, with 15 homers and 41 RBIs already. He might make an all-star team at this rate. O'Hearn's hitting .286 with 9 homers and 33 RBIs, doing exactly what they signed him to do. Mangum's a .291 hitter that's also an excellent outfield depth piece. And Garcia, though the team doesn't completely have room for him yet, is a dangerous hitter who, when he has made contact, has done some damage. In addition, Bryan Reynolds is having his best season in a while, with an .805 OPS and 39 RBIs. Spencer Horwitz has an .846 OPS and is still surging. Oneil Cruz can obviously still rake in between the frustration. It's a very full lineup, and one that might only get better as they figure out some of the last few details [like an actual viable catching option, which is weird to say when Henry Davis and Endy Rodriguez were supposed to be so good]. 

And then, right when Paul Skenes gets rocked for a few starts, Braxton Ashcraft is able to step up and take the brunt of the workload effortlessly. He's currently 5-3 with a 3.28 ERA and 86 Ks [more than Skenes!] This is a more human year for Skenes, as his ERA's over 3 and he's getting hit more often than usual, probably the effect of pitching for 2 years straight. The down seasons are gonna happen, just hopefully they're only this and not full burnout. You also have Jared Jones slowly returning to his old self, Bubba Chandler finding the strike zone, Mitch Keller trying to stay consistent and Carmen Mlodzinski all but assuring he'll be dealt in a month and a half. The bullpen's not great but it was a lot worse before. 

Just very refreshing to see a Pirates team this good, and one that's able to soundly beat the Astros, Cubs and Reds. This week they're playing the Dodgers. Considering how well the Braves series went, this could be similarly rough, but Skenes is pitching in one of these games, so maybe they'll keep things rolling.

Coming Tonight: The Yanks had nowhere to play him....but the Angels certainly did. And now they're being rewarded. 

Lugo for Broke

 

The Royals' season was already kinda going down the toilet, despite the amount of talent baked into it. But now, Bobby Witt Jr.'s got right knee soreness and it feels like the whole season could be hinging on it. Remember 2024, where everybody showed up and made this a formidable, varied team with so many different points to hit teams with? Now we're at 'if Witt's gone there's no point'. 

Cause like...when one of the big storylines of the WBC is 'look at Caglianone and Pasquantino go for Team Italy', and then they get back and Pasquatch hits .220 with a .650 OPS and Caglianone takes a month to get going, has a strong May then gets hurt...that's false advertising, man. Every spring for the past four years has been 'look at how well Vinnie Pasquantino's been playing', and then the season starts and he hits .220. He just does this. Mr. February. Right now it's Witt, Cags, Maikel Garcia and surprisingly Michael Massey who are the only people currently doing well in the lineup. Salvador Perez is technically hitting, but he's hitting .204. They're phasing him out of catching more and more, and while Carter Jensen is a slight upgrade, he's been slumping a bit lately. The lineup just doesn't have the forcefulness and depth that it used to, and even the Twins are doing more in that department right now.

As for the rotation...the draw in 2024 was that if you have Cole Ragans up top, then Seth Lugo and Brady Singer, and then Michael Wacha's your fourth man, it's still gonna be difficult. Having the depth of 'here are some young fireballers who can beat you and also here are two 34-year-olds who can also beat you' is how they got far in 2024. Now, Bubic and Ragans are hurt, Marsh is still hurt, Stephen Kolek's out on leave, and the sole lines of defense are Seth Lugo, who's good but not 2024 good, Michael Wacha, who's still very good, and Noah Cameron who's good now but took a while to get there...with the other two days' worth of options being Luinder Avila and a shrug....yeah, that's not deep. They're getting Kolek back tomorrow, that will help. And worse comes to worse they could try Ryan Bergert, if they needed to. But it's much less formidable now. Lugo's still a fundamentally good pitcher, he's got a 3.91 ERA and 64 Ks, but he's getting dangerously close to Chris Bassitt territories of innings-eating. Bullpen isn't great either.

The rumor is that, once Matt Quatraro loses his job this year [how the hell is Oli Marmol gonna out last this guy?], the Royals are gonna try to court Albert Pujols to take over, and that might help things, but...I dunno if this team is a managerial regime away from being fixed. If you keep putting people in position to hit and they don't hit, a new manager can't fix that. Maybe a new GM can, but we don't wanna talk about that yet probably..

