'The future is here': Pirates rookies promise winning while warning not to get used to losing

The Pittsburgh Pirates had lost 12 of their first 14 games to start July, so it was no surprise Henry Davis had a one-word answer when the rookie right fielder/catcher was asked how he was doing: Terrible.

Davis hates losing, so he was miserable.

What Pirates fans wanted to see was an immediate impact the way the promotion of Elly De La Cruz had on Cincinnati, as his arrival sparked a 12-game winning streak that catapulted the Reds into first place in the NL Central and wild-card contention by the time Davis made his major-league debut June 19.

Davis debuted six games into what would become a 10-game losing streak. By July 19, the Pirates had slipped to last place in the NL Central and 10½ games back. During that one-month stretch, the Pirates promoted five more top-10 prospects to the majors — second baseman Nick Gonzales, right-handed pitcher Quinn Priester, catcher Endy Rodriguez and shortstop Liover Peguero — in an announcement that the future is now.

“I think that the organization trusts us,” Rodriguez said before his July 17 debut. “They think we can help the team to win games. We’re here for that. We have our careers to prepare for being here now and winning again.”

Afterward, despite an 11-0 loss to Cleveland, Rodriguez remained extremely confident.

“The future is here, man,” Rodriguez said. “I know we’re going to do something special with this team. At some point, we’re going to do the best job. I know we have a lot of younger players here and I think we have the talent. We’re going to do something special.”

That the rookies arrived with fanfare, only to experience lots of losing, didn’t sit well with Davis.

“I think it’s important not to get numb to it,” Davis said. “It doesn’t have to be perfect to understand that winning in the big leagues is not easy, but it doesn’t mean that you don’t come in with the expectation to win every single day. I think the most important piece during stretches like this, where the team is not playing well, is that we have to let the losing suck. Let it be a feeling that is terrible. Don’t get used to it. Channel it into your work the next day.

“Even a team that wins 100 games is going to lose 62. Every one of those losses is an opportunity to let all that energy and that frustration turn into a really productive workday. Let it tell you what you need to work on right now. It can be individual, like me doing outfield work every day with (Tarrik) Brock, or it can be as a team, saying, ‘We’ve got to get really fired up for those competitive moments with runners in scoring position.’ That’s the key, to let it burn and let it (stink) and just let it turn into energy for the next day. You can’t get accustomed to it.”

The Pirates are banking on players they branded as Young Bucs for the rest of this season, as they cleared playing time by dealing five players by Tuesday’s MLB trade deadline in moves general manager Ben Cherington said should send a strong message: “We want to win as fast as we possibly can.”

After starting the season 20-8, the Pirates went 14-24, a .368 winning percentage, before making the first of the first-round call-ups by promoting right-handed reliever Carmen Mlodzinski on June 16. Since then, with a starting lineup that often features four or more rookies, they are 15-27 (.357).

The Pirates know it’s not common to win with rookies in the majors, but they believe their future will be better served by playing them now so that they have more experience when the team is ready to contend. They are showing a willingness to live with the rookie mistakes while occasionally reaping the benefits of their talent, given that Davis, Mlodzinski, Gonzales and Priester are all former first-round picks and Rodriguez and Peguero were international prospects who arrived in trades involving All-Stars Starling Marte and Joe Musgrove, respectively.

“We’ve been talking about the young guys for what seems like years now. Now, we’re really seeing the wave of them coming up,” Pirates outfielder Bryan Reynolds said. “It’s good to see the young guys come up and have success, to create that environment of success for young guys. That will help us win down the road.

“If you’re going to turn into a winning team, you have to have your young guys be good. The only way for them to be good is to have experience. If they’re ready, call ‘em up, regardless of if you’re in contention or not in contention. That’s what we did, and I think it’s paying off now. I think it’ll pay off more as we get going next year and so on.”

Davis’ inexperience in right field has been glaring, yet he has shown off his arm strength, most notably in combining with Rodriguez and Gonzales for a rare 9-2-4-2 double play last Sunday in a 6-4 walk-off win over the Philadelphia Phillies. Davis also endured an 0-for-25 stretch at the plate before going 2 for 5 with a two-run homer in an 8-4 win at Milwaukee on Friday night.

Mlodzinski’s ERA dropped from 5.79 on June 22 to 2.21, thanks to an 0.82 ERA in 10 appearances in July, and he has become a trusted reliever in high-leverage situations who got himself into and pitched his way out of a bases-loaded jam in the seventh inning Friday in Milwaukee.

Jared Triolo has batted .272 with a .327 on-base percentage and delivered strong defense at third base in Ke’Bryan Hayes’ absence.

“All the Young Bucs, they’re up here and having some success, so it’s great to see that,” Hayes said. “It’s kind of like how I did the past few years, continue to get that experience, seeing certain guys and being in certain situations. … It’s going to be pretty fun these last two months, to continue to grow and keep this energy as a team, that chemistry, especially with the young guys that are going to help us down the road.”

Of course, there have been some struggles. Where Peguero has posted a .531 slugging percentage in his first dozen games, he has a .265 OBP. Where Triolo has shown he can hit, only two have gone for extra bases. Where Gonzales has hit a pair of 400-foot homers to straightaway center, he was demoted after slashing .216/.268/.353 in 31 games.

But it was telling that the Pirates were willing to trade a versatile infielder with power in 24-year-old Rodolfo Castro to the Phillies for left-handed pitcher Bailey Falter, who was scheduled to make his starting debut for the Pirates on Saturday. The Pirates are giving their rookies a chance to make a strong impression in the final two months and even clearing out players who stand in their path.

“They hold the cards for making either a tough decision for the front office to have them here next year to the start of the season or vice-versa,” Pirates designated hitter Andrew McCutchen said. “That’s up to them. That’s up to how they play the game the next couple months. It’s up to me, how I play, if I’m going to be here next year and have a chance to continue to keep playing. We all have a responsibility. We just have to go out there, play our best, do our best job so when the season’s over, we can say, ‘I did everything I could possible.’ That’s up to them to make that decision. That’s it. Just continue to grind.”

What helps the rookies through the grind is they have each other to lean on while dealing with good times and bad, just as they did in the minors. All it takes is one look around the clubhouse to know they’re not alone.

“It’s huge. It’s something that makes you feel like you’re very important and something you’ve gotta take care of. I feel really glad to have those guys around me,” Peguero said. “Being able to experience this up here and have the kind of people like that around you, it makes you wanna do more things. … Having those guys around you makes you feel like you gotta do the best you can all the time.”

The Pirates are paying off on a promise to their rookies by rewarding their hard work through the minors, where the top prospects built a strong bond, with ample opportunity for playing time in the majors. The rest, as McCutchen said, is up to them.

“It’s something we’ve been working on, so seeing it happen makes us feel really good,” Peguero said. “We always heard that hard work always pays off, so I think that’s what’s happening right now. We truly believe in this team, all of us. All of the things that they’re doing, I think those things are going to come out in a good way.”

Now, the Pirates are counting on the rookies to deliver on their promise, by paying off with performances that will spark a franchise turnaround after back-to-back 100-loss seasons. That starts with not getting numb to the losing, by channeling their frustration into production and by bringing an expectation of winning to a team that hasn’t done much of it.

“This is something we’ve been talking about every year,” Peguero said. “This team’s gonna be a championship winner. I promise you it will be very soon.”

For the Pirates, whose future is here, it can’t come soon enough.