Where the 2023 Pirates' April ranks in franchise history

WASHINGTON -- The Pirates have been around for so long, and accomplished so much, that franchise history is no easy thing to make. And yet consider their surprising start to this season in this context: Had Pittsburgh collected its 21st victory in its 29th game on Sunday, it would have matched the 1992 squad for the franchise’s second-best 29-game start.

The franchise record was set 102 (!) years ago when the 1921 Pirates went 23-6 in their first 29 games. Still, only one Pirate team since started stronger than these 2023 Pirates, even after this year's crew endured a two-and-a-half-hour rain delay and a rough Johan Oviedo start in Sunday’s 7-2 loss to the Nationals at Nationals Park.

The series finale result was an outlier to end what can objectively be called one of the best Aprils in club history, in which the Pirates finished winners of 11 of their last 13 games and with a National League-best 20-9 record.

Before they open May with a matchup against the MLB-best Rays -- the only team in baseball with a better record -- let’s consider for a moment just how unusually excellent the month of April was in Pittsburgh:

• The Pirates' 20-9 record through 29 games constitutes their best start since 1992, when the team started 21-8 and finished 96-66 en route to a division title and came one win away from the World Series.
• Only three times have the Pirates needed fewer games to reach the 20-win mark in a season than the 28 this team needed: 1902 (24 games), 1921 (26 games) and 1977 (27 games).
• They finished April 11 games over .500. When they reached that figure Saturday, it marked the first time since the end of the 2015 season. That was also, not coincidentally, the Pirates’ last postseason team.

How are they doing this, exactly? Here are a few reasons:

The pitching
Oviedo’s seven-run blowup Sunday stands out amid a Pirates’ staff that enters May third in the NL in ERA (3.55). Their rotation leads baseball in quality starts (18), the NL in innings and strikeouts, and their 3.10 bullpen ERA ranks second.

The Pirates are capitalizing. They are 15-3 when their starter goes at least six innings, and 18-1 when leading after six innings.

“It started in Spring Training, the way we came out from Day 1 and emphasized the importance of throwing strikes and attacking the strike zone,” left-hander Rich Hill said. “It’s something we've harped on all year, and that's one thing we've been able to see from the starting rotation right on into the bullpen. Everybody's been throwing the ball great.”

The hitting
Even after being quieted Sunday by Josiah Gray and two Nats relievers, the Pirates have still outscored their opponents 90-37 since April 18. They lead the NL in runs scored (156) and run differential (+48) thanks to contributions from up and down the lineup, from stars Bryan Reynolds (.926 OPS, 23 RBIs) and Andrew McCutchen (5 HR, .830 OPS) and breakout hitters Connor Joe (4 HR, .962 OPS) and Jack Suwinski (1.011 OPS). The team lost budding star shortstop Oneil Cruz early to injury, only to watch Rodolfo Castro slide in and post an .853 OPS in the season’s first month-plus.

The baserunning
When MLB’s new rules altered the stolen base landscape prior to this season, many predicted young, athletic teams like the Pirates would take advantage. They have. Pittsburgh swiped two more bases Sunday to bring its pre-May total to 41 -- the most in baseball and 14 more than any other NL team.

Of those, 39 came in the month of April -- their most in a month since swiping 42 in May 1981 (also the most by any team in a month since the Royals stole 39 in September 2018). They’ve also stolen at least one base in seven straight games for the first time since 2014.

“We’re resilient; we play hard,” manager Derek Shelton said. “There are a lot of things we’ve done well. We’ve caught the baseball, we’ve executed and we just need to continue to do that as May starts.”