Coming Tomorrow- So Paul Skenes has had a rough go of things lately, meaning now was an ideal time for another Pirates pitcher to step up. But then Jared Jones got rocked in his first start back. So it was up to this other guy.

Mead 'Em and Weep

 

2026 has already been a nice year for Australian ballplayers, and so soon after Liam Hendriks sort of trailed off. You've got the frontrunner for AL Rookie of the Year, Travis Bazzana, already taking to the bigs like a fish to water, he grew up in Australia then went to Oregon State. You've got Brandan Bidois, a relief specialist who just came up with the Pirates and has been doing alright for himself [or really just 'better than Justin Lawrence and Mason Montgomery were doing]. And then you've got Curtis Mead, who struggled to find an entryway with Philly, Tampa and the White Sox then was dealt to Washington right before the season started and is now an everyday guy. For a country whose biggest exports to this point were Dave Nilsson and Graeme Lloyd, things seem to be picking up for our friends down under.

Mead is the kind of hitter that the Nationals need right now, because his contact sensibilities click with this team, and he's still got plenty of prime years left. Right now he's got an .829 OPS, 9 homers and 28 RBIs. He's settling in as a corner infielder, primarily playing third but occasionally finding time at 1st. Considering how many sneaky contact guys are already on this team [Daylen Lile, Jacob Young, C.J. Abrams, Luis Garcia], Mead just seemed to arrive at the perfect time. And throwing an Australian journeyman with contact ability in with the people who were part of the plan to begin with is a very Toronto-esque strategy of just going for it. Why not Curtis Mead, especially if he's playing this well.

It's the same mentality that's made Foster Griffin a rotation staple this year, even after all that missed time overseas. It explains why Jorbit Vivas, former Yankee also-ran, is providing some recent utility flair. It's also why the team has been so patient with Zack Littell, after a scary start to the season. His last few starts have been really good, and he's back to allowing only 1 or 2 runs per game, winning his last five starts easily. It's a shame Littell's April was so snakebitten, but the guy who surprised people with the Rays and Reds last year is definitely still in there. 

The Nats know they're probably not a competitor this year, and are just trying to be the best they can given those circumstances. Fortunately, this 'why not' mentality has put them in 3rd place, a game above .500 and with one of the most run-scoring teams in the league. This week they've been chasing the D-Backs, a very good team, and have the Giants to play next. Even if the likelihood of the Nats being sellers is still high, they're doing more with a depleted team than anyone would have thought, and it might even mean that James Wood leading a team to the playoffs might not even be that far away.

Coming Tonight- One of those guys that finds himself after turning 30. The Royals have been loving his stuff.

The Rare Double Catcher Formation

 

The Baltimore Orioles currently have two catchers on their ML roster. Both of them have a 1.5 WAR, and both of them are hitting .273. They're both among the best hitting catchers in the game. One of them is signed til the end of the decade. The other...is former Rookie of the Year runner-up Adley Rutschman. And to make things clear...Rutschman isn't exactly a concession. 

Right now it's clear that Rutschman is gonna get the bulk of the starts at catcher because Samuel Basallo isn't great defensively. But you also can't leave Basallo out of the lineup, because he's hot as hell right now, so you have to DH him and free up any flexibility you might otherwise have. So any chance of having both Coby Mayo and Jackson Holliday in the lineup if they're both fighting for third is probably very small, meaning once again Coby Mayo's gotta try something else if he wants to play everyday. These guys are very lucky that Ryan Mountcastle's already out for a while, because he was already out of a job at 1st and now he's out of a job at DH. 

Thankfully, so much of this lineup is working right now that the overflow isn't an issue. Really only Tyler O'Neill is truly stinking it up out of this bunch, but Colton Cowser's been getting the bulk of the starts anyway and he's heating up. Basallo's .494 SLG is the highest on the team, and he's got 9 homers and 26 RBIs, making this a very confident full season statement from the 21-year-old. It's also nice seeing Rutschman fully taking advantage of his role on the team, as he's landed 36 RBIs in 46 games. Henderson, Ward, Alonso and Leody Taveras surprisingly are all nailing their assignments and making this a fluid, bankable lineup. No wonder they've lapped Toronto, and no wonder they're headed for .500. 

