Padres hit Mitch Keller hard to beat Pirates, earn series split

Apr. 15—Mitch Keller has had trouble with his fastball command this season, so finding the strike zone has been a challenge for the Pittsburgh Pirates right-hander since spring training.

Against the San Diego Padres, Keller attacked the zone.

And they hit him hard from the start.

The Padres battered Keller for seven runs on nine hits, including five for extra bases, to beat the Pirates, 8-3, and earn a split of the four-game series Thursday afternoon before 4,023 at PNC Park. The Pirates (5-8), who won four of seven games in their opening homestand, start a 10-day, nine-game road trip Friday at Milwaukee.

Keller (1-2) gave up seven runs on nine hits with three walks, one wild pitch and one strikeout in 31/3 innings, boosting his ERA to 8.74. Pirates manager Derek Shelton blamed the lack of spin and sharpness on Keller's breaking ball, as well as the Padres' lineup.

"We wanted him to attack the zone, and he was in the zone," Shelton said, "but the fact that the sharpness of the breaking ball wasn't there against a good hitting team, and they took advantage of it."

Of the seven players who made contact with Keller in a 30-pitch first inning, five reached an exit velocity of 100 mph or higher. Trent Grisham's leadoff single to right touched 107.3 mph, according to Statcast, and he scored on Jake Cronenworth's 102.8 mph double to the right-center gap for a 1-0 lead. Manny Machado followed with a 374-foot homer, which hit 100.3 mph, down the left-field line for a 3-0 lead.

Keller blamed hanging breaking balls for those run-scoring hits, as Cronenworth crushed a curve and Machado fouled off four consecutive pitches before hitting a slider for his third homer of the season.

"If I take away those two pitches," Keller said, "I think the outcome of that first inning is completely different."

What followed, however, was more of the same. Eric Hosmer hit a 104.4 mph double to right, then scored on Tucupita Marcano's double down the left-field line to make it 4-0. Even Luis Campusano's lineout to center to end the inning registered at 104.4 mph.

The Padres scored two more runs in the second, when Jurickson Profar doubled and Cronenworth walked. Both advanced on a wild pitch, then scored on Hosmer's single for a 6-1 lead.

The Pirates cut it to 6-1 when Colin Moran doubled to left to lead off the second, then scored on a double down the right-field line by Erik Gonzalez. The Pirates had the bases loaded with one out, but Keller struck out and Adam Frazier hit a soft grounder to pitcher Chris Paddack to end the inning.

Shelton said he never considered pinch hitting for Keller in the second, given that he'd thrown 56 pitches at that point.

"No, we need to get Mitch stretched out," Shelton said. "We need him."

It wasn't until Cronenworth hit a sacrifice fly to left to score Grisham and make it 7-1 in the fourth that the Pirates pulled Keller. He threw 83 pitches, 51 for strikes, but Keller wasn't rattled by the Padres pounding his pitching.

"I'm still really confident in myself. It's just kind of one of those days where I made a few mistakes, and they took advantage," Keller said. "Then I made three or four good pitches, and they hit some doubles down the line where that wasn't happening. Just kind of tip your cap. Late barrels. ... I haven't given up two doubles down the line in a while, so just all in all, kind of a bad start. But I'm still confident in myself. I was all around the zone where I wanted to be. I was throwing pitches where I wanted to, just the first inning had some bad pitches there."

Rule 5 rookie right-hander Luis Oviedo pitched the sixth and gave up back-to-back walks to Profar and Cronenworth, followed by a Machado sacrifice fly to score Profar for an 8-3 Padres lead.

The Pirates did have a couple of bright spots.

Anthony Alford, who started 0 for 19, got his first hit of the season in the fifth. Pinch hitting for Clay Holmes, Alford hit a flare to left. He advanced to third on Adam Frazier's double and both scored on an error by Marcano on a Bryan Reynolds fly ball to right field to cut it to 7-3. And catcher Michael Perez also got his first hit of the season with a single to left while pinch hitting for David Bednar in the ninth.

"Even though it was a loss," Shelton said, "there were some positive things that we did, and we need to continue to do moving forward."

Kevin Gorman is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Kevin by email at kgorman@triblive.com or via Twitter .