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Frank Coonelly does not hide his emotions well. He can be seen silently steaming when the Pirates lose, beaming when they win.
Suffice it to say the team president has been all steam of late, including with this latest loss, 4-1, to the Cincinnati Reds yesterday at PNC Park.
That would be six in a row.
And 23 in 26 games, the worst such stretch since 1890.
"The team's recent play has been extremely disappointing. Beyond that, it has been downright aggravating," Coonelly said. "Decisions that we made for next year and beyond certainly left us short in some areas, but there is no excuse for the poor performance we've seen down the stretch."
Aside from citing the short-term effect of some of the team's many trades, he made clear that his dissatisfaction was aimed at the players.
• Game: Pirates vs. Los Angeles Dodgers, 7:05 p.m., PNC Park.
• TV, radio: FSN Pittsburgh, WPGB-FM (104.7).
• Pitching: RHP Jeff Karstens (3-5, 5.53) vs. RHP Jon Garland (11-11, 4.02).
• Key matchup: Everyone vs. Garland, 4-0 in his past five starts with a 1.85 ERA, including beating the Pirates Sept. 15 at Dodger Stadium.
• Of note: Since Garrett Jones' promotion June 30, only four players in Major League Baseball have more home runs than his 20: Derrek Lee (24), Prince Fielder (23), Mark Reynolds (22) and Ryan Howard (22).
"The players on the major league club have had a unique opportunity to make a positive impression going into this offseason, and very few have seized it. That will certainly play a role in our offseason decision-making. With the players who have seized their opportunity and the many players coming behind them, we remain convinced that we are much closer to playing winning baseball in Pittsburgh than it appears. But I am very frustrated that the fans who have supported us so passionately for so long have had to endure such poor play."
That poor play continued yesterday with the Pirates' plodding lineup again coming up empty, just five hits during Bronson Arroyo's seven innings and nine hits in all.
"Arroyo's tough, ranging from 60 to 88 on the gun," manager John Russell said. "But we didn't get many opportunities. When you're not scoring too many runs, you're not going to win too many games."
There is proof: Since the All-Star break, the Pirates' 219 runs and .239 batting average are the worst marks in Major League Baseball. In that span, they are 18-45.
All of the Pirates' offense in this one came in the seventh, after they trailed, 4-0, when Lastings Milledge hit his third home run. Otherwise, nothing really strung together until the ninth, when Jason Jaramillo went to the box as the potential tying run but struck out looking to end it.
Case in point about the stringing together: Andrew McCutchen opened the first inning by working a 10-pitch walk off Arroyo, which not only put a man aboard but might have set the tone for Arroyo to run up his pitch count early. Delwyn Young, the next batter, swung at the first pitch for a 4-6-3 double play.
If Arroyo was the reason for the Pirates' ineffectiveness, it apparently was news to him.
"I didn't have very good stuff, and I was hoping to get through the first few innings and kind of catch a groove," Arroyo said.
The Pirates' starter, Charlie Morton, was charged with four runs and six hits over seven innings, with all of those runs and four of those hits coming in a four-batter span of the Cincinnati third: After two outs, Drew Sutton's book-rule double scored one run, Joey Votto's follow-up double brought two more, Brandon Phillips' single another.
"I had a bad sequence of a few hitters that cost us the game," Morton said. "I allowed a couple of their good hitters -- and Votto's really good -- to get too comfortable. I wasn't aggressive enough. But, as the game went on, I felt like I learned more about how I needed to approach them, as opposed to just throwing from what I saw on paper."
Russell praised Morton for that aggressiveness, particularly his pitching inside.
"Charlie threw really well, if you take away those three or four hitters," Russell said. "He was really aggressive in his mindset. I was impressed, and I'm encouraged. I think he's growing up physically and mentally, and you can see the progress he's making for us."
The Pirates must go 7-4 to avoid 100 losses, and on deck are the Los Angeles Dodgers, the National League's best.