I do still think the rotation's a little shakier than it should be. We all thought Trevor Rogers had found his stuff again but now he's spotty like he used to be, with an ERA over 6 and a 3-6 record. Chris Bassitt's a little cooked as well, despite 4 wins and his usual innings-eating. Baz, Bradish and Brandon Young are a perfectly fine core but nobody's really excelling. Like, Bradish looks better than he has in a few years but his WHIP is up to 1.423. Hopefully somebody has a strong June, cause then I'll be a little surer about their long term chances. The bullpen's great though, Rico Garcia's having himself a year. 

The O's are 8-4 so far against all these division rivals. They swept the Rays, won out over the Sox and are going toe-to-toe with Toronto. Maybe this could be their year after all?

Coming Tomorrow- His name had been coming up a bit recently because the Rays traded Cristopher Sanchez to get him...and then they traded him to Washington before they could even benefit from him as a surprise corner bench weapon.

Hoo Lee Cow

 

Eighteen runs....against the CUBS???

Like, the Cubs aren't even that bad of a team, they've had ebbs and flows like everybody else. PCA will have a terrible snafu in centerfield and then he'll rock a triple or something. Jameson Taillon will bat the lineup around in an inning then have three straight 1-2-3 innings. They're inconsistent, but more on the side of good than bad. And they gave up 18 runs...to the Giants. Who also aren't bad, but really only emerge as a hitting giant occasionally.

So to recap how it all went down; Willy Adames hit 2 homers. Casey Schmitt hit 2 homers. Matt Chapman hit 2 homers. Jung Hoo Lee kept his hitting streak alive with an RBI double. Jonah Cox, who just came up last week, hit his first career home run as a pinch-hitter. The only starter without a hit was catcher Daniel Susac, who's generally been one of their best hitters outside of this game. Even Rafael Devers had 2 hits and an RBI, meaning even HE's getting hot, slowly. The whole lineup came together to rain down on the Cubs IN WRIGLEY. And now they've got two more games there...to see if they can do anything remotely similar.

My skepticism comes from the fact that, despite the team's .260 average, there's so many lapses in this team's formula that has kept them from really emerging. Rafael Devers is the biggest one. Even if he's currently leading the league in doubles with 20, he's still struck out 80 times and only has 7 home runs. The maddening tendencies, like the strikeouts and the poor defense and the attitude, are piling up, and it's become a similar struggle to his Boston days. I also look at Drew Gilbert and Bryce Eldridge, and they still haven't completely broken out a year later. You're seeing signs; Eldridge is hitting .286, but like Devers he has limited uses in the field. Gilbert's hitting .236 without much offensive production to speak of.

Which is why it's very nice that the core of the lineup has woken up in recent weeks, and Willy Adames, Jung Hoo Lee, Matt Chapman, Luis Arraez and Casey Schmitt have solidified some really nice seasons. Lee is hitting .322 with some insane contact perks this month. Schmitt has 13 homers and 35 RBIs and is still surging. Arraez, while not quite at batting title levels yet, is still hitting .325 with 76 hits. There's a lot about this lineup that's finally beginning to click, and just in time for Logan Webb's return as well.

I'm not sure if there's enough here for this team to really get going to extent they did yesterday, but there's more life in there than there was a month ago, and while they're far from reaching the Padres at the moment they're certainly hitting better than the Padres are.

Coming Tonight: They brought him up as a potential longterm catcher, then forgot they already had one. So now they have TWO young catchers hitting like crazy, which isn't the worst thing in the world.

In No Way An Improvement

 Even as someone who dislikes the Astros, I can tell you that the core era of that team subsisted on a well-built youth movement, so many slam dunk prospects, deals made for people in their prime, and a solid backbone that could withstand departures. The 2026 Astros are the result of that era having run its course. And so without the generation that gave us Springer, Bregman, Cole, Valdez, Tucker and Brantley...this is a very okay baseball team. And I think FINALLY...they're done pretending they're not.

Beyond Yordan Alvarez and Christian Walker, pretty much everything on this team is run-of-the-mill. If this was 2018, and they had a player of Isaac Paredes's caliber on a tear, it'd be going a lot better than this. Not that Paredes is playing badly, but...he's a .238 hitter with 8 homers and 28 RBIs. And even then, he's here for his power and all his home runs are pulled. They released a spray chart today, and the man's never launched a single opposite-field home run in his entire career. So they have an okay third baseman having an okay season being okay at the thing he's the best at...like, compare that to what Bregman was doing even in a down year. It's not even close. And somebody like Jake Meyers or Zach Dezenzo or Brice Mathews, doing the best they can but still winding up at replacement level...this is the level of local talent they have now. And compared to what Yordan Alvarez is doing, leading the league in homers and OPS and average and fitting firmly into the MVP conversation upton Judge's injury, it's even more pathetic. You can't run on a Jake Meyers season anymore when it's clear that Yordan Alvarez can lift a pinky and go yard.

