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June

What’s your favorite month of the year? Why?

I like June because it is the only month that does not have a holiday. I know there is flag day but I don’t think even the banks close for that one. As you know I hate all holidays real or fake like Halloween. The other reason to like June is the days are long and the nights are short. It is the month I played 54 holes of golf in one day. My second favorite is July. My daughter was born that month and I got 2 holes in one that month, one in 68 and another in 88. I would like September and October but the days are getting noticeably shorter and of course October ends with that pagan holiday Halloween. If I could change one thing I wish there was 12 hours of light and 12 hours of dark all year around. I would be willing to give up those long days of light of close to 17 hours. I know this is an impossible wish but what the hell we can all dream. Speaking of months who came up with this shit. I mean some are 30, some are 31 and of course we have stupid February with 28 except every 4 years 29. Why don’t we have 13 months of 28 days each with February having 29 every year. It would be fun naming the 13th month. Then every 4th year we could have the one day month between June and July. I guess a better question would be where do I come up with this shit. See you in June.

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Golf: Our Changing Golf Games

One of the many mysteries of golf is why our games change so much from day to day. You will hear many golfers bemoan the fact that one day their drives are great and their iron game is horrible. Then the next time out, the opposite is true. Everything is clicking from tee to green, and they cannot make a putt. Their putting is fantastic, but they can’t get a ball close to the hole. They are having a horrible time with their short game when it has been good for the last 4 rounds. Here is one that I have experienced when playing competitively. For maybe the last 3 to 4 rounds I have played going into a tournament, I may be driving the ball extremely well. Maybe it’s my iron game that has been spot on. Possibly, I have had 5 very good putting rounds. The day of the tournament, that best part of my game, becomes the worst part of my game. This part of golf has been brought home to me more now that I am retired and get to play a lot more golf. Since 1996, even when I was working, I managed to play 3 to 4 times a week and probably had around 2 range sessions a week. Now that I do not practice anymore, another part of this phenomenon has been brought into focus. Whatever the bad part of my game was the day before seems to go away on its own the next day. This happens even on the pro tour. Tour players’ scores will sometimes vary by 5 to 10 shots from round to round. After a round, they are seen on the driving range “fixing” the problem. It looks to me that going to bed and waking up solves the problem too. This may really be the biggest mystery in golf. Until somebody comes up with the reason this may happen, we have to find a better way of dealing with it.

Most of the time, we are looking to find ways to correct the part of our game that has gone haywire during the round. Instead of trying to do that, we should just make the best of it. The problem will most likely correct itself the next day. Some problems are bigger than others. Let us start with driving the golf ball. You will hit your driver 13 to 14 times a round. If your shots are having a particular pattern, just go ahead and play if you are making solid contact. If you are not making good contact, then change the ball position or open or close your stance. Sometimes what you do may not even make sense, but just go with the results. If your irons are the issue, then take some pressure off your iron game by going for the middle of the green until things seem better. If that doesn’t work, then again, ball position and stance may help you get better. You may wind up hitting nothing but low punch shots or your 7 wood from 150 yards and out. Sometimes taking more club than you think may work; taking less club may actually free up your swing when you go after the ball a little harder. This can be helpful toward the end of a round that you are playing well. Never underestimate fear and adrenaline. If your short game around the greens is giving you problems, then change the way you are playing the shots. Maybe go for the bump and run for all shots, even if that means not hitting the green on the fly. Go the opposite way and hit nothing but high shots, even when the high shot is not required. Getting closer or farther away from the ball may help. We discussed putting in the last blog, but the principle is the same. A grip or stance change may help the situation. The one thing you do not want to do is to try and fix your swing or technique. Whatever you come up with is not going to last anyway. You probably have misdiagnosed your problem anyway. The bottom line is you have to go with whatever game you have that day and do the best you can on the part that is misbehaving. Once the round is over, forget about it. It most likely will go away the next round. That is the good news about your game changing so much from day to day. The bad stuff doesn’t stay around either.

The best way to think when you start a round is to be ready for anything. Try to minimize what you are doing poorly and take advantage of what you are doing well. If you are driving the ball well, use it on holes where you might otherwise use an iron or fairway wood. If your fairway woods are bad, then use irons when you are over 190 yards away. If the irons are bad, then bunt that 7 wood 150 yards. If low punch shots seem to be working, do it. If trying to lift the ball up high in the air gives you good results, do it for every shot. If everything in your game is working smoothly, just say a little prayer and don’t expect it to happen tomorrow. Remember changing ball position and stance may do wonders. Do it quickly and see if results will change. If you are hitting better shots, continue until you stop hitting better shots, and then try something else. Remember you can hit a fade from a closed stance; Hogan did it all the time. Likewise, you can hit a hook from an open stance. There are no laws on the golf course, just results. It is not that you want expectations to be low; you want them to be nonexistent.

