Melancon allowed a hit and a walk, but recorded a strikeout and put away the Reds with a scoreless ninth Wednesday for his 10th save of the year.
Melancon remains a steady closing option even though his WHIP remains a bit inflated from the norm -- not that anyone's complaining about a 1.14 mark, but that's still well higher than the 0.87-0.96 range he's been in for the past three seasons. The Pirates play plenty of close games and should win a lot of them, meaning Melancon should again rack up the saves after converting a whopping 51 of 53 last year. His underwhelming strikeout rate keeps him from being among the truly elite closers, though he's making up for that with volume.