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Notes and observations from Major League Baseball as Memorial Day approaches:
n Back in 2017, MLB instituted a complete replay review system for umpires' calls that were challenged on the field in games. Reviews were conducted at the Replay Command Center -- which is located at the MLB Advanced Media headquarters in New York City -- by replay officials who are full-time MLB umpires who work shifts at the Replay Command Center in addition to their on-field shifts.
The reviews were instituted as a response to some egregious and blatant botched calls by umpires on the field that became a pattern and cost teams games and pitchers no-hitters and/or perfect games.
The review system has, by and large, been an improvement over the past naked eye protocol.
This past Saturday afternoon was an exception, however, as the review officials made the wrong call on a play at home plate in the ninth inning of a game at Wrigley Field that cost the Pittsburgh Pirates a 1-0 loss to the Chicago Cubs.
On the play in question, the Cubs' Cody Bellinger was incorrectly called safe by home plate umpire Chris Conroy after attempting to score on a one-out single to center field by Christopher Morel.
The replay showed that, after taking the throw from center fielder Michael Taylor, Pirates catcher Joey Bart tagged the sliding Bellinger well before Bellinger's foot touched home plate. Bart attempted to show Conroy that he had made the tag by afterward taking the ball out of his glove with his bare hand, at which time Bellinger dislodged the ball and Conroy made the incorrect safe call.
The Pirates challenged the call on the field, but the Replay Command Center upheld Conroy's initial and incorrect safe call.
The sequence provided an ugly and unjust ending to an otherwise splendid pitching battle in which the two starting pitchers --the Pirates' Bailey Falter and the Cubs' Shota Imanaga -- had gone toe-to-toe for seven-plus scoreless innings, crying out for a much better, optimal outcome.
Moreover, adding salt to the Pirates' wound is the fact that all decisions by the Replay Command Center are final, and the Pirates cannot field a further appeal.
It's a further grim reminder that baseball, like life in general, is sometimes not fair.
Let's hope that when this season winds down this fall for the Pirates, this call doesn't wind up being a factor in preventing the Bucs from qualifying for the postseason for the first time since 2015.
n The Pirates' team situation this year is an intriguing one. Going into this season, the team's bullpen and starting lineup were perceived as strengths, while its starting rotation was viewed as a large question mark.
With the season now past its quarter-pole for the Pirates, those roles have been reversed.
The starting rotation is the team's biggest asset, its bullpen has been up and down, and the batting lineup is riddled with soft spots and players who are struggling at the plate.
After making his first appearance in last summer's Major League Baseball All-Star Game, right-hander Mitch Keller is continuing to develop into a very reliable starting pitcher. Keller recently pitched one of the rare complete games in MLB by shutting out the Los Angeles Angels, then followed that with six scoreless innings against the Milwaukee Brewers and had another strong outing Sunday.
Keller, who, like the Pirates' other starting pitchers, has been plagued by a general lack of run support this year from a Pirates offense that had averaged well under four runs a game over its first 47 games entering Sunday's series finale at Wrigley, was near the bottom of the National League in team batting average, and in the lower quarter of teams in the league in runs scored.
The rapid emergence of rookie right-hander Jared Jones, who was one of the final additions to the Pirates' 25-man roster as spring training broke this year, has been one of the best bright spots for the Bucs so far this season.
The 22-year-old Jones possesses an excellent four-pitch repertoire topped by a fast ball that has reached 101 miles per hour, and sports a sparkling 2.89 earned run average in his first nine major league starts, while striking out 63 batters and walking just seven in his first 53 major league innings pitched. He has allowed 41 hits and just 18 runs. Jones has worked at least six innings in six of his starts, but has just a 3-4 record because the Pirates' bats haven't backed him up.
