Game #2 - Jay v Jon Lester; Well-Shook Lineup & Notes

Today's Second Game - JA Happ (9-7, 3.87; 5-1, 1.79 as a Pirate) takes on Jon Lester (9-10, 3.50) in a battle of the lefties tonight. Happ was beat up by Chicago in his Pirate debut on August 4th in a 5-0 loss to Jake Arrieta, but since has put up a 1.00 ERA in six games and won five decisions. Lifetime, he's 1-3 with a 6.04 ERA in five career starts v da Cubbies.

Lester got off to a slow start, but has been pretty solid in his prior 16 outings. He's compiled a 2.97 ERA, 1.01 WHIP and 106 strikeouts against 23 walks in his last 103 innings. His one weakness is holding runners, so we'll see if the Bucs try to take advantage of that. His only outing against Pittsburgh this year was in May, and he took home a easy win.

Well, some lefty shake-and-bake with Josh at 2B, S-Rod in right and Michael Morse at 1B. Fran's behind the dish, and Pedro is at SS. Jordy's in a 4-for-36 stretch, tho he does hit .277 v lefties; guess Clint is putting him on reset. We woulda thought JHK would get the start, but we're supposing that Clint wants to keep Kung's batteries charged; there are no such animal as a twin bills in Korea, and he's played 123 games already.

Notes from the opener:

• Gerrit Cole went 6-1/3 with eight K's; lack of help behind him was the only thing between him and another dominating performance. 
• Starling Marte came in as a defensive sub; his liner sac fly was the game winner.
• The ying & yang of JHK - he has a seven game hitting streak where he's 10-of-31 with two homers and seven RBI; he's also whiffed 10 times and not drawn a walk. 
• Travis Snider is 3-for-11 with two walks and seven RBI as a Pirate. He's still a work in progress, tho - he's whiffed five times.