There were a lot of positives in last night’s game for the Pirates; with the offense mired in a pretty ugly funk, both Gregory Polanco and Starling Marte had multi-hit games to help spark the Pirates to score some runs against a pitcher that shut them down just a few days ago. Polanco had three hits including a double, Marte had two hits including a monster homer in the eighth, and the Pirates looked much more like the Pirates we expected to see when camp broke ten days ago — obviously Marte and Polanco contributing could help make a huge difference for this offense. It’s also worth noting that Vance Worley also looked much better than he did in his first start, though in a pretty non-Vance Worley kind of way with six strikeouts and four walks in six innings. Antonio Bastardo continued his early-season struggles, and that lead to Mark Melancon coming in for a one pitch save. That one pitch was an 88 mph cutter.
This isn’t really a secret, but the Brewer team that the Pirates are hosting this weekend looks really terrible right now, and so it’d be nice to see the Pirates take advantage of them by reeling off some more wins. They’re facing Kyle Lohse tonight and Lohse has made two really ugly starts to open the 2015 season, including one against the Pirates. Jeff Locke goes for the Bucs; his one start in 2015 was an excellent one against the Brewers. After getting playing time for some reserves in various parts of the week, the Pirates are trotting out what’s pretty much their A1 lineup to face Lohse. The Brewers, meanwhile, are clearly a bit desperate to shake things up, as they have Ryan Braun leading off.
First pitch tonight is at 7:05.
Image: Justin K. Aller, Getty Images