The pitching isn't much better, because even the usual failsafes aren't working. They tried the 'let's bring up Jason Alexander' gambit again, and that didn't work this time around. Aside from Spencer Arrighetti, who's wonderful, this team has to trot out Mike Burrows and his 5.66 ERA, Tatsuya Imai and his occasional brilliance flanked by 6 run outings, Peter Lambert who's far too okay to be playing this great a role in this team, and Kai-Wei Teng, who's actually pretty decent but is being stretched out from a prior relief role and hopefully can stay healthy. The team's already lost Hunter Brown, Cristian Javier and Lance McCullers, Ronel Blanco and Hayden Wesneski are gonna be out for longer, and this unit is what they've got. For...what it is I guess it's alright, but this is the most anonymous Astros rotation since Bud Norris and Erik Bedard were the draws. Occasionally it works, but I don't know how sustainable it is, much like how I don't know how sustainable Christian Walker and Christian Vasquez are.

The Astros are firmly under .500, and are in fourth, but they do play the A's this weekend, and the A's rotation might have slightly more weak points. So it might be close. But if things continue at this rate, the Astros might be sellers at the deadline for the first time in nearly a decade, and that's an insane concept to consider.

Coming Tomorrow- A guy who's had a monster hitting streak as of late, and took part in a huge blowout of the Cubs yesterday.

The Cardinals Continue to Baffle Me

 

I think there's probably a connection between whether or not I like a team and whether I can understand when they start doing well. Because I'm very logic-based, I try to imagine that most teams have ebbs and flows in the usual way, and that when a team takes a few years to regroup they'll surface when they really have the right team, or when a team starts losing key players they'll ultimately stop winning games. The Astros and the Cardinals routinely defy this logic, and I believe it's specifically to vex me.

The Cardinals have won only 5 games since May 17th, have to trot Dustin May out there every five days and start Nolan Gorman and Victor Scott daily, and yet they're still 2nd in the NL Central and generally well regarded. This week has been all about the Pirates scoring 10+ runs repeatedly, Chase Burns allowing no runs and PCA getting his groove back and yet here we still are with this Cardinals team ahead of them.

There are elements that work, of course. J.J. Wetherholt, Masyn Winn, Alec Burleson, Ivan Herrera, Jordan Walker and Nathan Church are all having excellent seasons and earning their right to start everyday. Michael McGreevy's having a terrific full season ahead of the rotation, with a 2.98 ERA and a 1.101 WHIP. Riley O'Brien has 15 saves. Nelson Velasquez keeps making contact. Yes, of course all of that is good. I'm so relieved that Jordan Walker can actually perform at the MLB level after all this time. That is valid and good and happening. Beyond that this is a very dull, okay team. 

What is this rotation, even beyond McGreevy. Last year at least they had Sonny Gray and his strikeouts. Now what do they have? Dustin May can strike people out and go deep but he has ZERO wins above replacement and it's June. Matthew Liberatore still cannot get his ERA below 4. Andre Pallante and Kyle Leahy would both be great 5th options on a better team. The idea is for McGreevy to be the Jack Flaherty type young guy the team can rally around, but McGreevy's a very simple, low-strikeout control artist and to me that's not enough to lead with. The Guardians can do that with Messick because they have Gavin Williams and Tanner Bibee already. There's just...no depth, man. Richard Fitts is done for the year, Roby and Hjerpe are hurt, Tink Hence is struggling so bad he's been moved to relief, and they tried Bryson Mautz and he wasn't ready. So we're stuck with these five. Yay. 

The Cardinals could, for all intents and purposes, compete with this team. But literally every other NL Central team has a better rotation than they do. At least the Cubs have Imanaga, I'd take him over McGreevy. I just don't get excited about these guys. If they improve over time, like the Brewers' rotation last year, then great. I just don't see it right now. 

The other teams are circling the Cardinals, and I'm expecting them to drop in the standings a bit. Remains to be seen whether they're still competitors, though part of me thinks they'll persist mainly to spite, and confuse, me.

Coming Tonight: The Tigers gave this guy away and have struggled to fill third base ever since. Astros are doing just fine there though.