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Golf: Putting

One of my favorite subjects is putting. It is by far the most important part of the game. There are many people out there that think other aspects are more important. One that gets a lot of play is greens in regulation. I am sorry, it just won’t fly. I do not care how many greens you hit; if you don’t sink those putts, it is all for naught. I think the reason for this is that everyone wants to make shot-making the most important part of the game. It sells golf clubs, lessons, and just seems that it should be. Putting is so simple to do. There are almost no fundamentals, really. Your method is meaningless as long as you can get the ball into the hole. Many people will argue that putting is not golf. Like a lot of things in golf, there is really nothing to compare to in other sports. It would be like a basketball player having to throw a strike in bowling rather than shoot a free throw when he is fouled. I am going to touch on bowling again later. Watch any tournament down the stretch. See who holes the most putts. That will be your champion. I think this is what holds people back on their putting. They do not give it its just due. It doesn’t keep them from working on their putting. It is more of a mental thing. Subconsciously, they are more concerned and happier when they are hitting great iron shots and getting the ball on the green. They chalk up a missed putt to just one of those things. It is that unconscious lack of respect for putting that inadvertently undermines everyone’s game.

My putting had its usual ups and downs and right now it is in an up position. About 3 weeks ago I started spot putting. It is just a fact it is easier to aim at something that is 3 to 10 feet away than something that is over 15 feet away and beyond. Those spots on the bowling alley are not there just for show. I find a spot on the green or some color change on the green that is close to the line I want to go on. I line up to that. I get a picture in my mind of what speed I want the ball to go when it is going over the mark. On short putts I still try to find a mark. I have done this in the past and then got away from it. One of the big things now in golf balls is the alignment tool. I do not use it. I find that it is difficult to line it up exactly where I want it. Mentally I feel that it makes putting seem to be too exact. I will use it on short putts sometimes, especially when there is no spot between the ball and the hole. Now that leaving the flagstick in has been around for a while, there seems to be a shift toward taking the pin out. For myself, I am pretty ambivalent about it. I think the real problem here is that all flagsticks are not created equal. If during a round I see the ball being rejected by the stick a couple of times, I may start to take it out. In my mind, I think it is a crap shoot. There is no question in my mind that on certain putts the flagstick has kept balls out of the hole. It has also let other putts go into the hole that would have lipped out or gone right over the hole. I don’t know how long I will be using spot putting. Will it make it to my season-ending blog? Technique is irrelevant when it comes to putting. The key to putting is to get the ball moving at the right speed for the line that you have chosen.

The final key to putting is green reading. You can have the stroke of Ben Crenshaw and Brad Faxon combined, but if you can’t tell how much the putt is going to break and in what direction, then you are doomed. There are many green reading tips out there and cookbook methods. I think most of them are pretty worthless. My best advice is to use the laws of correction. On the very first hole, notice what you did on your first putt of the day. Whatever way you missed it, correct it immediately on the next hole. If you missed it short, on the next hole, make sure you are pass the hole. If it was low, play more break on the next putt. Instead of bemoaning the missed putt, just calmly observe why you missed it and correct it immediately. This is the only way you are going to get your putting on track. Recently, I had a day where my speed was perfect from the first hole. I did not change a thing and wound up making 5 birdies, of which 3 were putts of over 15 feet. I have no idea why my speed was so good that day. I made 5 bogeys that day, and all were related to ball striking and short game issues. If you make early corrections when putting, you will get a feel for the greens much quicker. However you do it, you must find a way to get the ball into the hole. The better you are at the most important aspect of golf, the lower you will score. It is a very simple equation.

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Golf: My 2025 Season So Far

My 2025 golf season is winding down. It has been a typical year, with lots of ups and downs. I would say there have been more ups than downs. Nothing new on how to play the game, but there are a few changes. There was not as much traveling for golf this year. Many of the guys I play with had tough years with injuries and, in some cases, illnesses. Everybody made it through the year, but some better than others, to say the least. The best way to go through this year is to take a page from the classic western The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. I would say there was enough to go around for all three.

