Apparently, this team is capable of making anything interesting. A long time ago, this game got off to an incredible beginning. Delwyn Young and Neil Walker stroked one-out singles and when Garrett Jones got ahead in the count 3-0, I think every Pirate fan thought the same thing; “If he walks, Pedro’s coming up with the bases loaded.” Jones did walk eventually, and Alvarez delivered by swatting a hanging 2-2 breaking pitch over the right field wall. The hits kept coming, the Brewers made some errors, and suddenly the Pirates had a 9-0 first inning lead.
At this point Greg Brown and Bob Walk casually mentioned that the Pirates hadn’t score nine runs in the first inning since a game against the Phillies in 1989. Immediately, I thought, “Uh-oh, I think that was the Jim Rooker game.” When Walk made a throwaway comment about “Not walking home,” that confirmed it. If you’re unfamiliar with the story, the Pirates ran out to a 10-0 lead on the Phillies in the top of the first of a June 1989 game and Rooker, then the color guy, proclaimed that if the Pirates lost, he’d walk home. The Pirates lost 11-10, and Rooker delivered with a charity walk from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh in the off-season. Surely, that couldn’t happen again, right?
Brad Lincoln got right to work on giving the lead back up, but Pedro crushed a second homer and the second inning ended 10-3. That has to be a safe lead, right? Hardly. Somehow, Lincoln was staked to a 9-0 lead but got pulled before Dave Bush and the third inning ended 10-7. And after another great DJ Carrasco outing, Brandon Donnelly gave two more runs back to a Jim Edmonds homer. 10-9. The 14-run inning against the D-Backs, the 20-0 loss to the Brewers, both of those would pale in comparison to blowing a 9-0 lead to the Brewers at home.
Lopez, Meek, Hanrahan, and Dotel held the lead, though, so we can focus on the good things tonight. Alvarez’s homers were both pulled hard to right field and looked a lot more like the highlight reel shots he hit in college than the long bombs he sent to center earlier this year. He looked like a power hitter tonight and that’s a very good thing. On top of that, Neil Walker rapped out five hits, Tabata had a huge double to keep the first inning rally going, and the bullpen sans Donnelly was excellent. Lincoln was bad, but that’s a conversation for another night. In three of the last four games, the Pirates’ offense has come alive in a huge way and they’ve come alive because of Alvarez, Walker, and Tabata. It’s great to watch.
