WASHINGTON — Sometimes, baseball games just refuse to follow the recipe. The Pirates got an excellent start from Chad Kuhl, were staked to a lead thanks to some timely extra base hits, and handed the ball to the most reliable closer in baseball in Mark Melancon.
Daniel Murphy had other plans, as his solo home run tied the game with two outs and two strikes in the bottom of the ninth inning. That’s when things got weird.
Three hours and nine more innings later, Starling Marte sent an Oliver Perez fastball 430 feet into the left field seats to give the Pirates a 2-1 victory in 18 innings.
With Pirates’ eschewing the usual recipe for victory in favor a long, drawn-out approach, I decided to take a look at the ingredients needed to win in 18 innings.
1 HERO
The Pirates had chances to win it earlier. Eric Fryer was cut down at the plate on a Josh Harrison double in the 16th and the Pirates had men on with no outs in the 17th and 18th, as well. But after Andrew McCutchen’s double play wiped Adam Frazier off the basepaths in the top of the 18th, the situation called for one big swing, and that’s exactly what Marte delivered.
“It was too many innings, we were tired and it was time for a home run,” Marte said through translator Mike Gonzalez.
“He can feel free to do it more often,” joked manager Clint Hurdle. “He took a bunch of hard swings throughout the game. He made really good contact with the ball.”
That’s an understatement, as Marte’s 3 for 7 line included four balls hit at 100 MPH or higher, including the game-winner:
.@Starlingmart made sure this swing put an end to the game. #LetsGoBucshttps://t.co/AVhmgaTu6u
— Pittsburgh Pirates (@Pirates) July 18, 2016
1 STRONG START
If the Pirates are holding auditions for second-half starting pitching spots, Kuhl just nailed his. The rookie right-hander, making his fourth career start, submitted his most complete outing, allowing just one hit over six innings of work and keeping the Nationals off the board.
The only hit Kuhl allowed was a Ben Revere single to centerfield in the first inning, and he cut down the next 14 batters he faced while striking out five. In total, he faced just one batter over the minimum and appeared to be in control throughout his start, a stark contrast from his previous outing a 2.1-inning fiasco in which he allowed seven hits and four runs.
“I just think that I was getting the ball down and was able to locate it,” Kuhl said. “I did a lot of work trying to get over the front side and really get the ball down with some angle and that’s something that I missed my last start.”
What made Kuhl’s success so startling wasn’t just the marked improvement from his last start, but it was the way in which he accomplished it. Noted as a ground-ball pitcher, nine of his outs came via fly balls, compared to just three on the ground.
“From what I can tell, they weren’t line drive outs, for the most part they were flares and stuff like that,” he said. “A couple of them were on changeups, so they got under them and couldn’t do anything with them. I’m not overly concerned with that.”
1 SPARK IN THE LINEUP
The Pirates’ offense could never get fully untracked against Max Scherzer and the Nationals’ bullpen, despite threatening early and often. The Pirates advanced a runner to second base in eight of the 18 innings, but were often unable to capitalize.
The man providing most of that spark was rookie second baseman Adam Frazier, who went 3 for 6 with three doubles, two walks and a run scored. Two of his double came off Scherzer. Frazier continues to look comfortable with the bat at the major-league level and has shown an ability to set the table for the hitters behind him.
“No doubt,” he said. “Pretty much my whole life, I’ve hit first or second. I’m definitely comfortable starting innings and trying to get on base as a leadoff hitter. If you get the leadoff guy on in any inning, it’s huge.”
12 INNINGS OF RELIEF
After having used Neftali Feliz and Tony Watson to bridge the gap from Kuhl to Melancon, Hurdle was left without his best three relievers in extra innings. He first turned to Arquimedes Caminero, who walked the first two batters he saw on eight total pitches. Fortunately, the rest of the staff picked up the slack just fine.
A.J. Schugel got out of Caminero’s jam, Jared Hughes tossed a scoreless 11th and then Juan Nicasio and Jon Niese each went three innings, allowing a combined one hit and striking out six.
“That was a first for me,” Schugel said. “I tried to do the same thing always. I knew I was a ground ball away.”
Melancon had to spend nine innings as possibly the team’s most anxious cheerleader after blowing just his second save of the season.
“Really long,” Melancon described the waiting, but he was buoyed by the outcome. “It was fabulous. Everybody stepped up.”
Niese, who had just moved to the bullpen Friday and was making his second relief appearance of the season, was an unlikely savior, but his three innings of work were indispensable and he calmly finished the 18th after Marte gave him a lead. Niese had a solid vantage point for Marte’s heroics. He was in the on-deck circle, but Nationals manager Dusty Baker couldn’t get the signs in to his pitcher in time to intentionally walk Marte, according to the Washington Post.
“I was excited and got that extra burst of energy and then I realized I had to gather myself to finish the game up,” said Niese, who was the team’s last available pitcher. “That’s the first time I’ve been in that situation. I realized that I was the last guy and I was going to have to go the distance. I was willing to do that and I was prepared to do that. Fortunately, Marte got that big hit.
SOME UGLY STATS
If an entire baseball team plays well, the chances are that they’ll win the game long before it gets to the 18th inning. As a result, a game like Sunday’s is almost definitely going to include some embarrassing stat lines, and the Pirates are no exception.
Andrew McCutchen takes the cake with an 0 for 8 with two strikeouts, but some of his teammates didn’t fare much better. David Freese went 0 for 5 with two strikeouts. John Jaso and Sean Rodriguez were both 0 for 4. Matt Joyce was 0 for 3. Erik Kratz was 1 for 6.
For the vast majority of the Pirates’ hitters, it was a forgettable day at the plate in a memorable game.
“I believe that this is great motivation for the rest of the season,” Marte said. “It shows that we are together, we are here to fight, to fight for a win. It’s just who we are.”
“We didn’t give up,” Kratz echoed. “Everybody wants it, but that’s what it takes to win that game.”
1 WORKHORSE
The game-time temperature at Nationals Park was 87 degrees and the high was 93 with 93 percent humidity. The entire game was played under the full sunshine of the day, and wearing a full set of equipment for all 18 innings was 36-year-old catcher Kratz.
“It was a 2-1 game, so it could have been a lot worse, it could have been 9-8,” shrugged Kratz, who seemed unfazed by the workload. “The pitchers did a good job. We only had two walks. For me, that saves me. Guys aren’t throwing a ton of pitchers, they’re attacking guys.”
Kratz certainly has a strong arm, but even anybody would have be exhausted after throwing 249 pitches back to the mound, right?
“I’ve been in nine-inning games where we get waffled and you’re catching 250 pitches,” he said.
