About an hour ago
The Pittsburgh Pirates debuted their gray road uniforms with “Pittsburgh” italicized to the chest, classic throwbacks in the early 1990s, and that wasn’t even the most prominent script change on Sunday.
Derek Shelton shuffled the starting lineup, a move the Pirates’ manager insisted he had a script before the start of the season, but that seemed to spark a dream in his wood.
Colin Moran and Jose Osuna homered in a three-run fourth inning during a 5-1 win over the St. Louis Cardinals at Busch Stadium when the Pirates’ pitchers and hitters combined to give Shelton a memorable first victory. MLB managerial.
There are too many people to thank in a single tweet, but for now I just want to say that this means everything to me.
The first victory is in the books and now we return home to Burgh! # TeamShelton # LetsGoBucs pic.twitter.com/7QgJ3TR6wh
– Derek Shelton (@derekshelton) July 26, 2020
Shelton called it “stimulating”. The pirate players celebrated by giving him a “pretty severe beer shower” – Shelton joked that he hates wasting beer – combined with baby powder, orange juice, and apple juice.
“It’s probably the best shower I’ve ever taken,” Shelton said.
After losing the first two games in St. Louis, the Pirates’ reversal of fortune began when Derek Holland changed the script. The Pirates left-hander was sent off by home referee Jordan Baker after criticizing a call from the social distance seats near the visitors’ shelter in the first inning, the first in MLB history. That led Shelton to the field to discuss the call with Baker, who covered his mouth with a mask in a lively conversation.
Shelton was originally announced to have been thrown, which would have ejected his record before his first major league victory. Instead, it was Holland who was pitched before pitching for the Pirates. It’s slated to start Tuesday against the Milwaukee Brewers at PNC Park.
Shelton shuffled the starting lineup, giving shortstop Kevin Newman the day off and using second baseman Adam Frazier in first place. Josh Bell served as a designated hitter and batting third, with Moran playing first and batting cleanup, followed by Phillip Evans at third base and Osuna in right field. Shelton said it was by design, not because the top three hitters combined for two hits in the first two games.
“This was scheduled. This was established before playing the first game, ”Shelton said before the game. “Yes, there was no reactionary (reaction) at all about anything. … I will not do it. It’s just not how I’m going to roll about it. It will be programmed. We knew we were going to give Newman the (off) day, and then somehow I tripped everyone up. ”
Kolten Wong got the Cardinals started when he faced Mitch Keller, advanced to second on a wild pitch and scored on Tommy Edman’s infield single when Keller was slow to cover first and made an off-target shot to the plate that the catcher Jacob Stallings couldn’t corral.
Moran tied him in the fourth, hitting the Pirates’ first home run of the season to lead Dakota Hudson. Evans, who went 3 for 4, followed with a single to set up Osuna’s 429-foot shot to the center for a 3-1 lead. The Pirates made it 4-1 in the fifth, when Stallings hit an opening double and scored on a sacrifice fly by Bell. They added an insurance run in the eighth when Evans doubled to score Bell for a 5-1 lead.
The Pirates also had solid shooting. Keller pitched a two-hitter with two strikeouts and three walks in five innings. JT Brubaker used a slider to hit four Cardinals, giving the bullpen a boost in his major league debut. Michael Feliz pitched a clean eighth, and Nick Burdi struck out Paul Goldschmidt, Paul DeJong and Matt Carpenter to finish the ninth.
“That is probably the most important point of this game,” Shelton said of Keller. “We are talking about a 24-year-old boy. We are down, 0 and 2. The manager does not have his first victory. For him to go out and run, pitch, the only run he gave was on a close play at first base, and he kept it all the time, he held steady, he threw pitches. When he realized that certain things were not working, he went to others. No. 1 is a credit to Jacob. Most importantly, what I get out of the game is another maturing step for Mitch Keller. “
Kevin Gorman is a writer for the Tribune-Review. You can contact Kevin by email at [email protected] or by Twitter.
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Pirates / MLB | sports
