Pham's homer snaps Bucs' scoreless streak as road woes continue

KANSAS CITY -- After one of the best homestands in decades, the Pirates seemed to be in position to wrap up the first half of the season on a strong note. All that was standing in their way to the All-Star break was a three-city road trip.

That road trip is now halfway through, and it’s been a very rough start. After being shut out in all three games of a weekend set in Seattle, Pittsburgh fell to Kansas City, 9-3, in the series opener on Monday night at Kauffman Stadium.

Tommy Pham's third-inning homer gave the Pirates a 2-1 lead and snapped a 30-inning scoreless streak, but the Royals got to Andrew Heaney early and often. Heaney did not have his breaking or offspeed stuff, and had it not been for an impressive catch by a backtracking Pham, his line would have likely looked a lot worse than what it already was: three innings, four runs on six hits and one walk with two strikeouts.

"I need everything to kind of be going well to go deep into the game, and I just didn't really have a whole lot today,” Heaney said.

Road troubles have been a recurring theme for Pittsburgh this season, sitting now at 12-33 away from PNC Park. Only the Rockies (11-34) and White Sox (11-36) have a worse road record than the Bucs. (By comparison, their 26-21 home record would extrapolate to roughly 90 wins over a full season.)

Heaney’s splits are indicative of those extreme home-road splits. In eight starts at PNC Park, Heaney has pitched to a 2.53 ERA. In 10 starts on the road, it’s 6.16. Monday’s start, his shortest of the season, didn’t help matters.

Heaney is one of the better starting pitchers on this year’s trade market, and while he has a long track record of more than 10 years of service, those splits may be worth an eyebrow raise. PNC Park is one of the more friendly ballparks for left-handed pitchers thanks to that cavernous left-center notch, and Heaney has allowed twice as many homers on the road (10) than he has at home (five), including a first-inning bomb by Royals first baseman Vinnie Pasquantino.

“I don't know how much PNC has to do with that,” manager Don Kelly said. “This is such a big ballpark, too. I don't know if it's a comfortability thing or what there. But just trying to find a way to attack the zone and use his offspeed effectively, and command his fastball like he does [is key].”

The bullpen did not fare much better in Heaney’s stead, with the usually reliable Chase Shugart allowing home runs to Bobby Witt Jr. and Salvador Perez while trying to eat innings. The Royals hit four on the evening, while the Pirates would only get one more run in the ninth on Alexander Canario’s two-out single.

The first half of the season has presented plenty of challenges to the Pirates, and getting through the ebbs and flow of a year is part of the game. They are certainly in a rough patch now, but Kelly’s messaging is staying consistent.

“Just continue that same mindset that we've had throughout the season of competing every pitch, going out there, working hard to get better every day and find a way to help us win,” Kelly said. “I think that as you go through a season, these times do get frustrating, especially with offense not clicking. It's really fun, there's a lot of energy when the offense was clicking at home and things were going really well. And now, we need to find a way to pick that up.”