Pitch By Pitch

I didn’t get to see or hear much Pirate baseball this weekend because I was in State College, PA for the Blue/White game, Penn State Football’s annual spring scrimmage. The weekend is really more about tailgating and enjoying the outdoors, but a reminder that college football season is on its way isn’t a bad thing either.

The Pirates were in San Diego for a 3 game series this weekend. Despite a mess of injuries, the Bucs found a way to win 2 out of 3 games and claim their third consecutive series win. Nate McLouth didn’t play at all this weekend due to an injured right oblique. It doesn’t sound like this injury will require a trip to the DL, but the team decided to keep McLouth out for precautionary reasons. Jack Wilson was sent to the DL because of the injured left middle finger that has been bothering him over the past week. Brian Bixler was called up to replace Wilson, and Bixler will likely split time at shortstop with Ramon Vazquez. Finally, Craig Hansen was sent to the DL because of neck spasms. Evan Meek was called up to replace Hansen.

Game 16 – The series opened with a tough loss for the Bucs. Pittsburgh used every pitcher that they had available before losing 4-3 in 11 innings. Ian Snell only lasted 5 and 1/2 innings. The relievers pitched 5 scoreless innings until Matt Capps walked 2 in the 11th and former Pirate, Brian Giles hit a game winning double.

Game 17 – Zach Duke looked strong once again to claim his 3rd win of the season. The Bucs dominated the Padres from start to finish in this game and took home the 10-1 victory. Duke pitched 8 and 1/3 inning, giving up 6 hits and 1 ER. He got plenty of support from his own batters with Freddy Sanchez going 3-5, Craig Monroe going 3-5, Eric Hinske going 2-3, Andy LaRoche going 2-4, and Jason Jaramillo going 2-4.

Game 18 – Ross Ohlendorf out-pitched Jake Peavy, and Adam LaRoche hit 2 home runs to lead the Bucs to an 8-3 win over the Padres. Ohlendorf pitched 7 innings, giving up 5 hits and 3 ER. John Grabow finished up the final two innings. Andy LaRoche went 2-5 to extend his consecutive game hitting streak to 10. So much for that slow start!

The Pirates are now 11-7, and they have already seen strong pitching performances from all of their starters. It sure looks like Pitching Coach, Joe Kerrigan is doing a lot of the right things.

With this series win, the Pirates are now 4 games over .500. That hasn’t happened since 2002. Also, the Pirates are now assured of a winning record in the month of April. That’s happened just twice in the last 15 years.

One final note from the weekend. Dave Davidson was claimed off waivers by the Florida Marlins. Only time will tell if this means anything.

A 3 game series with the Milwaukee Brewers is next. Let’s hope that our injury depleted Pittsburgh Pirates can find a way to keep the wins coming.

Monday – Jeff Karstens @ Braden Looper – 8:05 P.M.
Tuesday – Paul Maholm @ Dave Bush – 8:05 P.M.
Wednesday – Ian Snell @ – Yovani Gallardo 1:05 P.M.

We’ll be turning on the lights at Petco Park tonight.

Ian Snell @ Kevin Correia 10:05 Eastern.

The Pirates officially won their first series of the season when they took 2 out of 3 games from the Atlanta Braves. The Pirates scored 3-0 and 10-0 shutouts from strong pitching performances by Paul Maholm and Ian Snell. Zach Duke started the 3rd game of the series. Things got off to a bad start and never improved much. The Braves took the final game 11-1.

Some quick notes:

Game 10
Another great start for Paul Maholm. 7IP 4H.
Jack Wilson sat this game out with a sore finger.
Delwyn Young made his first at-bat as a Pirate. He entered as a pinch hitter and fouled out to the catcher.

Game 11
Another great start for Ian Snell. 7IP 4H.
Jack Wilson sat out again.
Craig Monroe had a 6 RBI game.
Andy LaRoche is using a new batting stance, and he seems to be figuring things out, going 3-4 with an RBI

Game 12
Zach Duke didn’t have a great start. 6IP 12H 6R.
Jack Wilson got back into the starting lineup. He went 1-3.
The Pirates had 7 hits, but they could only score 1 meaningless run in the 9th.
Delwyn Young played 2 innings in LF. He struck out swinging in the 8th.

