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Wednesday, August 26, 2020

Kevin Gorman's Take 5: Pirates knew they were in danger of being no-hit by Lucas Giolito - TribLIVE

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With the way Lucas Giolito was showing command of his pitches and mixing his fastball and changeup, Derek Shelton knew by the fourth or fifth inning that “it was the best stuff I’ve seen him have.”

The Pittsburgh Pirates manager saw plenty of Giolito the past two seasons in the AL Central, where Shelton was bench coach for the Minnesota Twins. Shelton watched Giolito develop into an All-Star last season, when the Chicago White Sox right-hander went 14-9 with a 3.41 ERA with three complete games and two shutouts.

So he knew the Pittsburgh Pirates were in big trouble.

Giolito threw the first no-hitter of MLB’s shortened season Tuesday night in a 4-0 victory over the Pirates in a dominant performance.

Giolito got the Pirates on 30 swings and misses, recorded 13 strikeouts for the second consecutive game and did it while throwing 74 of his 101 pitches for strikes.

“When guys throw no-hitters, there’s a couple things that have to happen,” Shelton said. “No. 1, you have to have elite stuff that day. No. 2, there has to be one or two plays.”

Shelton cited several plays: White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson made one, throwing across his body to beat Bryan Reynolds to the bag on a grounder in the seventh. First baseman Jose Abreu made one on a line drive by Erik Gonzalez in the sixth. Third baseman Yoan Moncada caught a Josh Bell line drive in a defensive shift. And right fielder Adam Engel robbed Gonzalez with a shoestring catch for the final out.

“When things like that happen, you know things are going their way that night,” Shelton said. “It’s a total credit to Giolito, to (catcher James) McCann. They did an unbelievable job keeping us off-balance, and the pitch mix was tremendous.”

1. Almost perfect: Giolito allowed only one baserunner, as Gonzalez drew a leadoff walk in the fourth inning. It was the first walk for Gonzalez this season, as he’d been either hit or miss with 18 hits and 14 strikeouts in 66 at-bats coming into the game.

Gonzalez drew a four-pitch walk, his first of the season.

“He missed a couple pitches,” Gonzalez said. “He threw me a changeup, too, but he missed. I was looking for it a little bit up, and he threw me down. When I got to 3-0, I was thinking, ‘I want to wait for one strike.’ He walked me.”

2. In a pinch: Shelton said before the game that Colin Moran and Kevin Newman were active and available, even though neither were in the lineup against the White Sox after leaving Sunday’s game against Milwaukee with injuries.

Yet Shelton didn’t use either as a pinch hitter in the ninth, when the Pirates had center fielder Jarrod Dyson (.167) and catcher John Ryan Murphy (.182) due up. Instead, Shelton let Dyson bat and used Jose Osuna (.133) pinch-hit for Murphy.

Dyson struck out and Osuna popped up to right.

Moran would have made more sense. Not only is he a left-handed bat but he has a history of breaking up a no-hitter as a pinch-hitter.

Moran broke up Michael Wacha’s bid with a leadoff single to right field in the ninth inning of a 5-0 loss to the St. Louis Cardinals on June 3, 2018, at Busch Stadium.

“If it could have been a closer situation, we could have done something like that,” Shelton said, “but we hit Osuna to try to give him a different look, somebody he probably hadn’t prepared for. With his stuff tonight, I just think (Giolito) was really good.”

3. Base on Brault: On the flip side, Steven Brault struggled for the first time as a starter this season. The White Sox slashed .305/.375/.619 against left-handers this season, so that’s not a surprise.

Brault hadn’t given up an earned run in any of his first four starts, but it was a bad sign when he walked Anderson and Abreu in the first before getting out of the jam.

In the second, Brault allowed a Luis Robert single, hit McCann with a pitch and walked Danny Mednick to load the bases. Whether Brault hit McCann or the knob of his bat came into question but the call stood after a review.

“I haven’t seen a replay of it. It sounded like it went ka-toink, but it can still hit hand and bat at the same time,” Brault said. “It’s unfortunate, but it was 0-2. That’s a bad pitch. It’s whatever. That’s not something I can complain about after I walked everybody else. So it’s fine.”

Brault allowed four runs on five hits and four walks without a strikeout, a stark contrast to the performance by Giolito. Brault said his new delivery was “a little bit long” and “a little bit sideways,” which took away some of his “natural athleticism.”

“The truth is, the hits that I gave up, other than the double to (Edwin) Encarnacion, were not hit particularly well and were not a good launch angle,” Brault said, referring to the leadoff double in the third. “I’m kind of just going to go away with that. If you don’t walk the people, then those little singles don’t matter.”

4. Nick of time: Giolito’s no-hitter certainly overshadowed a strong Pirates debut by reliever Nick Tropeano, a right-hander who was claimed off waivers from the New York Yankees on Aug. 11.

Pitching coach Oscar Marin told Tropeano that the Pirates would use him if they got into trouble early. Tropeano pitched four innings, allowing three hits and no walks with four strikeouts.

“I’m here to pick up the team in any way,” Tropeano said. “They wanted me to go a little long today. I felt pretty good. I was just trying to get ahead of all the hitters, with first-pitch strikes, using all my pitches and try to put them away when I can.”

5. On the bright side: There wasn’t much the Pirates could say about Giolito’s no-hitter, othan than to try to brush off the loss by noting that they play the White Sox again Wednesday at 2:10 p.m.

“I think that you kind of just have to take it that, the truth is – no hits, 10 hits – a loss is a loss,” Brault said. “You can only lose once every game, right? That’s one loss. Tomorrow Trevor’s going to come out and dominate them, then we’ll score some runs and we’ll win. That’s how it works. That’s the beauty of baseball. You can get beat one day then come back tomorrow and beat them.”

Only one problem: Trevor Williams (1-4, 3.70) faces a former Cy Young winner in left-hander Dallas Keuchel (4-2, 2.65), who gave up one run on six hits and one walk in eight innings in a 4-2 win over the Chicago Cubs on Aug. 21 in his last outing.

Williams lasted only four innings in a 2-0 loss to the Cleveland Indians but believes he’s up to the challenge of facing Keuchel.

“I think it’s fun,” Williams said. “It’s something that when you wake up in the morning, you have a little more of a challenge where I’m going up against a former Cy Young winner, and the name of the game as a starting pitcher is you’re doing your best to out-execute the other starting pitcher. If we each have 100 pitches, I’m trying to execute one more or two more or three more than the other guy and give my team the best chance to win. Those matchups are always fun. Really any big league pitcher is fun, but when they have a Cy Young next to their name as well, it’s fun to do that.”

Kevin Gorman is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Kevin by email at kgorman@triblive.com or via Twitter .

Categories: Pirates/MLB | Sports

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