LOS ANGELES– The Pirates didn’t face Clayton Kershaw, but they sure did their best to make the Dodgers’ Monday night starter resemble him.
Kershaw was nowhere to be found on the bump at Dodger Stadium: he was moved to the 15-day injured list with left shoulder soreness prior to the opening contest of the four-game set. Instead, Kershaw could be found throwing in the outfield pregame, forcing right-hander Michael Grove, owner of a 7.54 ERA this season entering the evening, to make his 14th career MLB start.
Pirates manager Derek Shelton said the team had a general idea of who the Dodgers’ starter was going to be in the morning and leaned on prior experience, having faced Grove last season. A little over a year ago, the Pirates touched up Grove, a Wheeling, W.v.. native, for three runs in an inning during the impressive three-game sweep of the Dodgers in Los Angeles.
This time around, Grove effectively maneuvered through four innings of one-run ball before turning things over to the bullpen, which mostly kept the Pirates’ bats quiet in their 5-2 loss at Dodger Stadium.
"He kept us off-balance enough,” Shelton said of Grove. “We got on the board early and then couldn't get it in… he's got a good arm. He's a young kid with a really good arm."
The Pirates did get a sole run off Grove, which came in the second. With two away, Jared Triolo ripped the first pitch he saw to right for a two-out RBI single. Austin Hedges reached on an infield single to load the bases, but Josh Palacios grounded out to first to end the threat.
The third inning presented the Pirates with another golden opportunity to get after Grove, as Bryan Reynolds worked a leadoff walk and Jack Suwinski was hit by a pitch in the ensuing plate appearance. Carlos Santana then hit into a double play and Henry Davis bounced out to third.
Suwinski, who grounded out to short and was hit by a pitch in his two plate appearances against Grove, dispelled any notion of the team not being sufficiently prepared for him.
"I still think there was enough time to figure that kind of stuff out,” Suwinski. “But I mean, at this point, just ready for things like that if they do come our way, just adjust and learn to adjust and figure out how we're gonna get ready for the game."
Opposite Grove was Mitch Keller, who gave up four or more earned runs for the fourth time in eight games. The eight hits he gave up were tied for the second-most allowed this season, a far cry from the 10-strikeout performance Keller turned in against the Dodgers on April 27 in Pittsburgh.
“Just obviously it wasn’t as sharp as usual,” Keller said. “Just didn’t have my best stuff, but I thought Hedgey and I navigated as best as we could, made some pitches when I had to. Some singles fell in. Some bad luck here and there. Overall, just not as sharp as I’m used to.”
It’s worth noting, though, that Keller faced a much different Dodgers lineup that lacked Will Smith, Max Muncy and J.D. Martinez a little over two months ago.
Keller was quick to dish out praise to the version of the Dodgers he faced Monday night.
“This is one of the best lineups in baseball, if not the best,” Keller said. “When you’re struggling and you don’t have your best stuff, it’s a difficult outing.
The stark contrast in performances by Keller against the same team were representative of the directions these two squads are going.
In the process, the Pirates lost their third game in a row to stay winless in July after going 11-15 in June, dropping to 39-45 on the year. The Dodgers, meanwhile, responded from dropping two of three against the lowly Kansas City Royals to win for the eighth time in 12 games.
On the mound
In his first start since being named the Pirates’ representative for the All-Star game, Keller labored against a potent Dodgers lineup.
Muncy led off the second with a homer to right-center on an elevated fastball, and the Dodgers tacked another on after back-to-back doubles by David Peralta and Jason Heyward. It took Keller 46 pitches to get through the first two frames.
He responded with a clean third inning but gave up one more run in the fourth and a pair in the fifth to round out his outing.
Keller’s velocity was a little down, too. Per Baseball Savant, each of Keller’s six pitches were at least 1.4mph slower than their respective season averages. Shelton remarked postgame that Keller didn’t seem to be efficiently moving down the mound, which could have contributed to the diminished velocity.
“I just felt a little sluggish,” Keller said. “Just not as sharp and crisp.”
In the field
Heyward’s second-inning double could have been a groundout to Santana, but the veteran first baseman who’s been one of MLB’s best defenders at that position this year couldn’t come up with the sharp grounder. It took a knuckling hop toward Santana, who stuck his mitt in front of the ball before it ricocheted to the warning track.
Three innings later, Heyward got the better of Santana again, hitting a soft liner with some awkward spin that was muffed and allowed an unearned run to come across. Shelton didn’t seem particularly worried postgame about Santana, who entered the evening with the most defensive runs saved of any MLB first baseman, per Fangraphs.
“This guy's been one of, if not the best defensive first basemen in the National League this year,” Shelton said. “Just had one of those games."
At the plate
There were few bright spots in the batter’s box for the Pirates, but Triolo was certainly one of them. The Pirates’ third baseman of the last handful of games with Ke’Bryan Hayes out with low back inflammation, Triolo reached base thrice in his sixth MLB contest.
In the second, Triolo was first-pitch swinging against Grove and shot a single to right to plate Nick Gonzales, who had reached on a fielder’s choice. The RBI was just Triolo’s second of his young MLB career.
He also worked an eight-pitch walk with two away in the fourth before ultimately being stranded. Triolo walked once more in the sixth inning, loading the bases before Hedges smacked a sacrifice fly for the Pirates’ second run of the evening.
Quotable
"We just didn't play very sharp throughout,” Shelton said. “Mitch wasn't sharp, we didn't play sharp defensively, we had a couple opportunities to score and only got one run in those opportunities. Just overall, didn't play a sharp game."
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