After losing a disappointing series at home to the Houston Astros, the Atlanta Braves come to town for a weekend series.

The Pirates are going to need more strong starts from Maholm, Snell, and Duke to get back up and over .500.

Friday – Jair Jurrjens @ Paul Maholm – 7:05
Saturday – Jo Jo Reyes @ Ian Snell – 12:35
Sunday – Javier Vazquez @ Zach Duke – 1:35

I won’t see much of these games because I’m traveling to Boston tonight to see my girlfriend and sister run in the marathon on Monday. We’ve got tickets to Orioles @ Red Sox on Sunday afternoon!

Have a good weekend! Go Bucs!

I actually did get to watch a majority of this this afternoon’s game since my aunt and uncle have DirectTV, and they happen to be offering a free week of MLB Extra Innings (what luck!).

Offensively, there wasn’t too much to see, as Aaron Harang threw a 3-hitter to defeat the Pirates 2-0. To be 1-hit and 3-hit within the first week of the season worries me a bit.

Ian Snell had an improved outing. After giving up a 2-run homer to Brandon Phillips in the first inning, Snell calmed down to pitch six effective innings, striking out 7.

Defensively, there were two gems late in the game. With one out in the bottom of the 6th, Ramon Hernandez hit a hard line drive up the middle. Jack Wilson made a diving stop, flipped the ball to Freddy Sanchez and second, and Freddy jumped over a sliding Edwin Encarnacion to complete the double play. With runners on 1st and 2nd in the bottom of the eighth inning, Cincinnati had both runners going on the pitch. Edwin Encarnacion hit a bloop pop that was caught by Jack Wilson. Wilson threw to Sanchez then to LaRoche for the 6-4-3 triple play. That was the Pirates first triple play since 1993.

We’re finally heading home for series with the Astros, Braves, and Marlins. Hopefully PNC Park is friendlier to Andy LaRoche who is still looking for his first hit in 2009 (0-14).

I only got to see about an inning of today’s game on TV, as I opted to watch Purdue @ Penn State. There was no shortage of action, with the Nittany Lions winning 11-9 (31 total hits in the game).

Today was a nice win for the Pirates. Paul Maholm looked sharp for his second consecutive start. He allowed 3 hits and 1 run in 7 innings. He struck out 3, and after 2 starts, his season ERA is 1.32.

From the plate, Nyjer Morgan continued his hot start by going 3-4 with 2 runs and an RBI. Nate McLouth’s bat is coming alive, going 2-3 with 2 runs and 3 RBIs. With a 5-1 lead in the 9th inning, Ryan Doumit added a grand slam and Adam LaRoche followed up with a homer of his own.

We’re still waiting for Andy LaRoche to get started. Today was another tough game, going 0-5. He’s still hitless in 2009.

With today’s win, the Pirates can’t finish this opening road trip any worse than .500.

Snell @ Aaron Harang is at 1:10 tomorrow. I’ll be at an Easter lunch with my family, so I probably won’t see or hear much from this game.

Go Bucs! Happy Easter!

The NL Central leading Pittsburgh Pirates looked for their first winning streak of the season this afternoon.  I got to enjoy most of this game on MLB.com’s Gameday Audio.  The nice advantage of Gameday Audio over XM Radio is that you get to choose the home OR away feed.  XM Radio typically gives you only the home feed.  I quickly got annoyed with the Cardinals play-by-play announcer, so it was nice to switch to the hometown feed.

The Bucs started off nicely, with Nyjer Morgan and Freddy Sanchez leading off with hits to give the Pirates a 1-0 lead in the 1st.  Unfortunately, Ian Snell didn’t have much to offer, and this game was “over” in a hurry.  Snell gave up 8 runs (6 earned) in 4 innings of work.  Andy LaRoche has struggled at 3rd base, with 3 errors in 2 games.

Albert Pujols has destroyed the Pirates in these first two games:

Game 1: Double, Single, Fly Out, Intentional Walk, Single

Game 2: Walk, Home Run, Reached on Error, Walk, Single

Oh well.  You can’t win ‘em all.  Game 3 of the 4 game series is tomorrow at 8:15 P.M.