Pirates see rookie Oneil Cruz's improvement at the plate as an 'encouraging sign'

After Jacob deGrom dominated the second game of a doubleheader that left the Pittsburgh Pirates humbled, manager Derek Shelton searched for superlatives to describe the New York Mets ace.

“As screwed up as it sounds, you pick the small victories,” Shelton said, accentuating the strength of deGrom’s slider in the 10-0 loss. “Hopefully we don’t see many guys that throw that. So we have to build off some of those things. When you have a guy like him that’s such an outlier, sometimes you realize you’re facing one of the best pitchers in baseball.”

The biggest of the small victories might have come from the tallest of the Pirates’ position players. Oneil Cruz, the 6-foot-7 rookie shortstop, hit a leadoff single off deGrom with a soft line drive to left field in the first inning and ended Wednesday’s split doubleheader as the only Pirates player to record hits in both games after going 2 for 4 in the 5-1 loss in Game 1.

“He’s having way more consistent at-bats. He’s swinging at the right pitches,” Shelton said, “and I think that’s an encouraging sign and something we’ve been working on.”

Cruz has been one of the bright spots through the first six games of a nine-game homestand in which the Pirates have gone 1-5. Batting leadoff, he’s hitting .360 with a double, a triple, two home runs and four RBIs. He’s had more hits (nine) than strikeouts (seven). Over the past dozen games, Cruz is batting .298 (14 for 47) with two doubles, two triples, three homers and nine RBIs but has 15 strikeouts against three walks.

“I’ve got to give credit to my work ethic, the work that I’m putting in, the cage work that I’m putting in, just having better pitch selection at the (batter’s) box and focusing on a zone in the box,” Cruz said through translator Mike Gonzalez. “I think that’s giving me results right now.”

More Oneil Cruz news:

• Oneil Cruz homers into river, Mitch Keller throws 6 scoreless as Pirates pound Mets
• Pirates rookie shortstop Oneil Cruz searches for consistency amid struggles at the plate
• Pirates rookie Oneil Cruz sets Statcast record for hardest hit with 122.4-mph single

Cruz had one of his best games as a Pirate in Tuesday’s 8-2 win over the Mets. He went 3 for 5 with two runs and two RBIs and fell a triple shy of hitting for the cycle, after chipping his front tooth off his helmet while sliding head-first into second base.

In the eighth inning, Cruz made a splash by crushing a 422-foot home run that cleared the right-field seats at PNC Park and landed in the Allegheny River. It was his 13th homer in 64 games, putting Cruz on a pace for 33 homers over a full 162-game season, but his first that ended up in the water.

“I wasn’t very sure that it was going to land in the river,” Cruz said. “However, at the speed it was going and the height it was going, I thought it was 50-50. … To be honest, I just care that it’s a home run, even if it goes barely over the fence.”

What impressed Shelton more than Cruz connecting three times at exit velocities of 110.9 mph or higher against the Mets was how he went opposite field for a 422-foot solo home run into the bullpen in left-center in a 4-3 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays on Sunday. With a 16-degree launch angle and a 115.8-mph exit velocity that Pirates starter JT Brubaker compared to hitting with a 2-iron in golf, it was a blast that barely cleared the fence but showed Cruz’s tremendous power.

“To go left-center in the bullpen here for a left-handed hitter,” Shelton said, “that’s the challenge: making sure that he stays in the middle of the field and stays within his approach. That one he kind of got out front, and he has that ability to lift the ball and has that kind of strength.”

For as much as Cruz has made headlines this season for smashing Statcast records with eye-popping exit velocities — he owns nine of the team’s top 10 this season — his propensity for striking out can’t be ignored. He has 94 strikeouts in 255 plate appearances, a 36.9% rate the Pirates addressed by concentrating on his hitting zone.

“I think it’s just continuing to learn and grow and swing at the right pitches,” Shelton said. “It’s something that we’ve continued to talk about. I think we’ve seen when he swings at the right pitches, he hits the ball hard, and we just have to continue to focus on that.”