There was plenty of good. I have already broken my record for rounds played in a year. I have played 158 rounds, which eclipses my old record by 6 rounds. Right now, we have a weather break, but things are looking up to play Thursday through Sunday this week. With any luck, this year I may make the 170 mark. I have shot my age, 75 or better, 48 times so far this year. Last year I did it only 22 times. Of course, I had to shoot 74 or better last year. I did shoot a 73 from the white tees this year. Most of my rounds were played from the gold tees. My best round of the year was a 2 under 70, the same as last year. I started the year with a 5.0 index and currently, it is 4.9. I did have a much more consistent year. The highest I went was 6.3, and the lowest was 4.5. I also won my age group in the South Park Seniors and tied for the 4th best score of the day with a 75. My driving was still the stalwart of my game. My putting was up and down, so I will still put it in the good. I have actually been putting very well lately after having a downturn with putting during October. My other big improvement this year has been my sand play. I am not great, but I am not costing myself 2 or 3 shots when I am in a bunker. The weather had its ups and downs also. It was very windy and wet in March, April, May, and the early part of June. Then we went through a blistering hot spell that left a lot of courses in terrible shape. The rain we did get in this time frame was more in the form of a deluge. Beginning about the 2nd week of August, we went through some of the best weather I have ever experienced in Western Pennsylvania. Temperatures ranged from 66 to 84. It never got too hot or too cold all the way through the 3rd week of October. We could have used more rain, but we did get just enough to help some of the courses recover. Right now, we have hit a bit of a cold spell, but milder temps are on the horizon.

Next the bad, and there was plenty of that. My iron game continues to give me problems. It was the biggest reason my handicap did not go down. My iron play was especially bad from the 9-iron on up. I would have some good days with the irons. I have pretty much given up on figuring it out. My irons now consist of just the 6-iron through the lob wedge. Even though my handicap did not change much, I did have some really bad rounds this year. It wasn’t quite as bad as last year, but I had 14 rounds between 84 and 90. All of these rounds were brought on by bad iron play and a terrible short game. My problems with my irons did not have just one issue. Sometimes I would hit them fat, other times thin, and short irons just skulled low line drives. Those three shots could occur in just one round. There were some days that I had no finesse with them at all. I would have days where I did everything well with them: hit cuts, draws, high, and low shots at will. These were the days I shot my best rounds, as long as the putter behaved.

Now for the ugly and we all know where this is going. THE CHIP YIPS. Plus I added the shank chip, which I believe is nothing than a form of the chip yips. Even my good round in the South Park Seniors had a chip shank on the 17th hole. I admit I was choking down the stretch as I was just 2 over par after 16 holes. I somehow managed to hit 2 very good shots on the Par 5 and was almost green high on the left. The pin was on the front right but the green is narrow at the front. I tried to get too fancy and shanked it right out to the middle of the fairway. From there I putted from about 20 yards short of the green to avoid another shank. I putted it about 8 feet past and missed for a bogey 6. I played 18 better than I thought I would and had a 10-footer for bird but made a horrible putt but parred the hole to stagger in with my 75. The putting yips for now seem to be under control. I will be writing about that later this week. I have tried various things when it comes to the chip yips and just go back and forth with it. Some things seem to work and then everything just goes haywire. Fortunately, at times they just seem to go away. They are there more than they are not. I may discuss them further in another blog, but I don’t know. If I have a big breakthrough, I will be writing about that.

There is still some golf to be played this year, and where there is golf, there is hope. I will do the end of season right near Christmas when the year will be ending. I will be blogging some more over the next two days. The next one will be about my favorite subject: putting. Not too sure what the second one will be; most likely something about the mental game.

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Pirates Morning Report: If I Was The Czar Of The Pirates

Now that baseball season is over, I was going to start doing some golf blogs. I decided to get this blog out as soon as possible. I could also title this “what the Pirates should do but won’t.” I also wanted to get this out while I still feel there is a glimmer of hope for the 2026 season. There are some things that the Pirates could do that would end all hopes for the 2026 season. If they sign Andrew McCutchen—I love Andrew McCutchen—they should have never let him go. They should have re-signed him after the 2018 season. He unfortunately hurt his knee, but at the time, who could have predicted that? The facts are this: he was the 29th ranked DH in baseball. The Pirates can’t afford this from their DH for another season. You can say the same thing about two other players, Jack Suwinski and Alexander Canario. If they are on the 13-player opening day roster, this season is over before it even starts. I am not even wasting my time showing their stats; I have done it way too many times before. Before it is too late and the Pirates take all the fun out of it, this is what I would do if I ran the Pirates.

