Sunday, August 23, 2020

8/23 From 1980: Hot Start; Bye Bye Perfecto; Beefy Meat of the Order; Game Stories; HBD Tyler

  • 1988 - Dave LaPoint tossed a five-hitter and Andy Van Slyke drilled a two-run homer in the seventh to carry the Bucs to a 2-0 win over Cincinnati at TRS. LaPoint and Norm Charlton traded zeroes until the seventh. After the Bucs scored, the Red staged a two-out rally in the eighth to chase LaPoint, but Jim Gott came on to save the day.

Ty has been successful in the piggyback at Tampa Bay
 - 2018 Topps Future Stars

  • 1993 - RHP Tyler Glasnow was born in Newhall, California. Glasnow was the Pirates 5th round pick in the 2011 draft and the prep star gave up a ride to the University of Portland by signing for a $600 K. Tyler dominated in the minors and was a consensus Top 25 Prospect, getting his first call to the show in 2016. He broke camp with the club the following year but was sent back to Indy in June after being batted around in the rotation and got 13 starts with the big club in 2017. He was sent to Tampa Bay in 2018 as part of the Chris Archer deal after working out of the Bucco bullpen.
  • 2001 - The Pirates defeated the Diamondbacks 5-1 in front of 30,784 at PNC Park, despite a 16-strikeout performance by Randy Johnson, who became the first pitcher in history to fan 300 batters in four straight seasons. Johnson only gave up six hits, but he walked nine batters in the loss to Tony McKnight and the bullpen. The big blows off the Big Unit were a two-run homer by Kevin Young and two-run pinch-hit double by Keith Osik, both in the seventh. 
  • 2014 - The Pirates 4-5-6 hitters (Neil Walker, Russ Martin & Pedro Alvarez) went 7-for-11 with three walks, two doubles, three homers, six runs scored and 10 RBI to help rough up the Milwaukee Brewers 10-2 at Miller Park. Alvarez hit a pair of opposite field homers after a six week long ball drought, one of them coming back-to-back following Martin’s blast into the bullpen. Edinson Volquez got the win with clutch pitching - he gave up 11 hits in 5-⅔ IP, but stranded runners at second and third with no outs once and later in the game worked out of a bases loaded jam with one out against Ryan Braun & Aramis Ramirez, getting an infield pop and swinging K.
  • 2016 - The first six Pirates to bat hit safely against Houston’s Joe Musgrove - Adam Frazier (single), Matt Joyce (double), Andrew McCutchen (double), Gregory Polanco (single), David Freese (single) & Josh Bell (single) - before Bell was thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double and the Bucs scored four times on the way to a 7-1 victory at PNC Park. Ivan Nova tossed a complete game six-hitter on 98 pitches, losing a shutout in the ninth inning, while Polanco launched a pair of home runs. It was the first time since 1975 that the Pirates strung together that many knocks to open a game when the first eight Buccos banged out hits. Despite that soft rookie outing, Musgrove joined the Pirates as a major piece of the 2018 Gerrit Cole trade with the ‘Stros.
  • 2017 - The Dodgers Rich Hill took a perfect game into the ninth inning at PNC Park and a no-hitter into the 10th; both went by the wayside as the Pirates prevailed in an unlikely 1-0 victory. The perfecto was lost on Logan Forsythe’s error while the no-no, shutout, and game were deep sixed on Josh Harrison’s leadoff, walk-off homer in overtime. Trevor Williams matched zeroes with him through eight innings without the style points - he gave up seven hits, four walks and bopped a batter, but stranded nine runners thanks to a pair of DPs and a throw-out on the bases. Felipe Rivero and Juan Nicasio kept the Trolley Dodgers at bay for the win. Game factoids: J-Hay is the first and so far only player to end a no-hit bid with a walk off HR. On the bump, Hill became just the second pitcher to lose a no-hitter via a walk off hit (raise your hand if you know the first), with the original Heartbreak Kid being the Pirates’ Harvey Haddix, who lost his perfect game in 1959 in the 13th inning. One final tidbit: Going into the game, the Pirates had scored five or more runs in seven straight games for the first time since 1996, so Hill was working his magic against a team that was on an offensive roll.


Mitch Keller - 2019 Topps Chrome

  • 2019 - A couple of “up” outings by a pair of Pirates pitchers who had decidedly up-and-down seasons and a ninth-inning uprising carried the Bucs to a 3-2 win over the Reds at PNC Park. Mitch Keller struck out nine in six innings, but left runners on first and third with no outs during a 1-1 game for Michael Feliz in the seventh. It took Feliz 12 pitches to retire the next three Redlegs swinging. Cincy edged ahead in the eighth off Keona Kela, but the Pirates lit it up in the ninth. Four of the five batters hit safely - the only out was a sac bunt - with Adam Frazier’s rap tying the game and Pablo Reyes walking it off with a single to give Felipe Vazquez the victory.

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