Pirates trio looks to continue uptick against former team in San Francisco

Pittsburgh’s Bryan Reynolds will attempt to complete a homecoming hat trick Wednesday afternoon when the visiting Pirates go for a sweep of the San Francisco Giants.

The Pirates, who occupy last place in the National League Central, clinched a third consecutive series win with 6-5 and 3-1 wins over the Giants on the first two nights of the three-game set.

Pittsburgh, which has won four straight games and seven of its past eight, will look to hang a sixth straight loss on the Giants.

The Pirates’ offensive hero in each game of this series has been a former member of the Giants.

Andrew McCutchen, who played 130 games for the Giants during the 2018 season, produced the difference-making runs with a two-run homer on Monday before Joey Bart, San Francisco’s top draft pick that year and a member of the Giants from 2020-23, broke a 1-1 tie with an eight-inning single in the rematch.

McCutchen hit 15 homers in his only season in San Francisco. When he hit his 10th of this season on Monday, it gave him double digits for a 17th consecutive season as he became just the 11th player in Major League Baseball history to achieve that feat.

Unlike his two teammates, Reynolds never played for the Giants, but he was their second-round pick in 2016 and, coincidentally, the key export in the 2018 acquisition of McCutchen from the Pirates.

Reynolds, who was batting just .226 as of July 18, has heated up a bit just as trade winds have swirled at a season-high rate around the Pirates. The 30-year-old has hits in six of his past nine games, a stretch in which he’s gone 11-for-39 (.282) with four doubles and five RBIs.

The switch-hitting outfielder has gone on record as insisting he wants to remain in Pittsburgh, noting that he has an eight-year, $107 million contract that doesn’t expire until 2031.

“Obviously, I don’t want to get traded,” he told reporters. “I’ve got five more years. I wouldn’t have signed here if I wanted to get traded two years later. Hopefully, it doesn’t come down to that. It’s why I have that (no-trade clause), right?”

According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Reynolds has six teams on his no-trade list. The Giants are one of them.

Reynolds and his mates will go for a series sweep Wednesday against Giants right-hander Logan Webb (9-8, 3.38 ERA), who will try to finish his worst month of the season on a positive note. He’s pitched to a 7.36 ERA in his first four July starts, allowing six runs in both of his home outings against the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Mets.

The 28-year-old will make his fourth career start against the Pirates, having compiled a 1-1 record and 2.89 ERA in the first three outings.

The Giants desperately need Webb to play stopper.

They have been in a freefall since June 13, when they sat tied with the Los Angeles Dodgers atop the National League West at 41-29. A loss Wednesday would put the Giants under .500 for the first time all season.

They enter the contest nine games behind Los Angeles for the division lead and five games behind the San Diego Padres for the National League’s third and final wild-card berth.

“We’ve had meetings,” Giants manager Bob Melvin said. “We’ve had team meetings. We’ve had all kinds of meetings. It’s going out there and fighting a little harder and winning a game and having a little more resolve, which we’ve shown this year. We just have not done it here recently.”

The Pirates are scheduled to counter on Wednesday with right-hander Mike Burrows (1-3, 4.15 ERA), who hasn’t faced the Giants in 13 career games.

The 25-year-old is winless in his past nine appearances despite having pitched shutout ball in two of his four July outings, limiting the Seattle Mariners and Arizona Diamondbacks to a total of six hits over 11 innings.

–Field Level Media