Bucs making push with ‘next guy up’ mentality

CHICAGO — On the day they lost a 13-inning thriller to the division-rival Cubs, the Pirates also placed staff ace Gerrit Cole on the 15-day disabled list with right elbow inflammation. Such adversity has been a staple of their season. Would you believe the Bucs now have zero active starters who were in their season-opening starting five?

It has been a lost year for Cole, a down year for Andrew McCutchen, a year in which the Pirates dealt their Opening Day starter, Francisco Liriano, and their dependable closer, Mark Melancon, at the Trade Deadline and a year that has been more about transition than triumph.

So what on earth are the Pirates doing within 1 1/2 games of a National League Wild Card spot?

“It hasn’t been linear by any means,” manager Clint Hurdle said of Pittsburgh’s path to contention. “It’s kind of been an Etch-A-Sketch type of season.”

The Pirates are surviving it, though, in large part because of what they got back when they made the difficult decision to deal away two important pieces. Moving Liriano to the Blue Jays with a year-plus of contractual control remaining and Melancon to the Nationals just ahead of his free agency was viewed by many in the industry as an effort more to cut costs than to improve in the present day.

But Ivan Nova, acquired in a separate and low-profile deal with the Yankees, has been a revelation in the rotation in the place of the struggling Liriano. And the young lefty acquired in the Melancon deal, Felipe Rivero, has been a shutdown weapon in high-leverage relief.

So maybe these guys who put together the second-best record in baseball over the course of 2013-15 despite a strict budget know what they’re doing after all, huh?

“We traded some guys away,” McCutchen said, “but we got some people in return. It’s not like we traded somebody away and got no one in return.”

Here’s what they got …

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