CINCINNATI – Braxton Ashcraft took the mound one last time in 2025 for the Pittsburgh Pirates against the Cincinnati Reds at Great American Ball Park on Thursday afternoon.
The rookie right-hander allowed two runs in 4.1 innings and struck out five in the Pirates’ 2-1 loss.
Though it was a pedestrian final outing for Ashcraft, his debut season was much more than that. In 26 appearances – eight of which were starts – Ashcraft finished 4-4 with a 2.71 ERA and 71 strikeouts in 69.2 innings while holding opponents to a .239 batting average.
“There’s a lot of pride in finishing the year with a [2.71 ERA],” Ashcraft said following his last start of the season.
Ashcraft was called up from Triple-A Indianapolis and made his MLB debut on May 26 against the Diamondbacks in Arizona and threw three-scoreless innings of relief.
The 25-year-old was used almost exclusively as a relief pitcher through early August before ending the season primarily as a starting pitcher.
“Just the mindset and the competitiveness that he showed and the way that he was able to adjust his stuff and continue to work on that while filling different roles,” said manager Don Kelly. “I thought he had a heck of a year.”
No matter the role, Ashcraft provided consistency throughout the season. In his eight starts, he posted a 2.16 ERA. In 18 appearances out of the bullpen, he had a 3.22 ERA.
Unless your name is Paul Skenes, every rookie goes through growing pains at some point. For the most part, Ashcraft avoided them.
“You never know with guys coming up, especially what we’re talking about — filling different roles and being in different [situations],” said Kelly. “For him to be able to maintain his mindset throughout all of that and put up a [2.71 ERA], just unbelievable.”
Between Indianapolis and Pittsburgh, Ashcraft totaled 118 innings, by far the most he’s ever had in his career. Several injuries – including Tommy John surgery that cost him the entire 2022 season – limited Ashcraft to just 164.1 innings combined from 2021-24.
But Ashcraft avoided time on the injured list this season and avoided getting shut down at the end of the year to get all the way to the finish line.
“Yeah, making it all the way through, making every appearance, whether it’s starting or out of the bullpen, is huge,” Ashcraft said. “Setting a foundation to carry that workload into next year and be able to build on that and be pitching in the next month next year, that’s the goal. And I think that was the biggest win of this year, throwing up zeros and quality zeros, and still maintaining stuff, maintaining velocity, and giving our team a chance to win whenever I’m well above the previous year’s innings numbers.”
With a full season under his belt – and a successful one at that – Ashcraft will head into next year’s spring training as a key part of the young pitching core that offers the Pirates a glimmer of hope coming off a disappointing season.
“At the end of the day, looking forward to where we’re at as a staff, where we’re at as a team, what we want to accomplish,” said Ashcraft. “I think that everybody’s kind of in the same boat. It doesn’t matter what our numbers are this year. I don’t think you can ask anybody on this team, find anybody that’s selfishly concerned about what their numbers have been. Wins, losses, whatever, from a pitching side, we just want to win ballgames. I think on that front, you look at where we’re at, and you can be excited looking forward to next year.”
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