SEATTLE — Mike Burrows is getting a high quality baseball training each time he steps on the mound.
The Pirates’ rookie right-hander discovered himself in one more tight, low-scoring recreation on Saturday night time at T-Cell Park, and he did his half to proceed the season as a Pittsburgh rotation mainstay.
Burrows tossed 5 scoreless innings and navigated some tough waters in opposition to the Mariners on the shore of Puget Sound. The Pirates would go on to lose the sport, 1-0, however with every begin, Burrows is studying and proving he belongs.
“He threw the changeup very well,” Pirates supervisor Don Kelly mentioned. “The fastball was working. One of many large keys for me was along with his offspeed, when he was in a position to land that curveball early within the depend, particularly. That opened all the things else up, and he had a extremely, actually good outing.”
Burrows regarded like a veteran in key conditions. Within the backside of the third inning, for instance, J.P. Crawford received him for a one-out ground-rule double. However Burrows induced a groundout off the bat of Julio RodrĂguez and didn’t flinch when Kelly elected to deliberately stroll Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh, who leads the Majors with 35 residence runs and hit two in opposition to the Pirates on Friday.
Burrows accepted the problem and struck out cleanup hitter Randy Arozarena wanting.
Arozarena, who hit 5 residence runs within the first 5 video games of this Seattle homestand, couldn’t determine Burrows all night time. The 25-year-old righty, whom the Pirates chosen within the eleventh spherical of the 2018 MLB Draft, punched him out on referred to as third strikes in his first three at-bats. It was a primary for Burrows, who had by no means struck out the identical batter three or extra instances in a recreation.
In the meantime, Burrows couldn’t fairly determine Raleigh, both, however he wasn’t going to supply him something middle-middle. He walked him 3 times, together with the intentional go.
“I do not assume I used to be as mad about [the walks] tonight, as a result of it was two good hitters that would do injury,” Burrows mentioned. “We had been making an attempt to make good pitches in sure counts, so I feel the walks had been OK tonight. There’s only a couple batters I fell behind on early that I did not wish to.”
In the case of shutouts, the Pirates appear to be serving to writer the e book on the topic for the 2025 season. After Saturday night time’s end result, Pittsburgh leads the Majors in getting shut out by opponents with 12. The Bucs have thrown 10 themselves, which ties them with St. Louis for the second-most within the Majors behind San Diego. Which means nearly 1 / 4 of their video games (24.4%) have resulted in shutouts.
The Pirates rank with the 2014 Rays (10-12 report) and 1989 Dodgers (12-10) as the one groups previously half-century to each win and lose 10 or extra shutouts in a season previous to the All-Star break.
This implies they’re pitching fairly properly and will use some extra offensive oomph, however that was robust to return by in opposition to Mariners righty Luis Castillo, who was displaying the shape that has made him a three-time All-Star.
The Pirates went down so as till Spencer Horwitz led off the fourth inning with a single. Their solely different hit was a Horwitz single with two outs within the sixth. They didn’t draw a stroll and struck out eight instances in Castillo’s seven innings, they usually weren’t in a position to get any runners previous first base all recreation.
“Castillo threw the ball properly,” Kelly mentioned. “Whenever you see the two-seamer, the four-seamer, after which he is in a position to combine it up and throw his offspeed in there. He’s a veteran man that saved us off-balance and utilized two fastballs very well in opposition to us.”
As for the Pirates, they intend to maintain grinding and attempt to give their scorching pitching workers some help.
“It’s robust proper now,” Kelly mentioned. “I imply, we hit some balls laborious tonight. However we have to bunch them collectively and proceed to be extra constant in our at-bats.”
