Pirates Rookie Continues Great Start

Ashcraft is relishing his opportunties out of the bullpen and it showed in his prior two appearances before this game.

He made his MLB debut vs. the Arizona Diamondbacks at Chase Field on May 26, throwing three scoreless innings, allowing just two hits and a walk and striking out center fielder Tim Tawa in the 5-0 shutout loss.

Ashcraft also threw a scoreless eighth inning vs. the San Diego Padres at Petco Park on June, striking out two batters in the 6-4 defeat.

This was the first game he got the chance to pitch with a lead and knew the importance, shutting the Astros offense down in the victory for the Pirates.

“Yeah, if you’re coming out of the pen, that’s where you want to be," Ashcraft said. "You want to be in a situation where every single pitch counts a little bit more. My whole career as a starter, you know what your role is and it’s to get as deep into the game as you can with as little runs as you can."

"But, in that situation in a 3-0 game, every single run, every single pitch and every single at-bat counts a little bit more. There’s not many innings to make up ground, so it was a cool situation to be put into, especially in my third outing in the big leagues. It’s something I don’t necessarily recognize at that time, it’s just we’re going out to get outs and get them as efficiently as we can so we can go as many innings as I can.” 

Ashcraft has also enjoyed pitching for new Pirates manager Don Kelly, but is still focused on doing anything he can to help the Pirates win.

"When you do certain things well, you get more opportunities," Ashcraft said. "That goes with anything, whether it's baseball, work, life, anything. My focus is going out and doing my job to the best of my ability. With that, opportunity comes. That's what our goal is. It doesn't matter if you're a pitcher or a position player. Our job is to do this to the best of our ability. With that comes more responsibility, and that's something I enjoy. That's part of the game."

"Any opportunity to help this team win is something that I enjoy being able to do. So, yeah, I mean it is nice to recognize they have this confidence in me. But at the end of the day, the job is to help the team win, and that's what I'm focused on."

This was also the first appearance for Ashcraft at PNC Park, giving him the experience of pitching in front of the home fans for the first time and what he hopes is one of many to come.

"It's a long run," Ashcraft said. "I was kinda begging for him to check me, but it was cool running in and seeing the fans, going up to the mound and doing what we do. This is a really cool job that we have. I've been just trying to soak up every second of it, soak up every second of every stadium that we're in. Like I said, this is the most fun I've ever had playing baseball. I've had a lot of fun with these guys. It's a good environment and it's really fun to win."