Pirates Buried By A Nationals Early Bomb

Follow a couple of shaky starts to the season, free agent acquisition and likely flip candidate, Tyler Anderson hit his stride over the next five outings; lowering his ERA to 3.05, his WHIP to 1.04 and his average against to .209, as he pitched an eight inning gem against the Cubs to bring his record on the season even at 3 and 3. At that point most Pirates were overwhelming positive about having a veteran anchor in the rotation, while others were optimistic about the trade return; with even a foolish few speaking about an extension for the lefty starter.

Flash forward to the present day, as Anderson has seen his ERA balloon to 4.89, his WHIP rise to 1.26 and his average against rise to 2.61; capped off by his performance against the Nationals, where a few bloops and a blast put the Pirates down 5 to 0 as the first inning came to close.

Immediately I thought Anderson’s night would be cut short. However, in the end he did what he has always done this season, in good and bad performances, which is last through at least five full innings; and somehow managing to make six in this one. Although he did surrender another run, but it didn’t really matter because of the lack of run support the Pirates offense would provide.

In the seventh Phillip Evans did bring in a run for Pittsburgh on and RBI double, only to have Washington tack on another two in the eighth; to put the Nationals up, for what what would be the final score of 8 to 1.

News and Notes

• Ke’Bryan Hayes’ hitting streak, which stretched back to last season, ends at 19 games.
• Ben Gamel has continued to hit. Over his last seven games he is slashing .429/.467/.786. Obviously, this pace is unsustainable; however, it should at least lead to more regular playing time in the short term.
• Duane Underwood, Jr. hasn’t been great, but he hasn’t been terrible; he has simply reverted back close to the mean of where he has been most of his career. On the season he has a 4.08 ERA, a 1.41 WHIP and 38 strikeouts in 39.2 innings of work.
• The Pirates did manage eight hits against a somewhat efficient Patrick Corbin, with six of them coming from Gamel, Bryan Reynolds and Erik Gonzalez.
• Adam Frazier got the night off, although he did pinch hit, and Colin Moran is still day to day with a tight back, so it was no surprise the offense was a little bit handcuffed in the contest.

The Pirates will look to break their nine game losing streak tomorrow at 4:05 PM EST at Nationals Park, with Chase De Jong (0-0, 4.80 ERA) on the mound against Paolo Espino (0-2, 2.78 ERA).