On June 15, the Pittsburgh Pirates got blown out to the Athletics 11-2 on the road. The pitching struggled in that game with Jared Jones allowing eight hits and five runs. Carmen Moldozinski also struggled, allowing seven hits and six runs.
The big loss now drops the Pirates to 36-37 on the season which marks the first time they have been below .500 since March 31 when they lost to the New York Mets. The Bucs have now also lost eight of their past 10 games.
The Bucs have been on an absolute free fall
since June going 4-9. A big reason because of that has been the pitching which has really struggled of late. Paul Skenes is having a shaky year to his standards. Some of his starts he looks like the Cy young pitcher we know, but there are other starts where he looks off his game.
Mitch Keller has an ERA of 5.14 and has allowed at least five earned runs in the last three starts. Bubba Chandler has also struggled of late for the Bucs with just a 2-7 record and a 4.76 ERA.
The offense has also been struggling, especially in the last four games. The Pirates haven’t scored more than three runs in the last four games, which resulted in a three-game sweep to the Miami Marlins.
The Pirates were in a wild card spot exactly a week ago, but they now find themselves two games out of the wild card. The team is also now in fourth place in the NL Central, being 5.5 games behind the Cardinals for second place and two games behind the Chicago Cubs for third place. The Milwaukee Brewers lead the division by 4.5 games with a 43-26 record.
The Pirates started off so hot to start the season, but it is safe to say that they have been wildly disappointing in the last couple of weeks. The Buccos need to play better and gain some momentum before the All-Star break, but if they can’t do that, then the playoff drought will continue in Pittsburgh.
