And good morning. Welcome into the Pirates Insider Show podcast. I am Jason Mackey. I am your host, of course, and welcome along to this maiden voyage of the Pirates Insiders Show podcast. This is a place where you can find daily recaps, analysis, all kinds of other stuff. Basically every day, 10 to 15 minutes a day, talking Pirates Baseball. Hopefully you can listen to it, I don't know, on a short walk or a run, driving to work, wherever it fits your schedule. We are here and we're going to be growing this thing, and I'm pretty excited about it. The latest endeavor in my new position and uh a lot of talking baseball. So it's going to be fun. Today's game, it wasn't the most fun of the year. Again, the Pirates suffered a seven to two loss to the Chicago Cubs. It was a Paul Skeens day. Skeens started out really, really good. And we'll get into all of that. There's some news that happened pregame. Jared Jones, of course, will start Friday night against the Minnesota Twins. Derek Shelton back in town. Connor Griffin not in the lineup today. He's dealing with a bit of a right forearm issue. Nick Gonzalez left after a couple innings. Tyler Callahan is up. He took over as Marilyn Valdez goes down. We'll get into all of those storylines, of course. And again, 10 to 15 minutes a clip and just talking some baseball here in a studio down the hall from the Pirates Clubhouse. It's going to be a great setting to get into some baseball discussion. So Paul Skeens tonight, absolutely incredible early on. Struck out seven of the first eight that tied for his most strikeouts through three innings. And Skeens just, it looked like one of those nights, right? It looked like one of those nights where Paul Skeens was unstoppable. He was going to do something historic, but not so much. It didn't end up that way. His final line, five and a third innings pitched, three runs, one earned on four hits, three walks, 10 strikeouts, 103 pitches, 62 strikes. He finished with 20 whiffs and some ins and outs of Skeens outing. Um ends up issuing a two-out walk to Dansby Swanson in the third, and then a single to Pete Crow Armstrong. Solid play by Joe Stinson Garcia in left field to throw him out. And then in the fourth inning, Skeens gets touched up for a run. This guy, Ian Hap, maybe you've heard of him. He's been killing the Pirates. And he did it again in this one. Ian Hap was a pain in the you know what. Uh, but he gets an RBI, finished with three hits, had a home run late off of Brandon Boudois. Prior to tonight's game, he was hitting 308 with the 944 OPS in 127 games against the Pirates with 20 home runs in 85 RBIs. I didn't look up specifically what he's done at PNC Park, but uh rest assured, it was very good. Uh so the Cubs get one run in the fourth. They get two more in the sixth. And so Skeens starts the inning, gets a line out, then issues a walk. Tyler Callahan makes an error, uh, and then a single from Ian Hap, our old friend, a ball that Jared Triolo uh throws away. And that basically does it for Paul Skeens. Don Kelly pulls him at that point, goes with Mason Montgomery. And a sneaky good outing again by Mason Montgomery. He has been really solid for the Pirates bullpen. Certainly there's been areas of concern, but he did it in Toronto on Sunday, did it again, went 1-2-3 in the seventh, struck out two. His season ERA, this is again for Mason Montgomery, 3.22. Other than Gregory Soto, he's been the Pirates' best reliever. Brian Reynolds, another storyline in this one. Hits a home run, doubles. He's really feeling it. We know those stretches that Brian Reynolds can get on, and he seems to be on another one right now. He's really been uh taking it to the Cubs. In this series, he finishes 8 for 15 all time, has 98 hits against the Chicago Cubs since making his major league debut on April 20th, 2019. That's more than any other major leaguer uh during that time. And prior to Thursday, Reynolds was hitting 294 with an 816 OPS in May. So some concerns about Reynolds early on. Not so much now. Uh, but as we get back to the game, Cubs built the 3-0 lead. Pirates answer a little bit with two runs in the bottom of the sixth, that Reynolds home run. Uh Joe Stinson Garcia legs out an infield single, and Tyler Callahan with a nice double uh to the right center gap. And what an interesting story with Callahan. Um, or it just, you know, unique the way he was talking to us. Um said he got here about 6:50, was walking in with the fans and his bag, and uh was a late arrival due to a flight delay uh going through O'Hare. I've certainly been there, Kyler. I know how that feels, but uh gets in late. Nick Gonzalez has a knee issue, and he left after three innings. That's bothering him. That came from a foul tip on Wednesday. Uh Don Kelly was asked after the game by Connor Griffin and Nick Gonzalez. They're both day-to-day. Uh, but anyway, uh, Gonzalez gutted it out for three innings, kept kind of locking up on them, and Tyler Callahan took over at that point. I mean, that's going to be a pretty significant storyline. We had a move before the game, like I said, and it's it's going to continue to be something for the Pirates. What happens to Nick Gonzalez? What happens to Connor Griffin? Jared Jones is going to come back. There's a corresponding move. Maybe they have to uh do something with the pitcher, but it a lot of moving parts with the Pirates right now. Things kind of feel unsettled. And I mean, obviously, there's stuff going on on the field. You want to see better results. They had a chance to, you know, take three or four from the Cubs, maybe sweep the series. They end up splitting the series. This was an opportunity for them to kind of get hot. Didn't happen. Uh, but we'll see what happens against the Twins this weekend. Derek Shelton back in town. But uh, I want to talk a little bit too on this podcast about the pregame news and you know, kind of the various situations. We spent time talking to Don Kelly too. And finally, the decision is here. And let's talk about where the Pirates are at with their pitching, why they did what they did. Jared Jones starting tomorrow night or Friday night, I should say