Opening Day Brings Fresh Start, New Opportunity For Young Bucs
Spring Training is over, and Opening Day is here once again! Gone is the shortened 60-game season as we get a full summer of baseball featuring 162 games over six months of action. The Pittsburgh Pirates kick off the 2021 schedule by taking on the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field. While Pirates fans are excited for the action, not many other people around the league are. Expectations are very low for this year's team with Vegas setting the over-under of their win-loss percentage at an alarming 58.5. Coming off a year where they had the worst record in Major League Baseball at 19-41, no one has the Pirates as being a Cinderella story or even a sleeper team to surprise this season.
However, don't tell that to this young group of Pirates, who are ready to take the field and hopefully surprise some people. Led by National League Rookie of the Year favorite Ke'Bryan Hayes, Bryan Reynolds, and Kevin Newman, this young group of Pirates players is hoping to shatter the expectations set forth by critics. They already showed improvement over last season in their Grapefruit League schedule. During Spring Training 2020, the Pirates went just 3-18 in their 21 games played. However, they greatly improved this year going 13-14-2 in their 29 games played, and a majority of those were close contests. While many of the guys on this year's club aren't household names, the new season offers new beginnings and a chance to make a name for themselves. There will be some ups and downs during the season, but the Pirates are looking to bring excitement back to the city.
Young Bucs in Control
If there is one thing you see when you look at the Pittsburgh Pirates Opening Day roster, it is a lot of youth. There are only two guys over the age of 30, Jacob Stallings and Trevor Cahill, and the rest are 29 or younger. There is good and bad that comes with this and both have to do with the talent level of the players. It is good because you have a lot of young promising talent on the team, but it can be bad because that talent hasn't had time to prove itself at the Major League level. The Pirates have this young talent on both sides of the ball from their pitching staff to their starting lineup. This talent is looking to flourish during their first full seasons in the Big Leagues and set a solid foundation for the Pirates in the future.
Of course, leading the offensive side of things is third baseman, Ke'Bryan Hayes. Hayes burst onto the scene last season, hitting an astounding .376 with five home runs and 11 RBI over his first 24 Big League games. The average is something Hayes has always had, but the surprising aspect of his game was the power. With his five home runs in 24 games last season, that gives him a 162-game projection of 33 home runs. Now, I don't think he will actually hit 33 home runs, but that power is still surprising. The most he hit in the Minor Leagues was 10 home runs and I expect him to be around the 15-20 home run mark. The other guy leading the offense is third-year man Bryan Reynolds who is looking for a bounce back. He hit just .189 last season but has hit .300 or better every other year during his pro baseball career. He finished fourth in Rookie of the Year voting in 2019, and look for him to have a bounce-back season and be leading this offense by season's end.
On the pitching side, it all starts with Opening Day, and the Pirates are looking for a strong start from Chad Kuhl. Kuhl was tabbed as the team's Opening Day starter yesterday and, even though he has spent four seasons in the Big League, this is only technically his second full season. He underwent Tommy John surgery in 2018 that forced him to miss all of 2019. He came back in 2020 and, aside from one outing, had a good year going 2-3 with a 4.27 ERA. If you take out his start on September 13th when he allowed nine runs in 2.1 innings, that ERA drops to a much more impressive 2.65 mark. The other young Buc leading the rotation is 24-year-old right-hander Mitch Keller. When he was on the mound last year, Keller was good making five starts and posting a 2.91 ERA over five starts. However, he suffered an oblique injury that forced him to miss a month and a half and his control has been off since his return. He did not have the Spring Training that he wanted, finishing with an 11.19 ERA in 11.1 innings, and is looking to turn things around as the season is set to begin.
Veterans Mixed In
To go along with the young talent that this Pirates team has, General Manager Ben Cherrington has also sprinkled in some veterans to help guide the youngsters along. Possibly the biggest veteran addition was Todd Frazier this Spring, but he will be starting the year with the young guys at Spring Training. Along with Frazier comes a group that includes names like Tyler Anderson and Trevor Cahill. All of these players have been through the grind of a Major League season several times and can help guide the youngsters as they grow and develop throughout the year. Again, the impact of these veterans will be felt on both sides of the ball, but some will be more of an immediate impact on the team than others.
For the offense, the impact of their veteran presence will have to wait a couple more weeks. Todd Frazier was signed on February 20th, 2021, opted out of his contract on March 27th, 2021, and resigned with the Pirates on March 30th, 2021. He had a pretty strong Spring Training for the Pirates, hitting .250 with three home runs and six RBI over 28 at-bats with the team. However, Phillip Evans had a much stronger spring, hitting .361 with eight RBI and earning a spot on the bench. Because of this, Frazier will start the year at the Pirates alternate training site in Pittsburgh and could get a call to the team later this month. This will give him a chance to work and give his experience to the next-gen Pirates before making an impact on the Big League club.
On the pitching side of things, the impact of the veterans on the team will be more immediate with both being on the Opening Day roster. Tyler Anderson is the veteran presence in the starting rotation, and he is coming off a bounce-back season with the San Francisco Giants. During his time with the Giants, he went 4-3 with a 4.37 ERA over 13 games, 11 starts, with the Giants. He doesn't do anything that is going to blow you away while watching him, but he is a guy who can make the opposition pound the ball into the ground. With the Pirates focusing on defense this year, his pitching style could play well at PNC Park. In the bullpen, that veteran presence is going to be provided by Trevor Cahill. Cahill is the oldest member of the active roster at 33 years old and has the most experience with 12 years of MLB experience. He can be used as both a starter and a reliever and did so with the Giants last season going 1-2 with a 3.24 ERA over 11 games, six starts. He was much better in the bullpen for the Giants last season and will most likely work in that role again in 2021.
The Pittsburgh Pirates (0-0) kick-off the 2021 season later this afternoon when they take on the Chicago Cubs (0-0) at 2:20 pm. Chad Kuhl (0-0, -.--) takes the mound for his first Opening Day start against Kyle Hendricks (0-0, -.--) for the Cubs. You can watch the game on AT&T Sportsnet, listen on 93.7 The Fan, it follow along with us on Twitter by following @Buccos_Cove.
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