Bart’s homer helps Pirates reach .500 by All-Star break

CHICAGO -- A lot has changed for the Pirates in one week. After blowing a ninth-inning lead against the New York Mets on July 7 -- which dropped them to five games under .500 -- Pittsburgh still had a chance to get back to .500 on the final day before the All-Star break.

Behind Joey Bart's three-run go-ahead home run in the fourth inning, the Pirates beat the White Sox, 9-4, on Sunday afternoon at Guaranteed Rate Field to close out the first half with a 48-48 record. That .500 record is the first time Pittsburgh will be .500 or better entering the All-Star break since 2016 (46-43).

“It's huge for the team,” starter Mitch Keller said. “That was the goal coming into this road series, trying to leave here at .500, and we accomplished that goal. And I think we played really good baseball this last series and even when we were at home. So just trying to take this and roll with it in the second half.”

The Pirates have been playing much better baseball lately, winning six of their past seven games. Sunday’s victory also marked the first time since their season-opening series against the Marlins that Pittsburgh has swept a team.

The recent hot stretch has surely put them into the thick of things in the playoff picture heading into the All-Star break. With the Cardinals (50-46) and Mets (49-46) both dropping their final games of the first half, the Pirates are just two games back from the second Wild Card spot and 1 1/2 games from the third Wild Card spot.

“We played really well over the last series,” manager Derek Shelton said. “I mean, going to Milwaukee and winning two and then coming here and getting a sweep -- it’s just part of our group.”

Sunday was a different type of game for the Pirates, considering Keller went just three innings -- snapping his 49-game streak of starts in which he went at least five innings, which tied him with A.J. Burnett (49 from May 8, 2012, to Aug. 10, 2013) for the second-longest such streak in Pirates history. But the offense showed up when it needed to most.

With Pittsburgh trailing in the top of the fourth inning, Bart had a chance to do damage after Ke’Bryan Hayes singled and Joshua Palacios walked with one out. The 27-year-old catcher then got a pitch to hit and drove a 90 mph cutter a Statcast-projected 416 feet to put the team on top.

“It was good,” Bart said. “We were kind of grinding today. Today is the day that everybody's been looking forward to. We get a break here. So it was nice to get a little jolt of energy there on a hot day. I was extremely happy about it.”

Sunday’s go-ahead homer is not the first time Bart has come up in key spots this season. He entered the day hitting .316 with runners on base, and on Tuesday against the Brewers, he launched a grand slam to give Pittsburgh a six-run lead.

Bart has surely endured some struggles at the plate since making his MLB debut in 2020. He hit just .207 with five doubles and five RBIs across 30 games with the Giants in 2023 before spending most of the year working on things in Triple-A.

However -- as seen by his two big home runs this week -- Bart’s talent is certainly there. He was the second overall pick in the 2018 MLB Draft by the Giants, and he has shown glimpses of his potential so far in his short career.

“The ability to drive the ball out of the ballpark,” Shelton said about what he likes most about Bart’s bat. “I think we saw it today. He got a 3-2 pitch from [Chad] Kuhl and was able to get it up. That was a big momentum swing in the game.”

The Pirates are definitely happy to see Bart hit for some power over the past week. They’re hoping he can keep that up, because the team has some tough matchups on the schedule to open the second half.

“We’ve got a tough road coming out of the break, because we have Philly and St. Louis, and then we get Arizona,” Shelton said. “We’ve got some teams that are in front of us, so we need to play well coming out of the break."