The number one priority for the off-season should be to sign Paul Skenes to a long-term contract. I feel that he would take a 6-year, 200 million dollar contract. However, if he would go for it, I would offer him 15 years at 600 million, making him a Pirate forever. Both of these deals could be done without increasing the current Pirate payroll all that much. You would trade Bryan Reynolds and Mitch Keller, which frees up 31 million. Look at it this way: if some other team had Paul Skenes and they said they would give you Paul Skenes for Reynolds and Keller, you would make that trade in 1 second. The Pirates have already freed up 25 million in salaries by getting rid of Tommy Pham, Andrew Heaney, Ke’Bryan Hayes, Adam Frazier, and Isiah Kiner-Falefa. That is 56 million, more than enough to do either deal. Is the 15-year deal risky? You bet it is. To me, it’s worth the risk. You are dealing with most likely a once-in-a-lifetime pitcher. Of course, Skenes would have to be willing to take the deals. The 6-year deal might have more appeal; who knows? I think either deal would have a good chance of getting the job done. What would be the starting rotation and what would the bullpen look like for 2026? My rotation would be Skenes, Bubba Chandler, Johan Oviedo, Braxton Ashcraft, and Hunter Barco. Barco is by far the least experienced, but I like him as the left-hander in the rotation. I can’t imagine him being any worse than who they had for the 5th and even the 4th starter last year. Where is Mike Burrows? I would put him in the bullpen and make him my new closer. He has the closer arsenal: fastball and changeup. I know that this would be a new role for him, but I think he would do just fine. Dennis Santana would go back to being the setup man. Justin Lawrence and Isaac Mattson would do 7th and 8th inning work also. That gets us up to 9 pitchers. The final 4 spots would be down to 7 candidates, in order of most likely to least likely to make the roster: Carmen Mlodzinski, Dauri Moreta, Chase Shugart, Evan Sisk, Kyle Nicolas, Eddy Yean, and Thomas Harrington. Then, there is the case of Jared Jones. I do not know what his timetable is exactly, but what better way to bring him back than to start him in the bullpen? You can never predict how injuries are going to affect your pitching staff, but this looks pretty solid to me. This staff looks pretty deep and could weather a few injuries here and there. Does anyone see a need to keep Mitch Keller on the team? I do not.

Now on to the position players. Besides trading Reynolds, I would also trade Jared Triolo. His defense makes him attractive to a lot of teams that have high-powered offenses, something the Pirates do not have. A lot of what I would do here is going to be predicated on not knowing what we might get in a trade for those three players: Keller, Reynolds, and Triolo. I will discuss the free agent market and trades at the end of the blog. I am going to look at this position by position with what the Pirates have after trading those players. At catcher, we have Joey Bart, Henry Davis, and new entry Rafael Flores. I would trade Joey Bart, but I would also be open to trading Davis. For now, the catchers would be Davis and Flores. The first baseman will be Spencer Horwitz. The last 62 games of the season, Horwitz’s slash line was .305/.395/.520. You hope he doesn’t turn out to be Triolo II, but you have to go with him a full season. Obviously, I would not have him lead off. Second base will go to Nick Gonzales. Gonzales slumped the last six weeks of the season to have solid regression from 24 to 25. Right now, he is the only viable option at the moment, but that could change. Hopefully, he will find his groove again. His ankle-foot injury could have been a factor, but time will tell. Hopefully, it will be fully healed by spring training. Third base, Jared Triolo is the only guy that can play third. Cam Devanney and Malcom Nunez are other options. Who is Malcom Nunez? I don’t think even the Pirates know who he is. He is 24 years old and has been with Indianapolis for the last four years. He got hurt this past year, and that could be an issue. In 874 at-bats, he has hit 21 homers at the AAA level. I would rather see Devanney play shortstop. The other possibility is Tsung-Che Cheng. Both he and Devanney are excellent glove men. This is what the shortstop position needs. Even though Devanney had awful batting stats, I am not ready to give up on him yet. Of the two positions, third base is where the biggest hole is, even if the Pirates would decide to keep Triolo. That leads us to the outfield. The first thing I would do is get Oneil Cruz out of center field and put him in right field. I would have Billy Cook and Nick Yorke play left field. Conner Griffin would be my opening day center fielder. I would see no need for him to go to AAA. Then you have three wild cards, all for different reasons. Can Endy Rodriguez, who has had severe elbow issues to say the least stay healthy for a season. Who knows how he will do even if he stays healthy? Even when he has been healthy, he has never had a chance to play regularly. To me, he would make the perfect DH replacement. He can also catch and play first base. Being a switch hitter makes him even more appealing as a DH. The next wild card is Esmerlyn Valdez, soon to be 22-year-old outfielder. He put up insane numbers at the Arizona Fall League. In 77 plate appearances, his slash line was .370/.519/.870. That’s right; he slugged .870. He could be on the team as soon as June. Finally, we have Tremar Johnson, the no. 1 pick of 2022. He had an okay year at AA Altoona, but with a young player—he just turned 21 in June—maturity and development can sometimes come fast. He’s got speed, and he does seem to be able to get on base. It might be too big of a jump, but he should at least start in AAA.

