1-0 in one hell of a weird game. Went 12 innings, where a total of one run was scored in the three that start with a guy on 2nd because reasons. Pirates had two straight where a guy got thrown out at home (including the one in which they DID score) and the Marlins had two straight where they grounded into a double play.

Keller was shaky, but the bullpen was lights out, even with Bednar unavailable and both Holderman and Mlodzinkski (sp) on the DL. Cruz had his first real homer of the year after dominating with them in spring training. Both Reynolds and Hayes were good. Spot starter/long reliever Luis Ortiz was great in his two innings of late relief, getting both of those ground ball DPs in extras.

Now let's hope Skenes gets off to a good start in AAA, so he can be called up quickly (or as quickly as Pittsburgh will do it to maximize years of control because Nutting is a real skittles) because Bailey Falter is the sort of 5th guy that makes me hope for rain every five days so he's never actually used.

Following 😁

Make it 2-0. Bullpen still hasn't given up much of anything (one garbage time run last night in the 9th) despite pitching more innings over two games than the starters. Hayes is hitting about .571 and drawing walks. And kind of excited for today, with Jared Jones starting. Dude was about untouchable in the spring and has serious heat. 

On one hand, they have a lot of very exciting young pitching that has the chance to be a great nucleus for the staff. On the other, it's hard to not temper the enthusiasm with how the organization botched Glasnow totally and then he became really good (on the off change he's actually healthy) the instant he showed up in Tampa Bay and with how Keller was horrible for a while and now regularly bounces between very good and very not so good, putting him firmly as an ace for us and probably a #3 or #4 for a good team.

Up to 4-0 with yesterday's win being the sort of game that never seems to work out well for them. Weak link Bailey Falter gave up five in the top of the first, but the team rallied to take a lead. Then Bednar blew the save attempt, but they rallied for two in the top of the 10th to win.

Very good start to the season that has me needing to say things like "It's just the fucking Marlins." to temper expectations. Well, eventually temper them. It's 162-0 until that first loss!

posted by Heretic

It's 162-0 until that first loss!

Correct!  

Best wishes for my 3rd favorite team!

5-0 heading into the first off-day of the season. First time for that since 1983 and (I think) the sixth (or fifth) time overall they've gotten off to that start.

Opening with back-to-back road series -- not ideal. However, when they're against Miami and Washington, that gives them a great chance to generate some buzz going into the home opener so there is some actual excitement when they do start play at home.

Pirates are a juggernaut.

Good start; hope they can hang in there.

Things will get interesting tonight. So far, they're 6-1 against two opponents who have combined for a 2-12 record at this point of the season. For their home opener, they have Baltimore, so that'll be a noticeable step up in competition.

Two of three from the Orioles with both wins being walk offs and the one today apparently coming due to a two-run errors by Baltimore is something I'll definitely take!

Things are getting less ideal. Starting pitching is still good, but the offense is vanishing and the bullpen is starting to remind me of old Huddle NCF and how he always called Cleveland's bullpen the "blowpen". Think against the Mets, the first game went from 3-3 to 3-6 when they got involved, the second went from 1-0 to 1-3 and the third went from 1-2 to 1-9.

The second one was the most annoying. I get that Jared Jones is a rookie who will be in for a major innings increase as far as workload goes this year, so I understand that there will and should be limitations on how far he goes into games. But pulling a guy who pitched 5 shutout innings on only 59 pitches to me is going from erring on the side of caution to simply erring.

I remember Quinn Priester last year. Had good stuff, but fell behind in counts and then would groove a fastball down the middle and then watch it land somewhere out of the park.

NOTHING. HAS. CHANGED.

So my kid treated himself to a pirates game as he finished up his spring semester/finals week. He and a couple friends moved down to some prime seating later in the game. For whatever reason he wore his Reds jersey and the camera guys showed him on the jumbo trim and the crown booed him big time lol.

Things are going downhill, much like that "agony of defeat" skier from Wide World of Sports back in the day. Mainly due to the offense being completely fucking incompetent at doing anything. Pitching has been good enough to win with, I don't know, any actual help from the bats. But that's not happening and the closest I've seen to a sense of urgency seems to be coming from a couple Pittsburgh press guys I read.

What's going on with Oneil Cruz?

posted by birddog23

What's going on with Oneil Cruz?

My semi-educated guess: Probably not being allowed to be himself at the plate. Team has a lot of young and talented hitting prospects and a hitting philosophy designed to take pitches and run up pitch counts. Which leads to these young guys being behind in the count because any pitcher with the skill necessary to throw strikes that aren't meatballs over the plate are doing that because they know odds are the batter has the take sign on.

Read yesterday a state showing that the team's batting stats when ahead in the count are WAY better than when behind in it. So, of course, they have a hitting coach whose philosophy typically gets them behind. There's a reason why Milwaukee jettisoned Andy Haines when he was their coach; I have no idea why our management hasn't done the same. Especially considering how they actually invested money in their current core...you wouldn't think a cheap organization that actually just invested $$$ would be content to watch it go to waste, but here we are...

It's National Paul Skenes Debut Day! So we have something to be excited about until the offense ruins it by scoring 0.5 runs.

Skenes was dominant today. 6 no-hit innings (1 walk), 11 Ks (including the first seven guys he faced) and the win at Chicago. As long as his ligaments and tendons don't dissolve from how nasty his stuff is, he has the potential to be a truly amazing pitcher. 

Main hope: He stays healthy and great as a Pirate and then, when he inevitably gets that trillion dollar contract by the Yankees or Dodgers that Nutting will not even attempt to counter, that's when any potential ailments occur.

Three out of four at the Cubs was a good thing. If they have 4-5 more series of good things in a row, they might even climb back into the race in the Central, since right now, it's looking like two decent-ish teams and three others looking up a mediocrity.

Former short-term Pirate T. Marcano (Tucuparita or some fucked up name like that) banned for life due to gambling. Apparently when he got hurt last year, he spent the rest of the year placing bets on games to pass the time. And apparently sucked at it, as I saw a random Twitter post saying he only won about 4% of his bets. Which, I guess, makes him the Pittsburgh Pirates of gambling.

The Bonds jersey retirement would be cool but that time in August is bad for me

Lol Chappy

https://twitter.com/thecomeback/status/1798210821237158301?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1798210821237158301%7Ctwgr%5Ec63e71d383bab6f3fa18453c6b8b81c91d80a43a%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.si.com%2Fmlb%2Fmlb-conspiracy-theories-aroldis-chapman-mad-long-fly-out