tonight, when you're listening to this. Um, I can't say it's surprising. I expected them to use Jared Jones as a starter. I think a lot of that is him coming off internal bray surgery, what he's worked to get back and show. Um, and it frankly, I'm interested in seeing it. You're interested in seeing it. We asked Paul Skeens afterward his thoughts. He said, You think I was throwing hard? Uh, Jared Jones is gonna be very pumped up. Had a chance to talk to him um yesterday evening about coming back. And uh he he was he was great about it. Talking about the time down, gave him a chance to look at some of his other pitches. Feels like he's a completely different pitcher. He's gonna be just as hyped up as he was around his major league debut, and he's just pumped to get back out on a major league mound. And the Pirates are a better team, and this is a it's a tough decision that they're making. Uh, certainly sensitive to that. We just got done talking to Carmen Majinski as well. And I mean, Carmen was you can kind of read between the lines, and it's a tough balance right now. And I understand where he's coming from, where like this kind of stinks for him. It's a tough pill to swallow. He understands why it's happening to a degree. Doesn't mean he has to like it. At the end of the day, he is a member of the team, the organization, and and you know, uh is going to do his job. Uh, but you know what? He had an opportunity to start. He did a lot of things really, really well, put up a 376 ERA. He had something to prove, thought that he proved it. I yeah, easy for the guy on the other end of the microphone to say, but I look at it like this with Carmen Majinski. And, you know, if he if he would be listening to this, I wouldn't expect him to like it. If I was the competitor in there, I wouldn't want to hear it either. But the Pirates are a better team with Carmen Majinski deployed in this role. And it's not a traditional, you're gonna go to the bullpen, you're gonna be a reliever kind of thing. I mean, I know that that that's what it is. That's where he's gonna be pitching out of. But what they're trying to do here is essentially address the biggest weakness of this team with the person most capable of doing it. And uh when I talked to Don Kelly about this, he framed it as a high-leverage bulk guy, which, you know, it sounds like a funky term, but it's true. Carmen's only going to be pitching in games where it really, really matters. He's not going to be going one or two innings at a clip. And the Pirates have needed somebody to take that opportunity and run with it. The game two nights ago was a perfect example. Like, was it Bubba Chandler's best start? No. But I mean, he certainly had worse, and it's a tie game in the middle of the game. The Pirates can't keep it there. They bring on Justin Lawrence, Johan Ramirez, they don't get the job done. The Cubs strike for a lot of runs in the seventh inning, and boom, they lose the game. Like if you have Carmen in that spot, somebody to hold it there, you're going to uh you give your you make your team, your your total team, so much better. Some of the other questions I got about this move, why not Bubba Chandler in the bullpen? I mean, my read on the situation is that Bubba Chandler's ceiling as a starter is so darn high. And no, he hasn't reached it, but for him to reach that, he has to pitch, he has to start, he has to continue doing what he's and you have to try to, you know, coax that aggressiveness, that not overthinking out of him. And I'm not sure you want him occupying that role that Carmen is occupying. I'm not sure I love Jared Jones as a closer. I want Jared Jones as a starter. I think there's a lot of value there. If I'm gonna take one person on the current staff who's been a reliever and make them a reliever again, it's probably Carmen. And that's a really difficult decision for Carmen for somebody who has wanted so badly to prove that he can start, it's a tough pill to swallow. The I guess what I would say to Carmen or how I would think about that if I was in the clubhouse, it doesn't have to be permanent. And I've learned this from covering baseball. I'm certainly not gonna put myself in their shoes. I don't know what it's like to play it, but being on this side covering it, you don't realize how much stuff changes until you're in the middle of it. And no decision that the pirates are making here is final. It can always change. It will change. I get asked a lot, what are they gonna do when? What if they have and it never comes to fruition. If you have too much pitching, that's a great problem to have. What I'm saying is I think Carmen can pitch well, can push, can earn the opportunity that he wants. I don't think his career is, you know, in jeopardy or anything like that because he's pitching out of the bullpen. He's gonna give the Pirates an opportunity to win more games this way. And I hope that's the point that we get to. Derek Shelton this weekend's gonna be interesting to see what sort of ovation Shelty gets. Um, I will just speak a little bit on my relationship with him, covering him. He's been nothing but a total pro to me. Um, you know, there's obviously a lot of, you know, vitriol and frustration directed at Shelty because of how, you know, his tenure went. Uh, but uh the guy gave a lot. The guy cared. The guy tried to do the best job that he could. It didn't work out. There's a lot of people that were frustrated during those years. It's not just Shelton, not just fans. A lot of things that didn't go the way anybody wanted it led to what we're seeing in 2026, the pirates operating in a different way. Uh, but I I can't sit here and, you know, be upset about Derek Shelton or I don't like I'm I'm I'm happy he's somewhere else, and I'm happy he's happy, and I also think the pirates are on a better track. Both things can be true, right? I I just he's never been anything but a total pro to me. It'll be good to see him on Friday. It will be interesting to see the reception that he gets. This has been the Pirates Insider Show podcast. Talk to you with another one of these tomorrow. I'm Jason Mackey. Thanks so much for listening.