Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Fish Flounder As Bucs Take 5-1 Win For Their 5th In A Row

One lesson young Jose Urena can take from his first MLB start is that three outs is the magic number. In the first, Jung-Ho Kang singled home Josh with two outs. In the second, Josh doubled home Jordy with two outs, and The Kid followed by dropping a ball into the seats in left to make it 4-0. Urena worked through the third and fourth without giving up another run, but in the fifth, Pedro singled home Starling Marte with yep, two outs. The Bucco bats cooled after that, but the five-spot was plenty.

Jeff Locke was pitching, well, a Jeff Locke kinda game. Clint tried to nurse him through six, but with two outs waved Jared Hughes in. Locke hadn't been scored on, but gave up four hits and walked four to go with six whiffs and was at 104 pitches when he got the hook. Hughes got Adeiny Hechavarria on a grounder (what else) to close out the frame. Like Charlie Morton's game last night, there were runners but not much in the way of threats put up by the Fish as the whiffs, Pirate D and a couple of timely at 'em balls kept their attack frustrated.

Kan't keep Kang off the sacks (photo Dave Arrigo/Pirates)
The Marlins finally broke into the run column in the seventh off Rob Scahill. Dee Gordon beat out an infield single, went to third on a passed ball followed by a wild pitch and scored on Martin Prado's ground rule double that Josh couldn't quite catch up to - with two outs. Notice a trend tonight?

Arquimedes Caminero faced his old mates and struck out the side in the eighth. Clint had him finish up the game, and though he lost a few ticks off the heater, Arquimedes still worked a 1-2-3 frame to close out the 5-1 win.

Gerrit Cole takes on a TBA; it's likely to be lefty Brad Hand, who started 16 games for Miami last year but has been working from the pen this season.

  • Jung-Ho now has an eight game hitting streak goin' on.
  • Eight of the nine Pirate starters had hits tonight; only last night's hero, Fran Cervelli, went without a knock. JHK had two hits and a plunk; Josh also had a pair of hits.
  • The Pirates have won five in a row and are above .500 for the first time since May 12th. The Bucs didn't take five in a row in 2014 until September, in the midst of a 12-of-15 run, though they did have several four-game runs.
  • It was another so-so crowd of 20,806 tonight. 
  • Omar Moreno and Jack Wilson will represent the Pirates at MLB Draft Day on June 8th. The draft will be carried by the MLB Network.
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2 comments:

  1. WilliamJPellasMay 27, 2015 at 11:10 AM

    I have had enough of Jeff Locke in the starting rotation, though I suppose he has been relatively durable and that does count for something. I don't know how Clayton Richard is doing at Triple A, but if he is healthy, to my mind he would almost certainly be an upgrade over Locke. Plus, Richard is a fellow lefthander, so if the Pirates are bound and determined to have another southpaw in the rotation, they would still have one with Richard if they sent Locke to the 'pen as the long man. Not sure where that would leave Vance Worley, but neither Worley nor Locke would be much of a loss the way they have pitched this season, though you always want depth and both guys are younger than Richard. Your thoughts?

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  2. Ron IeraciMay 27, 2015 at 6:47 PM

    Depth, will, depth. Losing Taillon and Cumpton - and who knows what's up with Kingham; they still haven't announced a diagnosis for him yet after three weeks - put the pitching plans behind by a year, maybe 18 months. So the FO has little option but to try to stockpile some arms; most teams like to stay eight guys deep. Clayton has had mixed results in a couple of Indy starts, so you're looking at Casey Sadler & Adrian Sampson as next-up. We'll see how Jeff & Vanimal fare when the pipeline is flowing again, maybe as soon as next camp.

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