I suppose there are a lot of things that we could focus on with this win, but Gerrit Cole’s third inning is what sticks in my memory. Cole loaded up the bases in the first before escaping with a flyout, then gave up two runs in the second that immediately erased the Pirates’ early 2-0 lead. In the third, he got ahead of Adam Lind 0-2, then after Lind worked the count a bit and fouled some balls off, got him swinging on a 98 mph fastball. He struck out Khris Davis with three straight fastballs; 96, 93, 99. He fell behind Gerardo Parra 2-1, then evened the count up. Parra fouled off a 96 mph fastball, which was the tenth straight fastball from Cole. And so he went to the slider and got Parra swinging. It wasn’t the easiest I’ve ever seen a pitcher strike out the side (it took 16 pitches), but it more or less shut the Brewers down in their tracks; they sent the minimum number of hitters to the plate from that third inning onwards. Cole finished up with a second straight solid six inning start; six innings, five hits, six strikeouts, one walk, two runs, and a bunch of groundouts. Jared Hughes, Tony Watson, and Mark Melancon closed the game down without incident.
On the other side of the box score, Josh Harrison had two hits and scored once, and Pedro Alvarez hit his fourth homer of the year to break the 2-2 tie in the third inning. Chris Stewart — who made his first start of the year for the Pirates — added a two-run single in the sixth to seal the win.
The other bit of this game worth mentioning is that Jordy Mercer got hit in the chest with a pitch in what seemed like a pretty scary moment. He had to leave the game, but apparently his x-rays were negative and he’ll be fine. It’s not clear if he’ll miss any time, but things could’ve been much worse.
It’s tempting to dismiss this sweep as a function of the Brewers’ terrible start to the season, but the Pirates needed this pretty badly. The bats came alive after that awful series against the Tigers, they got some excellent pitching, and they’re back to .500 for the first time this season. The Cubs are up next, and that should be an awfully interesting four-game set.
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