A lot of the lineup will be dictated by what the Pirates would get in return for Keller, Reynolds, Bart/Davis, and Triolo. Hopefully, they would get nothing but position players. They do not need to add pitching. Their biggest need is third base and outfield. As far as the free agent market is concerned, I would not delve into that at all. Having said that, I would consider three players if the contracts are not too big: the Japan star Munetaka Murakami, who has played third base, Bo Bichette, and Kyle Tucker would be the only other two free agents I would even consider because they are under 30 years old. I know there are players on the Pirates that are up for arbitration that will increase their payroll some. With 55 million gone from the payroll, the Pirates could do the six-year Skenes deal and sign one of the three free agents mentioned. It would still keep their payroll manageable at around 120 million. These are the things I would do during this offseason. I think the best bet is to improve the team through trades. Any one of those three free agents would be a big help also, but it would increase the payroll more than what the Pirates are comfortable with. One thing does not change: I finish every article of this type with the same sentence. We all know that this is what the Pirates should do, but we know that they won’t do it. They just do not have a high interest in bringing winning baseball to Pittsburgh.

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Pirates Morning Report: Game 7, An Unlikely Hero And Missed Opportunities

Final Score: Dodgers 5 Blue Jays 4 in 11 innings

Why The Dodgers Won: The Dodgers became the first team to win back-to-back World Series since the Yankees won 3 in a row from 1998 to 2000. You have heard of bullpen games. This was a starting rotation game. The Dodgers used all of their 4 starting pitchers. Shohei Ohtani went 2 and 1/3 innings, Tyler Glasnow went 2 and 1/3 innings, and Blake Snell went 1 and 1/3 innings. Last but certainly not least, Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched 2 and 2/3 innings the day after he went 6 innings in game 6. He was the winning pitcher in 3 of the Dodgers’ 4 wins. The Dodgers used only 2 pitchers out of their bullpen, and one of those, Emmet Sheehan, made 12 starts during the regular season out of 15 appearances. It was a sad last 2 games for the vaunted Blue Jay offense. In the last 2 games of the World Series, they were 4 for 26 with runners in scoring position. They left 22 men on base, including 14 in game 7. It is going to be a very long offseason for the Blue Jays.

The Key Moments Of The Game: In the bottom of the third, with a runner on 3rd base and one out, the Dodgers decided to intentionally walk Vlad Guerrero. They paid the price when Bo Bichette took an Ohtani slider and hit it 442 feet into the seats, giving the Blue Jays a 3-0 lead. The Dodgers started chipping away with a run in the 4th and a run in the 6th. Mookie Betts opened the 6th inning with a walk and eventually scored on a sacrifice fly. Both Dodger runs scored on sacrifice flies. In the bottom of the 6th, the Blue Jays scored a run on a single and a double. Then the Dodgers long balled the Blue Jays to victory. Max Muncy in the 8th made it 4-3. In the top of the 9th, Miguel Rojas took a 3-2 slider and lined it over the fence to tie the game. Rojas, who is 36 years old, had hit only 7 home runs during the regular season. He did not start in the first 5 games of the series. He is at the end of a 3-year, 15 million dollar deal. He is a free agent in 2026. I wonder if anyone will sign him. He is one of the most unlikely World Series heroes of all time. Will Smith, who is 30 years old and has a 10-year, 140 million dollar contract, hit the go-ahead homer in the top of the 11th. It is just too painful to go through all the missed chances the Blue Jays had since the 6th inning of game 6. In the last 15 innings of the World Series, the Blue Jays had a runner on 2nd with no outs 4 times and a runner on third with less than 2 outs 3 times and did not score a run. They could not do what the Dodgers did 2 times in game 7: hit a sacrifice fly. If they could have just done it one out of 3 times, they would be the World Champions. On one final note, I think the bench-clearing incident, as ridiculous as it was, did not really have any bearing on the outcome of the game. It is a little ironic that the most fortunate play of the game for the Dodgers was the line drive by Andres Gimenez that Max Muncy snared, even though he was playing in for the bunt. Gimenez needlessly instigated the confrontation. Just like the Blue Jays, you could say it was not his night.

