Pirates Put An Exclamation Point On Their 100 Loss Season

10-1-21 By Craig W. Toth (aka @bucsbasement on Twitter)

Last night versus a dismantled Chicago Cubs lineup-one without Javier Baez, Anthony Rizzo and Kris Bryant-the Pittsburgh Pirates lost their 100th game in the 2021 season; the 9th of its kind in their 140 year franchise history, and the first since 2010. Now, it’s not like we as Pirates Fans didn’t see this coming, at least the possibility of it; even if we didn’t actually predict it.

Prior to the start of the season I wrote down 63-99 as my record prediction for your Pittsburgh Pirates, but only because I didn’t want to see the number 100 in black and white. There was always a chance that this was going to happen. With the departure of Joe Musgrove, Josh Bell and Jameson Taillon in the off-season, and the almost certain trade of Adam Frazier during the season-which obviously came to fruition-this season alway had the potential of putting another stamp in the history books.

What Pirates Fans didn’t see coming was a Ke’Bryan Hayes stint on the IL from the beginning of April-only two games into the season-until June 3rd; or Colin Moran missing two full months of the season as well with a groin injury, followed by a broken pisiform bone after being hit on the hand.

Compound that with injuries to Travis Swaggerty, Roansy Contreras, Oneil Cruz and last night’s starter Miguel Yajure, and you have no real chance of providing prospective support to the Major League Roster. Hence, the continual waiver wire watch by Ben Cherington and Company.

It has been a bad season, and overall this is a very bad team. There is absolutely no denying this. However, just remember that the ones that were predicting 120 losses, will be just a close to actual number of wins and losses as the optimistic Pirates Fans that were hopeful in their anticipation of a 75 win season. And, in all honesty do any of us really come out on top in this scenario? In between arguments of real fans and fanboys? The answer is no. We are all Pittsburgh Pirates Fans, and honestly it totally sucks that our team just lost 100 games. Let’s just focus on that.

News and Notes

• Miguel Yajure wasn’t himself last night. He was missing about 4 to 5 mph on most of his pitches, which ultimately and unfortunately led to batting practice for the Cubs during he first two innings. Still, as I mentioned earlier, I would point more towards the two and half months on the IL with right forearm and elbow discomfort, than the assertions by some on Pirates Social Media that he just plain sucks, or in a couple cases calling for a DFA; which is a term that I am now convinced, most don’t truly understand. However, once again there is no denying that Yajure’s line of 2IP/7H/7ER/2BB/1K/2HR sucked.
• Former Pirates Draft Pick, Tanner Anderson was called up in the long relief role, and pitched 5 innings for only the second time this entire season. The Cubs got to Anderson in the top of the 5th for two more runs, with the game already way out of reach by that point.
• Cole Tucker’s road trip hot streak has cooled off significantly. He is 3 for his last 19, and is hitting .238 for the month of September.
• Anthony Alford is back to striking out 50% of the time over his last 7 games, but is still holding strong at .265 over his last 24. And, Yoshi Tsutsugo is now on a 4 for 26 streak, with only one home run over his last 21 games. He struck out 3 times in 4 at bats last night.
• Bryan Reynolds is currently batting .298 with a .902 OPS and 24 homers. Please Baseball Gods can you just give Pirates Fans something this year? .300+, .900+ and 25 home runs is all we are asking for.

The Pirates begin their final series of the year against the Cincinnati Reds tonight, with Wil Crowe (4-8, 5.77 ERA) on the mound and yours truly in attendance.

For Cincinnati, Luis Castillo (8-16, 4.05 ERA) will toe the rubber.

Welcome to Buctober!