Final Score: Pirates 2 Cubs 1 in 10 innings
Why The Pirates Won: This was the battle of the passive bats. The Pirates eked out the win. The Pirates took 25 pitches for strikes. The Cubs outdid them by taking 28 pitches for strikes. Each team only scored 1 run in the first 9 innings. The Pirates scored a run in the top of the 10th with the ghost runner on second. The Cubs could not even do that, giving the Pirates a 2-1 victory. Paul Skenes was undone by the foul balls. There were 24 foul balls. It took him 95 pitches to get through 5 innings. He gave up 4 hits and walked 2. It was far from his best stuff. It was a gritty performance in rainy conditions. The Pirate offense continues to amaze. They only had 6 hits in 10 innings. They were 1 for 8 with runners in scoring position. They did walk 3 times and kept their strikeouts at 7. It was a nice and fortunate win for the Pirates. The road trip is at 1-1. Can they get at least 2 wins in the next 5 games? Will they ever start swinging the bats? I mean that literally.
Key Moments Of The Game: After breezing through the first 2 innings, Paul Skenes had a rough 3rd inning. He did not give up a run but threw 35 pitches to get through the inning. He faced 5 batters. On the last 4 batters, he reached 3 and 2 counts. He gave up a single and a walk. In the bottom of the 4th, he gave up a 2-out double. In the 5th, it took a great relay to throw the runner out at the plate. The Cubs had a runner on 1st with 2 outs. Kyle Tucker laced a line drive into left-center field. Oneil Cruz quickly got to the ball and fired a low and fast throw to Isiah Kiner-Falefa. He made a great short hop pickup. He fired to home with a perfect one-hopper to Henry Davis. Davis applied the tag. The runner was out by 3 feet. It ended the inning. Paul Skenes was done for the day. Each team scratched out a run in the 8th inning. Both runs scored on balls that were not hit out of the infield. The Pirates had the bases loaded with nobody out in the top of the 10th. They scored only 1 run. It did not come back to haunt them. Bednar shut the Cubs down in the bottom of the 10th to get the save.
Next Game: This afternoon, Cubs in Chicago. Matthew Boyd goes for the Cubs. Another tough pitcher with an ERA of 2.89. He is a lefty. It will be interesting to see who the Pirates send out there. Mike Burrows is going for the Pirates. He has looked better in his last 2 outings. He better have his A game today. Even that may not be good enough with these batting weaklings.
The Goofy Game of Golf/Life Searching for the Answer 