Luis Ortiz, Pirates struggle to silence Rays’ offense

PITTSBURGH — The Carmen Mlodzinski to Luis Ortiz combo had worked nicely twice before, but the third time certainly wasn’t the charm Friday at PNC Park. The Rays racked up 14 hits against the duo in the series opener, and the Pirates would end up losing, 10-3.

Ortiz had been on a roll of late, transitioning back from his new bullpen role to a bulk guy with an opener in front of him, allowing just one run over 9 1/3 innings the first two times the Pirates deployed him in that longer spot. It didn’t go smoothly this time. After the Rays got one run home off four hits against Mlodzinski, Ortiz would go on to allow six runs and 10 hits over four innings, including a pair of Josh Lowe home runs.

“They put the ball in play,” said Pirates manager Derek Shelton. “There wasn’t a ton of hard contact, even with Carmen. There was not a lot of hard contact. Then, ultimately, the command wasn’t what we’ve seen over the last couple outings.”

Ortiz was more reliant on his four-seam fastball than he had been for most of the year, perhaps a product of the Rays entering with the second-worst whiff rate against four-seamers as a team (26.6%) and the fourth-worst batting average (.224). Ortiz often leans more towards sinkers and throws the four-seamer just 18.6% of the time. On Friday, he threw it 35 times out of his 79 pitches, 44.3% of his pitches.

Whether that was a matchup decision or going off of feel, the Rays hit the pitch hard, picking up four hits against the fastball, including Lowe’s game-clinching home run in the sixth.

“It felt the same,” Ortiz answered, via interpreter and coach Stephen Morales, when asked if anything was different Friday. “… They made a lot of weak contact, but they were able to put the ball in play a lot. That’s part of the game.”

The Pirates’ only real chance to climb back into the game came in the fourth when they plated two runs and had the bases loaded for Andrew McCutchen down two, but the designated hitter bounced Colin Poche’s fastball to third to start an inning-ending, around-the-horn double play.

It’s tough to win when you give up double-digit runs, though, and that’s happened on four separate occasions this month. Starting pitching is still the unquestioned strength of this team, but they’re running a little short on it at the moment.

Friday was the third time over the last seven games that the Pirates carried out some variation of a bullpen game, deploying exclusively relievers twice last weekend against the Rockies. Some of that is due to wanting to build in more off-days for Paul Skenes and Jared Jones, who will need to have their innings monitored this year. They are also down several starters, all of whom are making progress towards a return.

Martín Pérez is set to make a rehab start with Triple-A Indianapolis Saturday, and Quinn Priester threw a live batting practice with Indianapolis Friday. Marco Gonzales threw a live batting practice at PNC Park Friday, and while he’s further behind than the other two in terms of a build up, he should return at some point this season. Mike Burrows, the team’s No. 10 prospect, according to MLB Pipeline, is on his path back from last year’s Tommy John surgery and should make a rehab start with Single-A Bradenton early next week. When he’s fully healthy, he should be on the Major League radar.

None of them would be ready for the next series in Cincinnati, where the Pirates will almost surely have some variation of a bullpen game again. Even when those starters begin to return, there could be demand for spot starts to manage pitcher workloads.

If that happens, Ortiz would likely be tasked again with the pseudo-starter role.

“I feel comfortable with that,” Ortiz said. “It’s been working a lot. If that’s the role I have to go into the game to, I’m more than comfortable with it.”