One batter too long: Brewers slam Pirates after Derek Shelton sticks with starter Zach Thompson in 4th inning

The way the game of baseball is played and managed in 2021, starting pitchers don’t often work beyond the fifth or sixth inning.

But all Pittsburgh Pirates manager Derek Shelton was trying to do Monday night at American Family Field in Milwaukee was get Zach Thompson through the fourth.

It turned out to be too much to ask, and Shelton’s decision helped the Brewers (6-5) defeat the Pirates (5-5), 6-1.

Facing a 2-1 deficit with two out, Shelton allowed Thompson, a right-hander who had already walked four batters, to pitch to lefty-swinging former National League MVP Christian Yelich – with the bases loaded.

Two pitches later, Yelich hit an 85-mph changeup 429 feet into right field for his fourth career grand slam and the 6-1 lead stood up for the rest of the game.

What hurts is that lefty relief pitcher Dillon Peters was warmed up and ready to go, Shelton said. When he finally was called upon in the fifth, Peters threw three hitless, scoreless innings that consisted of 33 pitches, 23 strikes.

“We were trying to get (Thompson) through Cutch (Andrew McCutchen, the next batter),” Shelton said after the game on AT&T Sportsnet. “Obviously, it didn’t work out. In hindsight, should have brought in Peters there. It was my decision.

“The changeup that he hit kind of cut back in Yelich’s bat and he left it up. That was something we thought he could use as a weapon there.”

The crucial at-bat prior to Yelich stepping to the plate was a walk to Willy Adames, the previous batter, on a 3-2 pitch that loaded the bases for the second time in the inning. If Thompson throws a strike there and escapes, the Brewers’ lead would have stayed at 2-1, and the later innings might have been more interesting.

“Really close pitch, just got away. It just slipped out of my hand,” said Thompson, who has allowed eight runs in eight innings (two starts) since coming to the Pirates from the Miami Marlins in the Jacob Stallings trade. “Just made a wrong pitch and paid for it. Gotta move forward after it and make them pay for it next time.”

Other than the fourth inning, Pirates pitchers were efficient. Thompson struck out five batters in four innings, giving up a run in the first on a wild pitch. Aaron Fletcher was nearly perfect in a three-up, three-down eighth when he threw only nine pitches (seven strikes).

Even in the fourth, Thompson might have enjoyed a better outcome. Earlier in the inning, Omar Narvaez and Lorenzo Cain recorded a single and double that outfielders Bryan Reynolds and Cole Tucker appeared close to catching before the baseball bounced away from their gloves.

“A lot of my pitches played really well,” Thompson said. “Something we’ve been working on is getting more spin. I’m going to take the positives. You can’t sit on the negatives for five days (until the next start).”

The defeat ended the Pirates’ two-game winning streak, but they still have won four of their past six.

Other than rookie second baseman Diego Castillo’s first career home run, the bats failed, especially in the clutch.

In the fourth inning, Castillo was hit in the leg by a pitch. Because he swung at it, however, he was not awarded first base. If Castillo was in pain, he didn’t show it. He homered on the next pitch.

“In my mind, I said let’s hit the ball and run the bases hard,” he said of his mindset for the next pitch. “It just happened, I hit a homer.”

“He continues to play well, continues to have good at-bats,” Shelton said of Castillo, who’s hitting .310. “Any place we put him, anything we’ve done with him, he’s responded. Getting better at the major-league level is a challenge and he’s done that so far in the first 10 games.”

But there were no more offensive highlights. The Pirates stranded two base runners in each of four innings – the first, sixth, seventh and eighth.

At least, the bullpen wasn’t especially taxed. Peters and Fletcher saw to that.

“My job was to get as deep as I could into the game and save the bullpen for the rest of the series,” Peters said. “Keep those horses down in the bullpen fresh.”