Marte blasts 3-run walk-off home run in extras

PITTSBURGH -- A few minutes before Sunday’s series finale at PNC Park, general manager Neal Huntington provided a list of nearly everything that’s gone wrong for the Pirates this season. Huntington is a fast talker when he gets on a roll, and it still took him the better part of a minute to cover all the injuries, significant slumps and bullpen blowups.

Yet after coming back in the 13th inning to beat the A’s, 5-3, the Pirates entered Monday’s off-day sitting a game above .500 at 16-15. It’s not where they want to be, of course, and it will take more time to dig out of the hole they created with an eight-game losing streak. But it’s much better than where they could be given the long list of issues Huntington recounted.

“That’s the recipe for a 10-20 team,” Huntington said. “This club has continued to be resilient.”

• Box score

There might not be a better word to describe the way Pittsburgh won on Sunday. The Pirates’ bats went silent after the sixth inning, and the A’s capitalized on a pair of walks against lefty Tyler Lyons and took a 3-1 lead. Considering the Pirates hadn’t scored since the second inning, that should have put an end to it, right?

“Going into the 12th or 13th or 400th inning with one run, it’s easy to get discouraged,” shortstop Cole Tucker said. “But we have complete belief in our lineup and the position that we’re going to put ourselves in to win.”

Tucker started it off with a one-out single, then Jung Ho Kang walked and Adam Frazier drove in one run with a single to center. Up came Starling Marte, who said he was just looking to hit a game-tying sacrifice fly off Oakland’s Fernando Rodney.

Instead, Marte cleared the fence in front of the A’s bullpen with his fifth career walk-off homer and eighth career walk-off hit.

“It signified a lot to be able to be that guy,” Marte said through interpreter Mike Gonzalez. “It brings me back to that place of being that guy that the team can continue to depend on.”

But first, let’s review Huntington’s list:

• Corey Dickerson, the Pirates’ .300-hitting, Gold Glove-winning left fielder, has played in four games.

• Gregory Polanco, their starting right fielder, missed nearly a month.

• Lonnie Chisenhall, their replacement right fielder, has not played all season.

• Erik Gonzalez, their starting shortstop, is going to be sidelined at least two more months following a collision that knocked out Marte for nine games.

• Kevin Newman, their backup shortstop, missed nearly a month due to a finger injury resulting from a freak accident with a pitching machine.

• They’ve had at least one catcher, Elias Diaz or Jacob Stallings, on the injured list all season.

• Two of their regulars, Francisco Cervelli and Kang, own batting averages below .180.

• Starter Chris Archer is on the injured list, and Opening Day starter Jameson Taillon -- bothered all season by elbow pain -- joined him there on Saturday.

• A handful of high-leverage relievers, including setup men Keone Kela and Richard Rodriguez, have struggled or been injured or both. Then they lost promising rookie Nick Burdi to a biceps injury.

• They’ve lost three games when leading after seven innings, matching their total from last year.

• They’ve already been through an eight-game losing streak, their longest skid since 2016.

How, then, have they not fallen off a cliff already? How do they have a winning record?

It begins, as it did on Sunday, with their starting pitching. Right-hander Jordan Lyles allowed only one run over 6 2/3 innings against Oakland. It will be critical for the Pirates to get more strong work out of their rotation as they move forward without Taillon and at least temporarily without Archer. Lyles stepped up in that regard.

“The start we got today was very strong,” manager Clint Hurdle said. “With two starters out, for him to get bumped up and go ahead and go that deep in the game and pitch into the seventh, we needed it.”

First baseman Josh Bell has carried the Pirates' lineup through all their struggles at the plate and stints on the injured list. He played a part again on Sunday, bashing a leadoff double to the left-center-field notch in the second inning and eventually coming around to score on Colin Moran's sacrifice fly.

Then there’s an unquantifiable aspect, the next-man-up mentality. The Pirates only used 48 players last season, but their total for this season ticked up to 34 when Dovydas Neverauskas and Lyons took the mound on Sunday. After Lyons allowed two runs, Tucker said, his teammates told him they had his back.

“More than anything, it’s keeping a positive mindset within the clubhouse,” Marte said. “The second thing is the energy, making sure that we’re giving out positive energy to one another.”

It's been enough for the Pirates to stay above water through 31 games. But they have higher expectations, and Huntington's list seemingly never gets shorter. Can they keep it up?

"We’re going to have to find a way to score more runs. We’re going to have to figure out a way to cover those nine innings and keep our opponents’ run totals down," Huntington said. “It’s going to be a challenge. But we’ve already faced a ton of adversity, and this club continues to fight and fight its way to .500 and now hopefully push above it.”