Frankie v Tim Cooney; Lineup & Notes

Today's Game - Franciso Liriano (5-6, 2.99 ) takes on Tim Cooney (0-0, 3.95 ) to carry us into All-Star break. Since his redo against the Twins, Frankie has gone 4-2 with a 2.08 ERA and 67 strikeouts (60-2/3 IP) in his last nine starts. He's 4-2 with a 2.38 ERA in 10 career starts against St. Louis. He's 0-1 with a 3.77 ERA in two starts this season; a strong no-decision at Busch Stadium and an 8-5 loss against Michael Wacha at PNC Park .

The rookie lefty got hit hard in an early April start, was sent down and recalled this month from the PCL, where he was an All-Star, to replace Jaime Garcia. He's a plus control guy with a 90-ish heater and change; he also has a curve and slider. The scouting reports we saw consider him a back-end major league starter, slotted as a 4/5 rotation arm.

The game starts at 8:05 - back-to-back national games for the Bucs, how about that - and will be on ESPN and 93.7 The Fan. There are supposed to be scattered T-storms, with the greatest chance for precip just before game time. Noah would be right at home in Pittsburgh.

In a battle of the lefties, Gregory stays in the lineup but Pedro takes a seat. Starling's back, so his odd removal from the game last night was just part of an out of the ordinary lineup switch by Dave Jauss, not a recurrence of the oblique tweak. Speaking of out of the ordinary, how about Jordy leading off for the first time? 

• Last night’s victory was Pittsburgh’s third win of the week when trailing after six innings; the Pirates were 1-24 in such games prior to Wednesday’s rally to topple the Padres.
• If you were wondering, Mark the Shark had a scheduled day off yesterday.
• The Pirates have recalled RHP Wilfredo Boscan from Triple-A Indianapolis and optioned Steve Lombardozzi to Indy, with Deolis Guerra and Vanimal both burned up yesterday.
• Jekyll & Hyde: Vance Worley has a 1.88 ERA with a WHIP of 0.888 and OPS+ of 60 from the pen. His stats as a starter were 4.38 ERA, 1.615 WHIP and 127 OPS+.
• 27th round draft pick Ryan Nagle, an OF'er from Illinois, has agreed to terms with the Pirates, pending a physical, with a $160,000 signing bonus.