Don Kelly wants Pirates to 'play aggressively,' so new manager willing to live with mistakes

If Don Kelly is going to put his personal stamp on the Pittsburgh Pirates as manager, he wants it to be with an aggressive attitude.

That’s why Kelly is willing to live with the defensive mishaps that proved costly for the Pirates in a 7-1 loss to the Cincinnati Reds on Monday night at PNC Park.

Where shortstop Isiah Kiner-Falefa made a throwing error on an Austin Hays single that put the go-ahead run in scoring position in the sixth inning, Kelly points to Kiner-Falefa’s range to get to that ball and a Santiago Espinal grounder in the first inning.

Where left fielder Tommy Pham dropped a low liner while trying to make a sliding catch, Kelly discussed the degree of difficulty involved and how it was a tough play for anyone to make.

“The way that I view it is, going out there to play defense, we’re not going out there to not make mistakes,” Kelly said. “We’re going out there to play aggressively and, honestly, I feel like we played pretty good baseball since the change was made up until this point. We’ve been in games, but tonight got away from us a little bit. We need to play better.”

A day after five of their 14 strikeouts against the Philadelphia Phillies were on called third strikes, the Pirates went down swinging on all seven strikeouts against the Reds. They managed only five hits and scored one run, yet both were improvements from the 1-0 loss on Sunday in Philly.

Kelly has managed with the mindset of giving the Pirates freedom to make plays, even if they occasionally go awry.

When Kiner-Falefa hit a leadoff single in the fifth inning against the Phillies on Sunday, he attempted to move into scoring position but was caught stealing. When the Pirates had runners on first and second in the seventh inning against the Phillies, Adam Frazier was instructed to bunt — only for it to bounce back to the mound, where reliever Orion Kerkering threw to third for a force out. Kiner-Falefa followed by grounding into an inning-ending double play.

Their offensive ineffectiveness dates to April 23, the start of a 24-game streak where the Pirates haven’t scored more than four runs in a game. They have been outscored 104-55 with four shutout losses and 10 games decided by one run over that span.

Kelly was asked if every mistake was magnified because of the offense.

“That’s a fair question, and it’s something that these guys feel,” Kelly said. “I go back to that mentality of, yes, we need to play good baseball while going out there to play aggressively and not go out there defensively not to make mistakes. That goes for the pitching, hitting, defense and baserunning as well.

“How do we go out and play the game the right way? Play aggressively. Offensively, do the things that we need to do. Attack when we need to attack when the ball’s in the middle of the plate. We’re not going out there to not strike out.”

But the Pirates aren’t taking advantage of the quality starts from the top of their rotation. They have scored a total of 33 runs over the 14 combined quality starts by Paul Skenes (3-5) and Mitch Keller (1-6), which is taking a toll on the All-Star right-handers’ records.

Keller doesn’t look at it like the mistakes are magnified so much as the stakes are raised because of the number of close games involving the Pirates, who are putting immense pressure on themselves to win.

“Every single night we go out there and every play is huge,” Keller said. “Every strike is huge, as you can see. Guys are getting on umpires all the time for counts going one way or the other. I wouldn’t say that plays here and there are more pressure or bigger than they seem. If we just take care of what we’re doing, it should take care of itself.”