PITTSBURGH — Much of the baseball world was introduced to left-hander Framber Valdez this past postseason. Although he made his MLB debut in 2018, the uniquely built (5-11, 240 pounds) Astros starter made a name for himself with four playoff starts this past fall, including a pair off victories in the World Series.
With the changes made to the MLB schedule, the Pirates will now see more of Valdez and other pitchers throughout the American League — not that they’re going to be too terribly excited after what Valdez did to them on Monday at PNC Park.
The 29-year-old lefty changed speeds and induced a bunch of weak contact while shutting down the Pirates during a 8-2 loss for the home team, one that was compounding by Roansy Contreras’ inability to do the same against Houston’s hitters.
Valdez issued five walks and hit a batter, but he also did a fine job of wiggling out off trouble. Double plays saved him in the fifth, sixth and seventh. He also used his four-pitch mix — sinker, changeup, cutter and curveball — to notch five strikeouts in seven innings of two-run ball.
It was much like what baseball fans saw Valdez do against the Phillies in the World Series, when he pitched 6 1/3 innings and allowed one run while striking out nine in Game 2. Valdez gave up one run over six innings with another nine strikeouts, as the Astros closed it out with a Game 6 win.
On the flip side, it was a night Contreras would rather forget.
After twirling a gem in his last start — one earned run over 5 2/3 innings against the Red Sox — Contreras took a step backward. The 23-year-old right-hander had trouble throwing strikes and recorded only one out in the fourth inning, as the Astros blitzed him for seven earned runs on nine hits, four walks and a hit batter.
Three of those walks scored. Contreras lacked sharpness with his slider and couldn’t consistently locate his fastball, familiar problems whenever we’ve seen Contreras struggle.
Most concerning might be the decreased velocity. Contreras averaged 95.6 mph with his four-seam fastball this season, but that number dropped to 93.8 mph on Monday. Houston had only one extra-base hit against Contreras but made a bunch of contact and hit plenty of balls hard.
The Astros grabbed a 1-0 lead in the first whenever right fielder Kyle Tucker went the opposite way with a heater. Second baseman Mauricio Dubon has been a pleasant surprise for the injured Jose Altuve, hitting .304 in six games before Monday, and made it a 2-0 game by taking an outside slider to right-center field.
Left fielder Yordan Alvarez upped the Astros’ lead to 4-0 in the second when he handled a 94 mph heater at the top of the zone, going opposite field to left at 101.9 mph.
ON THE MOUND
Ji-Man Choi gave the Pirates some life with his first homer of the season in the second, but the Astros kept hammering Contreras. Catcher Martin Maldonado lined an elevated heater into left before Tucker knocked another fastball up past second baseman Mark Mathias, who was playing in.
That turned out to be Contreras’ last batter. As he let out his frustration — certainly understandable on this night — Shelton came out and gave the ball to Wil Crowe. The outing dropped Contreras’ ERA to 8.00 on the season while furthering questions about the Pirates’ starting rotation.
Mitch Keller and Johan Oviedo have been solid. However, Contreras, Rich Hill and Vince Velasquez have essentially one good start between the three of them. In a game Contreras surely wanted to win, the first after the Pirates lost Oneil Cruz and against a franchise with a history of developing Dominican pitchers, the outcome was not at all what he wanted.
AT THE PLATE
If there was anything redeeming part of Monday’s loss, it was the second-inning home run from Ji-Man Choi, who began the game hitting just .053. With Oneil Cruz out, the Pirates need someone else with some pop, and Choi obliged while hitting just the sixth homer by a left-handed hitter off Astros starter Framber Valdez.
Choi worked a full count and got a middle-middle fastball that he didn’t miss, blasting it 407 feet at 108.3 mph into the Houston bullpen to bring the Pirates within three at 4-1.
The Pirates picked up a second run in the fourth inning, when Carlos Santana — who began the game 6 for 15 (.400) over his last four, with three extra-base hits — stroked a leadoff double and scored on Rodolfo Castro’s ground-ball single to the right side, cutting Houston’s lead at the time to 7-2.
UP NEXT
Mitch Keller, fresh off seven innings of one-run ball in Boston, will start Tuesday, his first career start against Houston.
