Pirates Morning Report: The B Squad Comes Through

Final Score: Pirates 2 Reds 1

Why The Pirates Won: Rich Hill pitched 5 dancing through the raindrop’s innings giving up on 1 run on 6 hits and 3 walks. The Reds had 2 runners on base in 4 of the 5 innings. The 4th inning saw only 3 batters but that was because one was picked off 1st base after getting a single. Then the B squad of the bullpen took over the game. Yohan Ramirez pitched the 6th and 7th, giving up 2 hits and a walk, but struck out 4, many of them on balls that almost hit the Red’s right handed batters. Then my old buddy DUJ came in to pitch the 8th and 9th, retiring all 6 batters he faced on just 22 pitches. This was his 10th appearance of the year, and he has had only 2 bad outings. It will be interesting to see who will go when De Jong comes back. The Pirate bats were more or less quiet but got 1 run on an opening triple by Hayes, followed by a sacrifice fly by Reynolds, who had a very nice offensive game getting 2 doubles. In the bottom of the 4th, Carlos Santana and Jack Suwinski had back to back doubles to get the game deciding run.

Key Moments Of The Game: Top of the 1st, 1st and 3rd, 2 outs, no runs scored. Top of the 2nd, 1st and 2nd, 2 outs, no runs scored. Top of the 3rd, 1st and 2nd no outs, no runs scored. Last but not least, top of the 5th, single, strikeout, single and misplayed ball by Bae to score a run and put a runner on 2nd with 1 out, no more runs scored. The Reds were 0 for 8 with runners in scoring position and left 10 runners on base for the game. Simply a game of lost opportunities for the Reds to allow the Pirates to move to 15-7.

Next Game: This afternoon, Reds in Pittsburgh. Another buddy of mine Vince (I Am Going To Prove You Wrong) Velasquez will start, to try and get the Pirates a sweep of the Reds. There is no question the Pirates are on a roll.