The 2025 baseball season has come to an end. Even though I did not think they would, I have to give the Dodgers credit for going full bore to try to win two World Series in a row. It took them 11 innings into Game 7, but they got the job done when it needed to be done. As mentioned before, this will be a long offseason for the Blue Jays. It is what I always say: hitting is always a sometime thing. In spring training 2026, I expect the Blue Jays to be practicing hitting fly balls deep enough to score a runner from third base. It was a great season for baseball. This was probably the best postseason baseball has had since the 1986 season. In the coming weeks, I will look at what the Pirates should do but probably won’t do in 2026. I think you will find it to be a bit of a surprise. Not as big of a surprise as the Pirates having a winning season, but surprising nonetheless.

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Pirates Morning Report: We Have The 7th Elimination Game Of This Post Season.

Final Score: Dodgers 3 Blue Jays 1

Why The Dodgers Won: The Dodgers were able to put 3 runs on the board after 2 were out in the top of the 3rd. They were able to make it stand up for a 3 to 1 win over the Blue Jays to force a game 7. The Blue Jays did everything they wanted to do except score runs. They were able to get Yoshinobu Yamamoto out of the game after 6 innings. The Blue Jays had chances to score in the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th but failed every time. They were 1 for 9 with runners in scoring position and left 8 men on base. The Dodgers were even worse overall in hitting, getting only 4 hits. They got 3 of those in that 3rd inning. It does not take a math major to figure out they got only 1 hit in the other 8 innings. They got 2 walks in the 3rd and another 2 walks for the rest of the game. The Dodger bullpen barely hung on, but hang on they did.

Key Moments Of The Game: In the top of the 3rd, the Dodgers had a runner on 2nd with 2 outs. Then came the dreaded intentional walk to Shohei Ohtani. Will Smith followed that up with a double, making the score 1-0. Freddie Freeman walked on 5 pitches, bringing the slumping Mookie Betts to the plate. He fell behind in the count 1-2 but lined a single to left on an up-and-in fastball. This scored 2 runs and gave the Dodgers a 3-0 lead. The Blue Jays bounced back in the bottom of the inning when George Springer got a big 2-out single to make the score 3-1. Then came the heartbreaking bottom of the 9th for the Blue Jays. Roki Sasaki got out of a 1st and 2nd, one-out jam in the bottom of the 8th. The bottom of the 9th got even worse. He hit the first batter, Alejandro Kirk. Addison Barger got a ground rule double that turned out to be a bad break for the Blue Jays. Even so, this put runners on 2nd and 3rd with no one out. The Dodgers brought in Tyler Glasnow. Ernie Clement swung at the first pitch that was up and in off the plate. He blooped it right to Freddie Freeman. This brought up the light-hitting Andres Gimenez. On the 2nd pitch of his at-bat, he swung at a pitch that was just off the outside of the plate. He went with the pitch and blooped it out to left field. That is when Addison Barger made the cardinal sin of breaking too far down the line toward third. The throw by Kiki Hernandez beat Barger to the bag, and the game was suddenly over. Glasnow got out of the inning by only throwing 3 pitches with none of them being in the strike zone.

Next Game: Tonight, in Toronto, game 7. This 7th game of the World Series is really difficult to get a read on. The Dodgers, even though they won game 6, are still in a team hitting slump. The Blue Jays, on the other hand, may be psyched out by not cashing in on all the opportunities they had to tie and win the game. Both pitching staffs are running on fumes. The game could go either way. It could be a wild scoring affair or a close, tight, low-scoring game. The most interesting part of the game will be how each team manages their pitching staffs. This will be the key to victory. I still like the Blue Jays’ chances. No matter what happens, I expect it to be a great game to end one of the best postseasons in the history of baseball. Let’s just hope that some umpire does not screw it up.

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Pirates Morning Report: Blue Jays Do It Again.

Final Score: Blue Jays 6 Dodgers 1

Why The Blue Jays Won: The Blue Jays overcame the 1st pitch home run jinx by starting the game with not one but two home runs to jump out to a 2-0 lead. It was 3 pitches and 2 home runs by Davis Schneider and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Unlike a lot of games where a team has led off with a home run the Blue Jays won this one. They got an outstanding, record-breaking pitching performance from 22-year-old Trey Yesavage. He went 7 innings, giving up just 1 run and 3 hits. He struck out 12 and walked no one. The Blue Jays’ bullpen gave up only 1 hit and a walk while striking out 3 more. As great as Yesavage was, the Blue Jays played some great defense behind him. They have not made an error in the Series. After the home runs, Blake Snell pitched pretty well for the 6 innings. The Blue Jays were only leading 3-1 going into the top of the 7th. They had scored another run in the top of the third when Teoscar Hernandez misplayed a liner down the right field line, allowing Daulton Varsho to open with a triple. Ernie Clement immediately drove him in with a sacrifice fly. In the top of the 7th, the Dodger management team continued to make bad decisions.

