Bucs Split Today, Off Tomorrow; Notes

Tomorrow: A day of rest; look out, beach! The team picks it up again Wednesday afternoon when they meet the Orioles at Bradenton. Jeff Locke starts; might be a big outing for him.

Today: Frankie had one of those days when he was falling behind in the count, and those rarely end well. Daniel Bard poured some hi-octane gas on Liriano's embers (three runs yielded without getting an out) and poof - it was Atlanta with a lot and Pittsburgh with a little in a hurry. The Bucs chipped away a bit, making the final score 7-3 Bravos. Eric O'Flaherty continued to be strong, running up another pair of scoreless innings with four whiffs, while Jorge Rondon and Trey Haley also kept the Braves at bay. To continue the spring MO, the Buccos stranded an even dozen. 14 strikeouts constitute a lot of wasted at bats. The Atlanta box score.

Eric O'Flaherty still sharp (photo vai MLB.com)

Meanwhile, Juan Nicasio kept on dealing after whiffing his way out of a first inning jam against Minnesota to put up five more zippo frames with eight K; Jeff Locke & V-Song would do well to look over their shoulders. The boys behind Juan did their job too - Neftali Feliz and Jim Fuller tossed four frames, surrendering one hit - as the Bucs took a 2-0 victory.The Minnesota box score.

• Ruh-roh: C Elias Diaz has "lateral right elbow discomfort." He'll be treated and re-evaluated after a week of rest; he's been out of action since the middle of last week.
• MiLB's Sam Dykstra ranks the Pirate farm system as #8, and lauds both its depth and star power.
• Neal Huntington piled a couple more chips on the table when he told the press gang that Juan Nicasio will compete with Jeff Locke and Ryan Vogelsong for a back-end rotation spot. Hearing that has got to be a bummer for Kyle Lobstein.
• Lyle Spencer of MLB.com ranks the outfields; we're #1.