The Pirates, you are certainly aware, have won five in a row and seven of eight, to run their record to 14-9, which is a very good record after 23 games (“on-pace for” stats are dumb and entirely unhelpful in April but the Pirates are on a 98-99 win pace, which means that we can say they’ve picked up where they left off last year). They are also 3 1/2 games behind the 17-5 Cubs and have actually lost ground against them over the last ten games. Standings and games back and the like are not hugely important now, but the Pirates are going to have to win a lot of games against the likes of the Reds if they’re going to keep pace with the Cubs.
Francisco Liriano starts for the Pirates tonight. He’s presumably happy to be back at PNC Park, after three pretty ugly starts on the road. He’ll face Alfredo Simon, who has been terrible this year aside from one decent start against the Pirates. Jared Hughes is back in the bullpen today with Rob Scahill demoted to make room for him. Hughes’ rehab did not go terribly well but blah blah stats don’t matter on rehab blah blah blah. Hughes brings the Pirates a little bit closer to being full strength, which is a good thing.
First pitch tonight is at 7:05.
