Milwaukee Brewers at Pittsburgh Pirates 7/29/21 - MLB Picks & Predictions

The Milwaukee Brewers travel on the road to PNC Park to take on the Pittsburgh Pirates, who have been one of the worst teams in the MLB this season. The Pirates have lost two in a row, including the opening game of this series, which dropped them to 38-62 on the year sitting 20.5 games back in the NL Central. The Brewers lead the division, and after six wins in their last ten games have extend their lead to 7 games at 59-42 on the year.

Despite the success that Milwaukee has had this season, they’ve had their struggles at the plate hitting .225 on the year which ranks 29th in MLB but are scoring 4.44 runs per game which ranks 14th in the MLB this season. Center fielder Avisail Garcia has picked up the slack in production, he leads the team with 17 home runs, 59 RBIs and is hitting .256 on the year. Outfielder Christian Yelich has struggled this season hitting .235 with just six home runs and 28 RBIs in 67 games this season.

Milwaukee will hand the ball to their right-handed ace Freddy Peralta who is having an incredible start to the year with a 7-3 record with a 2.29 ERA on the year. Peralta has struck out 140 batters in just over 100 innings of work including just 46 walks in that time. He had a shortened last outing in his last start where he pitched just four innings allowing no runs on a hit while striking out five and walking two. 

The Pirates have had a lot of struggle this season where they’ve ranking 17th in team batting average hitting .238 and are last in the MLB in scoring offense averaging just 3.67 runs per game. Two guys have emerged as potential pieces to the future, including left fielder Bryan Reynolds who is hitting .309 with a team-high 18 home runs and 57 RBIs, and second Adam Frazier who is hitting a team-best .324 with 32 RBIs. 

The right-handed Chad Kuhl will get the start for the Pirates and he’s had an up-and-down start to the season where he’s 3-5 with a 4.38 ERA on the year. He’s coming off three straight solid starts, the last the worst of three, but a solid 5 innings outing where he allowed three runs on six hits and struck out eight in a win over the Giants.