Cubs In Town, Jamo v Lester, Lineup & Notes - Archer, Kela Now Pirates

Today: The opener of the quickie two-game set is at 7:05. The match will be aired by AT&T SportsNet and 93.7 The Fan. Of course, judging by the current monsoon, starting on time could be iffy, though the storms are supposed to pass through before game time.

Pitchers: RHP Jameson Taillon (7-7, 3.73) kicks off against LHP Jon Lester (12-3, 3.06). JT has been dependable for the Bucs. He's been charged with three earned runs or less in each of his last 11 starts (5-4/3.09) and in 18 of his 21 outings overall. This will be Jamo's first start of the year against the Cubs. He hasn't had much luck against them in the past with a 2-3/5.06 slash against them in five career starts. Lester seems to be wearing down a bit in July; he's 2-1/6.31(the ERA is inflated by one very no good outing). He's already 2-0 against the Bucs (and the Cubs have won all three of his 2018 starts against Pittsburgh), pitching one gem and two other games where he was so-so but got lots of support from the bats. Overall, he's 7-5/3.39 against Pittsburgh.

Jamo starts the Cub series (photo Pittsburgh Pirates)

Lineup: Jordan Luplow LF, Starling Marte CF, Gregory Polanco RF, David Freese 3B, Fran Cervelli C, Josh Harrison 2B, Jose Osuna 1B, Jordy SS, & Taillon P. Lefty lineup today; southpaw again tomorrow.

Notes:

• Busy day. The Bucs landed RHP Chris Archer of Tampa Bay in exchange for OF Austin Meadows, RHP Tyler Glasnow and a PTBNL. Earlier in the day, they swapped for righty reliever Keone Kela, sending Taylor Hearn and another PTBNL to Texas. The deals seem solid, with the qualifier that we have to see who the players to be named are. Kela's is supposedto be a lower-ranked prospect; no hint of who's involved in the Archer deal. The price was high, but both guys are under team control for the future - Archer through 2021 and Kela through 2020.
• In his last 20 games, David Freese is hitting .364 (20-for-55) with three home runs and 13 RBI.
• Over the last 16 games, Pirates starters have a combined 2.75 ERA and held opposing batters to a .237 batting average.
• Quick starts count: the Bucs are 39-15 when scoring first and 16-37 when the opposing team plates the first run.
• Chicago has been meh of late, going 3-4 in the past seven games. The Bucs are 4-5 against the Windy City boys this season (1-2 at PNC Park and 3-3 at Wrigley). Chi-town leads the Pirates by seven games in the division.
• Per Ken Rosenthal of MLB.com, the Pirates had a Plan B if the Keone Kela deal fell through; they were talking to San Diego about Kirby Yates. The 31-year-old has mostly been a set-up guy who features a splitter and has a 2.94 ERA in the past two campaigns.
• After the Bruins set comes an off day Thursday and a weekend three-gamer v the Cards to end the brief home stand.