Pirates Squander Opportunities, Fall to the Cubs 2-0

The Pittsburgh Pirates had many chances to score runs against the Chicago Cubs this afternoon. They failed to do so. Twice, they had the bases loaded with zero outs. In the end, zero runs were scored. The Pirates were shutout. In total, they left 11 men on base while going 0-12 with runners in scoring position.

Jon Lester had his best start of the month for the Cubs, going six scoreless with three strikeouts. He was able to navigate around four hits and five walks given up. Tyler Chatwood followed that up with two scoreless innings followed by the save from Rowan Wick.

Steven Brault turned in his best outing of the year, going seven innings while striking out a career-high eight batters. Of his 82 pitches thrown, 75 were some variation of a fastball. This worked well as Brault was able to cruise through six scoreless innings. His only mistake of the day came on the first pitch of the seventh inning (it was a fastball) when Kris Bryant cranked a dinger to left field. Bryant was able to redeem himself after two fielding errors earlier in the game. That was the only run allowed by Brault and he was eventually charged with the loss.

In the eighth, the Cubs added their second run when Elias Diaz chucked a ball into left field when attempting to pick off a runner.

The Pirates are now 51-71 on the season. Tomorrow they will wrap this series up in Williamsport for the 2019 Little League Classic. Mitch Keller gets the start for the Pirates and will oppose Jose Quintana.

First pitch is 7:00 p.m. eastern time.