Even the best-in-baseball Royals couldn’t stop the surging Pirates, who climbed above .500 for the first time since opening day with a 2-1 victory over Kansas City on Tuesday at PNC Park.
The win followed a familiar formula, too. Solid starting pitching. An opportunistic offense. And another lights-out effort from the bullpen.
After a six-game losing streak, Pittsburgh has won four of five, six of eight and nine of 13. The Pirates (12-11) are 11-5 since that disastrous, early stretch that made the season feel lost.
As if their recent play hasn’t been impressive enough, the Pirates’ win Tuesday came against a Royals team that boasted the best winning percentage (14-7, .667) in baseball, the result of Kansas City winning 10 of its last 13.
The decisive run came in the seventh inning, and it came in typical Pirates fashion — in that they earned that run through aggressive baserunning and timely hitting.
Jacob Stallings took a 2-0 fastball to right for a leadoff single. A Gregory Polanco strikeout followed. The key play involved the Pirates utilizing the hit-and-run to avoid a potential double play and help their catcher reach third base on Kevin Newman’s single.
Pirates pinch-hitters have been effective this season, and Wilmer Difo produced a bloop single that scored Stallings and upped his average in those spots to .333 (4-for-12).
The lead was no issue for the Pirates. After Duane Underwood Jr. relieved Tyler Anderson, Sam Howard and Richard Rodriguez pitched the eighth and ninth to polish off the win.
What the Pirates bullpen has done over the past handful of games has been ridiculous. Since April 13 (13 games), Pittsburgh has allowed just five earned runs in 46⅓ innings, which works out to a 0.97 ERA. It is also 5-0 during that stretch.
They couldn’t have got there, of course, without a terrific start from Tyler Anderson, who has been an absolutely outstanding offseason pickup. Tuesday was arguably his best start of the season, as he became the fourth Pirates starter to complete six innings in 2021.
Anderson allowed one earned run over six on three hits and a pair of walks. The left-hander struck out five and lowered his ERA this season to 3.38.
In five starts, Anderson has not gone fewer than five innings or allowed more than three earned runs. In fact, he has a 2.20 ERA over his past three starts, striking out 14 and only walking six. Anderson finished strong in this one, allowing just a single and a walk over the final three innings.
How Anderson kept the Royals’ bats at bay was also interesting. Despite throwing his four-seamer and cutter a combined 65.2% of the time this season, Anderson used those two offerings less than half (45%) of the time against Kansas City.
In their place, Anderson went to his changeup 38%, up from its season usage of 25.2%. It was similar for his sinker, which went from 8.7% on the season to 17% against Kansas City.
What kept Anderson from earning the win was a terrific performance from Royals starter Jakob Junis. Kansas City’s starting pitchers just completed a sweep of the Tigers, in which that group pitched to 1.90 ERA. It looked like it from the success that Junis had, keeping the Pirates without an extra-base hit and throwing a terrific cutter 40% of the time — also well above his season average for the pitch.
Playing solid, fundamental baseball has been an important part of the Pirates’ turnaround, and that idea was how they took a 1-0 lead in the first inning. Meanwhile, the lack of it was how the Royals fell behind.
It started with a two-out walk to Bryan Reynolds, who took second on a wild pitch. Colin Moran smacked an inside fastball to center, and the throw home was off the mark, allowing Reynolds to score. Moran, who leads all of MLB with 16 RBIs from the cleanup spot, made a smart play by moving into scoring position on the throw.
The single helped Moran reach base for the sixth time in the past eight games, in which he has compiled eight RBIs. The Pirates first baseman finished with three hits.
After a couple of quick innings from Anderson, the Royals tied the score, 1-1, in the third, taking advantage of a leadoff walk.
Shortstop Nicky Lopez reached and moved to second on a sacrifice bunt. He reached third on second baseman Whit Merrifield’s groundout to second and scored when first baseman Carlos Santana chopped one down the third-base line.
Erik Gonzalez made a valiant effort, but his long, jumping throw was a little too late and wild to nail Santana, who came into the game hitting .333 with a 1.133 OPS and 10 RBIs in his previous nine games.
