The Pirates are on an incredible run right now. Their 32-12 record since May 22nd represents perhaps the best sustained run of Pirate baseball in my lifetime. A lot of things have happened during that run that are worth talking about and considering during next week’s All-Star break, but tonight the 32-12 record really only represents one thing. What that 32-12 run did was pull the Pirates within 4 1/2 games of the first place St. Louis Cardinals, from the nine game deficit that they faced when the run began.
Essentially, the Pirates went on a 40-game hot streak to give meaning to this four-game set to close out the season’s first half. The Pirates could end this series with a half-game of the Cardinals. They could end it 8 1/2 back. They could fall on any of the even-and-a-half intervals in between. Assuming that this series is either split down the middle or breaks 3-1 in one direction or the other, this series is not the be-all-and-end-all of the 2015 season, but it certainly has the potential to set the tone for the season’s final 74 games. If the Pirates are going to make the 2015 regular season different from 2013 or 2014, I think that this is the weekend that it has to really start to take shape.
I don’t know if there’s much else to say; the Pirates have spent 2 1/2 years playing second fiddle in the NL Central to the Cards. Three wins this weekend gives them a chance to change that after the break. The Pirates get to start Cole, Burnett, and Liriano over the weekend, which means that stealing a win in tonight’s Jeff Locke/Carlos Martinez could set up an awfully good weekend. Locke has been excellent of late and is coming off of one of the best starts of his career last Saturday against the Indians, but Martinez is having an excellent season and will get to face a short-handed Pirate lineup (all signs now point to Starling Marte’s oblique injury landing him on the DL, though last I checked it hadn’t officially happened). The Pirates held their own over the weekend against the Indians and their high-strikeout-borderline-control staff that sort of tracks with Martinez, so maybe that experience will give them a leg up tonight. At least, I hope it will.
First pitch is at 7:05. Hold on to your butts.
Photo by Justin K. Aller/Getty Images
