The Pirates’ offense was slow to get going in Friday’s series opener at Wrigley Field, and the Cubs were able to down the visitors with what felt like death by a thousand cuts.
On a windy day in the Windy City, Trevor Cahill allowed eight singles and no extra-base hits, but that was enough slack to let the Cubs jump ahead early and send the Pirates to a 3-2 loss, their seventh defeat in the past eight games.
On paper, the Pirates’ bats had a favorable draw. The last time Pittsburgh faced Zach Davies, the offense chased him after 1 2/3 innings with seven runs in tow. The Chicago righty, who topped out at 89.6 mph on Friday, entered the game with an 8.22 ERA, but his history paints a different picture.
“He traditionally is a strike-thrower,” Pirates catcher Jacob Stallings said. “With a guy like him, you can't just assume that he's going to come in and walk people. … I prepare for when they're on, and if he was a little erratic today, hopefully I don't swing at the balls.”
Davies was more of the former than the latter on Friday. The Pirates mustered only five hits against him in seven innings, all of which were singles.
Few of those hits came early: one of the two Davies gave up through five innings was a bunt single by Cahill, his first hit since June 3, 2019. Having played with the Cubs in 2015-16, he knew how first baseman Anthony Rizzo would crash hard, and he adjusted on his final attempt.
But it turned out to be one of a few frustrating innings for the Pirates. Cahill's bunt hit gave the top of the order two on with one out, but Adam Frazier flied out and Bryan Reynolds grounded out.
Two of the Bucs’ hits set the team up with a pair of runners on and no outs in the seventh inning, followed by a walk to load the bases. However, Davies induced a couple of weak grounders for a forceout at home and a 1-2-3 double play to escape the threat.
“I think that’s where I succeed the most, is when you have off-balance swings and guys aren’t putting the barrel on the ball as much,” Davies said.
“[It was] extremely costly,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said of the seventh inning. “Obviously, the game ends 3-2, and we had another opportunity in the seventh and just didn't capitalize. It’s unfortunate with how it was.”
The Pirates were able to scratch two runs across in the ninth. Jacob Stallings launched a ball off the grass in right-center field and over the wall for a ground-rule double -- the first extra-base hit by either team -- to put runners on second and third. Todd Frazier plated Pittsburgh’s first run on a groundout, and Ka’ai Tom drove a two-out RBI single.
But after the Pirates loaded the bases on a blooper by Wilmer Difo and a hit by pitch on Adam Frazier, Reynolds popped out to end the game.
Cahill did plenty to keep the Pirates in the game, though it took some adjusting after early runs in what the veteran righty described as an “old-school” game of well-placed singles. Though Cahill has struggled in the first inning this season, allowing 12 runs in that frame, the one against him on Friday was unearned on a missed catch by Phillip Evans.
“If [the game plan] is not working that day, I have other options, other weapons to choose from,” Cahill said. “And if those options are working that day, just throw until they make an adjustment. I think that kind of helped me get through that first inning.”
Michael Feliz threw two scoreless innings in his return from the injured list, and Luis Oviedo pitched a perfect eighth after he worked his way back into game action recently.
However, the way the Pirates have swung the bat recently, it will take an exceptional amount of scoreless innings to find wins. Over their past five games, the offense has scored only six runs. Pittsburgh scored 28 runs across a six-game span before that.
To get out of a 1-7 stretch over their past eight games, the offense is going to need to find a way to win games the way the Cubs did on Friday: Scratching across runs with more consistent timely hitting.
“We just have to capitalize on run-scoring opportunities,” Shelton said, “and today, we had those and didn't capitalize.”