Key Moments Of The Game: The Dodgers made what I call an Aaron Boone panic move by changing the batting order for game 5. One of the oldest sports sayings is to go with what brought you here. Messing with the Dodger top of the order proved to be disastrous. Snell had thrown 93 pitches through 6 innings. I saw no problem on allowing Snell to come out for the 7th inning. Addison Barger opened the inning with a ground ball single down the left field line on a 5-pitch at-bat (98 pitches). The ball was not hit hard but was placed perfectly down the left line. During the Isiah Kiner-Falefa at-bat, Snell wild-pitched the runner to second. IKF, showing his Pirate roots, grounded out to short on 6 pitches (104) not advancing the runner. Snell walked the weak-hitting Andres Gimenez on 7 pitches (111). Even though he does strike out Davis Schneider, he wild-pitched Barger to third base. At this point, he has thrown 119 pitches. This is where the Dodgers decide to take out one of the best pitchers in baseball and bring in 23-year-old Edgardo Henriquez with 1st and 3rd and two outs to face Guerrero. Snell had gotten Guerrero to ground into a double play in his last at-bat. Henriquez threw the 3rd wild pitch of the inning to allow in the 4th Blue Jay run. He walked Guerrero and Bo Bichette singled to make the score 5-1. Henriquez was taken out and replaced by none other than Anthony (Are You Kidding Me) Banda. Miraculously, he gets out of the inning. Even more dumb founding, Banda comes out for the 8th. The Dodgers are not so lucky this time; he gives up a run on 2 hits. To show how bad this guy has been, his ERA actually goes down after this performance. Where in the hell was Roki Sasaki? I would have brought him in after the walk to Gimenez. The Blue Jays, thanks to some questionable moves by the Dodgers, go home with a 3-2 lead in the series.

Next Game: Tomorrow night, in Toronto. Can Yoshinobu Yamamoto do it one more time? Will the Dodgers continue to tinker with their lineup? I know Mookie Betts is in a slump. So was Shohei Ohtani before he had one of the greatest games in postseason history. Will the Dodgers admit their stupid mistake and put Betts back in the No. 2 spot? You have to go with your best in their accustomed positions and hope they figure it out. The other big plus for the Dodgers is that they are getting a day off. If ever a team needs to regroup, it is these Dodgers. Between this and Yamamoto starting, I think the Dodgers have the advantage in Game 6. That is not to say they will win. The one place Yamamoto does seem vulnerable is the 1st inning. It has been a back-and-forth series so far. The only really exciting game was the 18-inning marathon that the Dodgers won. It’s funny, that game may have cost them the series.

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Pirates Morning Report: There Will Be A Game Six

Final Score: Blue Jays 6 Dodgers 2

Why The Blue Jays Won: Both teams had to be tired coming off the 18-inning marathon on Monday night. Only the Dodgers really showed it. Two of their hottest hitters, Shohei Ohtani and Will Smith, went 0 for 7 with a walk. The team only scored 2 runs on 6 hits, and one of them was a garbage run in the bottom of the 9th. Shane Bieber pitched a nice 5 and 1/3 innings, but he did not have overwhelming stuff or command. He threw 81 pitches, with 33 being balls. He gave up 4 hits and walked 3, giving up 1 run. The Dodgers were 0 for 5 with runners in scoring position. The Dodger bullpen imploded in the 7th. The Blue Jays by far looked like the fresher team. It was a close game through 6 innings. The Blue Jays had a 2-1 lead thanks to a 2-run homer by Vlad Guerrero Jr. in the top of the 3rd. Then came the 7th inning, where a lot of questionable decisions were made.

