The Pittsburgh Pirates have quickly faded into the direction of playing for a top-5 pick in the 2012 MLB Draft.
The Pirates dropped their 10th straight game on Sunday afternoon, falling to the San Diego Padres 7-3, at PNC Park. The Pirates were outscored 35-10 in the series, giving up 28 runs in the first two games of the series.
It was a humiliating series for the Pirates and it was fitting that the series ended with Pedro Alvarez grounding out to third to end today’s game.
The way the Pirates are losing, most notably the embarrassing losses this weekend, has made this collapse a historic one for the franchise.
The Pirates have suddenly gone from buyers just one week ago at the July 31st trade deadline to now likely sellers this month in the waiver wire trade market as the team will surely explore the trade value for the likes of Paul Maholm, Ryan Doumit, ect in upcoming weeks.
The team is five games under .500 at 54-59 and trail the Milwaukee Brewers by 10 games in the NL Central.
The Pirates were outscored 59-25 in what has ended up being their worst homestand in the team’s 125 year history, according to the Associated Press via STATS LLC.
The Pirates were tied for first place on June 26th and since their memorable 19 inning loss to the Atlanta Braves, the team is 1-12.
Things don’t figure to turn around anytime soon with the team starting a three game set in San Francisco Monday night, followed by a three game road set against the Milwaukee Brewers, starting on Friday.
Pittsburgh’s brutal six game road trip is then followed by a three game home-stand against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Some help is expected to be on the way soon at the plate, with Derrek Lee getting closer to returning. Meanwhile, outfielder Alex Presley traveled to Bradenton today to begin a short rehab stint and things are finally going well for Jose Tabata from a health standpoint. He could be back a little bit earlier than expected.
He went 1-for-4 today in a rehab game with Triple-A Indianapolis and will be evaluted mid-week.
The starting pitching and bullpen has finally hit a wall and that shouldn’t be shock. It was only going to be a matter of time for the rotation and there is little help on the way.
Ross Ohlendorf will make one more rehab start before the Pirates make a decision on him. He could join the rotation as a swingman but during today’s media session, GM Neal Huntington didn’t sound overly excited about the possibility of bringing Ohlendorf back up with the big club. He does have minor league options.