Rocky 7th inning has Pirates back to seeking bullpen solutions

PITTSBURGH -- The Pirates' bullpen showcased 12 straight innings without allowing a run. Then Wednesday night’s seventh inning at PNC Park delivered a reality check.

Across 34 combined pitches from Yohan Ramírez and Justin Lawrence in the frame, Pittsburgh allowed six runs to flip a tie game into a gaudy deficit. The Pirates went on to fall to the Cubs, 10-4, breaking a three-game winning streak.

Pittsburgh’s bullpen now has a combined 4.13 ERA, ranking 11th in the National League.

“It is a challenge,” Pirates manager Don Kelly said of finding the right combinations in middle relief. “There's going to be opportunity. There's gonna be opportunity for guys to step up in situations that they get the ball in the sixth, seventh, eighth inning, and we need those guys to step up and get some outs.”

With Pittsburgh and Chicago entering the seventh inning tied at 4, Ramírez remained in the game after working out of a jam with just two pitches in the sixth. But the right-hander quickly ran into trouble to open the next frame, hitting Michael Busch with a pitch and allowing a double from Alex Bregman. Up came Ian Happ, who already drove in two runs earlier on a first-inning single.

The Pittsburgh native knocked a sweeper right around the right-field foul pole for a three-run homer.

“They got the first two guys on, and then Happ has killed us,” Kelly said.

Seiya Suzuki singled in the next at-bat and Ramírez’s day was done. Ramírez, who keeps batters off balance and who entered allowing an average exit velocity of 84.5 mph that sits in the top 97th percentile in baseball, saw his ERA rise to 4.75 this year and 10.13 in May.

Lawrence entered in relief, pitching for the first time in five days, and Chicago instantly pounced. Michael Conforto hammered the first pitch from Lawrence over the fence to make it a five-run game. Lawrence couldn’t bounce back from there, allowing three more baserunners and another run before Bregman lined out to end the frame.

For a few days, Pittsburgh seemed to be turning a corner in the area that has plagued the club early in 2026.

Rookie Wilber Dotel added stability in a bulk role, even earning a win on Monday to open the series against the Cubs after three scoreless frames. Gregory Soto tallied two clean saves on Sunday and Monday. With the game out of reach on Tuesday, Brandan Bidois and Dennis Santana worked without many hiccups.

Left-hander Evan Sisk held his ground to keep the game tied at 4 on Wednesday in the sixth. But in the seventh, it all came crashing down. Kelly said postgame he thought about going to left-hander Mason Montgomery to face the switch-hitting Happ, but after the game-breaking home run, Montgomery sat down.

While Soto has grown more reliable in the back end of the bullpen, the middle innings are a place Pittsburgh can rely on its depth. Kelly said before Wednesday’s game that the Pirates thought about a six-man rotation, but he decided against it due to the concept reducing the number of relievers they’d have. Jared Jones could return from surgery on his right UCL this homestand and would be in line to start Friday based on his latest rehab start coming this past Saturday.

With a piece of the rotation moving to middle relief, Kelly and Co. would fill a void. If Wednesday’s seventh inning showed anything, it’s that Pittsburgh needs an answer to its problem sooner rather than later.

“[We’re] talking through everything,” Kelly said, “and trying to figure out what's best for the team and finding a way to put ourselves in a position in both the rotation and in the bullpen to help us win as many games as we can. That is what we're going after.”