Key Moments Of The Game: The Dodgers sent Shohei Ohtani out to start the 7th inning. In the previous inning, he had a couple of hard-hit outs. He did strike out the last batter, but his last two fastballs dipped to 96 MPH. Dalton Varsho put the first pitch of the inning, a 97 MPH fastball middle in about belt high, and drilled it into right field for a base hit. Ernie Clement took pitch number 3 of the inning, a 96 MPH fastball that was down and in, and doubled into left center field off the wall. Then the Dodgers decided to go with two of their most ineffective relievers in the postseason, Anthony Banda and Blake Treinen. They paid the price. They finished the inning by giving up 3 hits and a walk, allowing 4 runs to score. If you could have limited the damage to 1 run in that inning, you would have still been in the game, they wound up getting rocked. When the inning was over, Banda’s postseason ERA was 10.38 and Treinen’s was 8.31 even though he was not charged with giving up a run in 1/3 of an inning. This should be their last appearance in the postseason. If it is not, the Dodgers will deserve whatever the results are. The game was broken open 6 to 1, and the Dodgers never really threatened after that. They scored 1 run in the bottom of the 9th, but it was traded for an out. A solid win for the Blue Jays.

Nest Game: Tonight in Los Angeles. With the win, the Blue Jays assured themselves of going back to Toronto for a game 6. After game 2, I wrote that I thought the winner of this series would be the team that would win that close, hard-fought, down-to-the-wire game. What I did not know was that the game would go 18 innings. This 18-inning win seemed to have an adverse effect on the entire Dodger organization. You could argue whether they should have even stayed with the planned battery for game 4. At least consider giving Will Smith a rest after catching 18 innings the night before. Then, with the game on the line, why pitch Banda and Trienen? There were obviously other options. Jack Dreyer was one of them, pitching 2 innings no less. The Dodgers showed their age after the game 3 marathon in more ways than one. No matter what happens tonight, the Blue Jays accomplished their goal of getting back to Toronto. If they win tonight, they have an excellent chance of keeping the Dodgers from winning back-to-back championships.

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Pirates Morning Report: An Eight Game World Series

Final Score: Dodgers 6 Blue Jays 5 in 18 innings

Why The Dodgers Won: The much-maligned Dodger bullpen held the potent Blue Jay offense scoreless for 11 innings. Will Klein shut out the Blue Jays over the last 4 innings. He gave up 1 hit, walked 2, and struck out 5. He appeared in 14 games for the Dodgers this year. In a game that featured 5 home runs, 31 hits, 19 walks, 6 of which were intentional, 2 hit by pitches, and 2 Dodgers errors, it was amazing that only 11 runs were scored. Shohei Ohtani was 4 for 4 with 5 walks. The scoring opportunities were numerous, and both teams were just as inept in bringing in runs. The Blue Jays were 2 for 12 with runners in scoring position and left 19 runners on base. The Dodgers were 2 for 14 with runners in scoring position and left 18 men on base. There were 49 runners on the base paths during the game. Only 6 of those runners scored. Only 4 runs were driven in by hits that were not home runs. There were only 2 runs driven in by singles, one of which was only because Bo Bichette can’t run. The Blue Jays used 9 pitchers. The Dodgers used 10 pitchers. The other surprising fact about this game, besides the Dodger bullpen, was that the Blue Jays struck out 16 times. After 17 and 1/2 grueling innings, the game ended suddenly with Freddie Freeman taking a center-cut 3-2 sinker over the center field fence to walk it off for the Dodgers.

The Key Moments Of The Game: There were too many to mention. The bottom of the 13th had to be an analytical nightmare. Tommy Edman led off the inning with a double. Then the Dodgers bunted, heaven forbid, him over to third base. Eric Lauer then got pinch hitter Alex Call to pop out on a 2-0 pitch. Then the Blue Jays decided to do the cardinal sin of intentionally walking the batter not once but twice to load the bases. Of course, those batters were Shohei Ohtani and Mookie Betts. They did this to face Freddie Freeman. On the 2nd pitch, Freeman hit it hard but right at the center fielder to end the inning. It was a victory for old school baseball. Freeman would get his revenge in the bottom of the 18th.

Next Game: Tonight, in Los Angeles. It will be interesting to see what effects last night’s game will have on both teams. There could be physical and psychological effects. The Blue Jays’ offense has to be down from having so many chances to win the game but not coming through. The Dodgers’ bullpen all of a sudden has to be feeling real good about themselves. The Dodgers are going from one extreme to the other. They went from possibly being over-rested to the point of exhaustion. This is a team that is a little bit long in the tooth. Even though they won and it is a good thing, you have to wonder a little bit just how much they might have in the tank for games 4 and 5. Then there is the injury to George Springer. Will he miss a game or the entire Series? This would definitely hurt the Blue Jays’ cause. This was by far the most exciting and intense game of the Series so far. Will a win like this give the Dodgers momentum, or will they be running on fumes for the rest of the series? We will find out tonight.