As good as Keller and Jones have been, the recent Major League Baseball arrival of 6-foot-5 right-handed pitcher Paul Skenes -- who the Pirates took as the top draft pick last year out of LSU, will likely turn into a watershed development for the franchise. In his second Major League start, on Friday afternoon at Wrigley Field, the 6-foot-5 Skenes held the Cubs hitless and scoreless with his electric stuff for six innings, striking out 10 batters. Skenes -- whose fast ball reaches 102 miles per hour -- made his highly-anticipated debut on Saturday, May 11 against those same Cubs in front of 34,924 fans at PNC Park, striking out seven batters in four-plus innings while allowing three runs and six hits.
With those three leading their rotation and left-handers Bailey Falter and Martin Perez providing stability in the other two spots, the Pirates have one of the best starting pitching alignments in the major leagues.
Now, they consistently need to score runs -- something which their offense has shown signs of improving upon with outputs of 10, eight and nine runs in the past week.
There have been trouble spots throughout the lineup. Rowdy Tellez, acquired by the Bucs this past offseason after hitting 35 home runs for the Milwaukee Brewers just two years ago, has failed abysmally at the plate and has been the target of much fan wrath in the season's first six weeks.
Henry Davis, who the Pirates took out of the University of Louisville with the first pick out of the 2021 MLB draft and who the Bucs had planned to make their full-time catcher this season, struggled so mightily with the bat through the first month of the season that he was demoted to Class AAA Indianapolis to figure things out.
Outfielder Jack Suwinski hit 26 home runs last season, but had hit only four and a dismal .172 batting average through the first 48 games this season. Moreover, after striking out 172 times in 447 plate appearances last year, Suwinski fanned 38 times in his first 131 at-bats this year. His combined strikeout ratio in the past two seasons is higher than once out of every three plate appearances.
Michael A. Taylor, a Gold Glove outfielder who the Bucs acquired from Minnesota before the start of this season, covers tons of ground and catches just about every fly ball hit his way. He hit a career-high 21 homers last year with the Twins, but has hit only one so far this year.
Jared Triolo was impressive offensively and defensively while playing a variety of infield positions last year, but there has been public clamoring for his demotion after a miserable spring at the plate.
Tellez, Suwinski and Davis have all batted well below the .200 mark this season, while Taylor and long-time franchise icon Andrew McCutchen -- who has been used as a designated hitter -- aren't much above that average at the plate.
The bullpen, particularly in middle relief, has had its share of troubles. Flame-throwing left-handed veteran Aroldis Chapman, acquired as a free agent last winter, has been more up-and-down than lights out, and two-time All-Star closer David Bednar is still battling to regain his form of the past two years after missing most of spring training with a lat injury.
But if the offense and bullpen can catch up to the starting pitching, the Pirates could turn things around for themselves in a relative hurry.
n First baseman-outfielder Connor Joe has been the Pirates' most pleasant position-player surprise this season, and highly-touted former top draft pick Nick Gonzales has put his career back on the positive track by rebounding with a solid first month at the plate at Indianapolis and a promising return to the big league club at second base.
n The news hasn't been as positive this season for young right-handed pitcher Roansy Contreras, who showed tremendous promise in the 2022 season after being acquired by the Pirates from the New York Yankees, but has steadily regressed over the past two seasons, was recently designated for assignment, and traded by the Pirates to the Los Angeles Angels.
n Though an 8-20 slide dropped them behind both the Milwaukee Brewers and Cubs in the NL Central Division, it's a long season, and with six teams qualifying for the playoffs -- three division winners and three Wild Cards -- in each league, the Pirates figure to be in the hunt for the postseason all season as a division championship contender at best and a sixth-seeded Wild Card entry at worst. The Los Angeles Dodgers, Atlanta Braves and Philadelphia Phillies are favorites to finish among the NL's top three teams, but several other teams -- the Washington Nationals, New York Mets, San Diego Padres, Arizona Diamondbacks, Cincinnati Reds, San Francisco Giants and St. Louis Cardinals -- are currently all bunched up around the .500 mark. That scenario makes the additions of both fifth and sixth-seeded playoff teams in both leagues for postseason play a couple years ago a genuine boon to fan interest in just about every city.
John Hartsock can be reached at jhartsock@altoonamirror.com.