With all of the time that we've spent talking about Francisco Liriano and Jeff Locke and Gerrit Cole this year, there's something that's gotten lost in the mix: some days, AJ Burnett takes the mound with his best stuff, and when that happens the other team doesn't stand a chance. Burnett was brilliant this afternoon, […]

AJ Burnett pitched one heck of a game against the Cardinals in the first end of the double-header, but the game went 11 innings and he (once again) failed to pick up a win. Pitcher wins are, of course, meaningless in the grand scheme of things, but it'd still be nice for AJ Burnett to […]

Francisco Liriano didn't really seem to have his best stuff tonight, but that hardly mattered at all. He walked five hitters in his seven innings, but the Rockies only managed two hits off of him, and so they didn't score at all. The Pirates constantly seemed like they were falling one hit short of an […]

The Pirates have lost two games in a row. They "need" a strong start and a win tonight as much as any team that's 21 games over .500 and has the best record in the baseball can "need" a win at this point in the season. It would be nice to see them play well […]

I suppose that as bouncing back from 13-0 losses goes, this wasn't ideal. Really, what happened was that one bad inning probably kept the Pirates from winning this game. Gerrit Cole looked really sharp in the first inning, but his slider flattened out a bit in the second and he gave up a home run […]

When I was in high school, I ran cross country my junior and senior years. Once every other week or so, we'd do a vaunted "hill workout" where our coach would, without warning, lead what we thought was a distance run to Seventh Street in Sharpsville, where we'd just run in circles up and down […]

The Pirates forced the entire baseball world to notice them this week by beating the Cardinals four times in a row. As a result, some of my favorite national writers have written about them.  At FanGraphs, Dave Cameron talks about how the Pirates aren't regressing this year and that maybe it's time to stop expecting […]

For much of the summer, there's been a slowly growing call for Andrew Lambo's promotion to Pittsburgh. Lambo's been hot all year and his promotion from Altoona to Indianapolis in early June did nothing to slow him down. He's hit for great power with 28 home runs between the two levels this year and he's […]

Some people don't like baseball because games can occasionally go on for forever and because there are so many games that each individual game looks meaningless in the context of an entire stadium. Not me. I love data. Long foul balls are just strikes unless you serve up a home run on the next pitch. […]

I'm not sure why, but as a Pirate fan, I want this fifth win over the Cardinals every bit as bad as I wanted the first four. The Pirates have made a statement in this series regardless of what happens in tonight's game, but a five-game sweep would be one of the most emphatic statements […]

You've likely already seen the news that Mike McKenry will miss the rest of the 2013 season with a torn meniscus. It came across yesterday afternoon right at the trade deadline, and frankly, it's not huge news for the Pirates. McKenry's a pretty prototypical back-up catcher, and Tony Sanchez is ready to replace him and […]

This is getting ridiculous.  From the moment that Jeff Locke took the mound on Wednesday night, it was apparent that he didn't have "it," if you define "it" as whatever it is that he has this year that's made him different from last year, despite no one being exactly sure what it is. He gave […]

Neal Huntington gave a press conference almost immediately after the trade deadline ended. I thought a bunch of the things he said were really interesting, and I'd recommend you check the quotes out (you can find them just about anywhere that has a writer with a press pass on staff, but Bucs Dugout has a […]

The Pirates have beaten the Cardinals three times in a row. It's been awesome. The Pirates and Cardinals play two more games this week. It's time to make a statement, I say.  Before this series started, I sort of thought of a 3-2 series split in either direction as a non-result. Three wins would be […]

It's official:  No last-minute deals for

Heard rumblings that

Justin Morneau's been a name that's been at least peripherally associated with the Pirates for most of this trade deadline season. Jon Heyman says the Pirates and Orioles are both interested in the former MVP. John Perrotto says

There's still not a lot happening, though if my memory serves me correctly, trade deadline day rarely starts to heat up before lunch time on the East Coast. For now, what we've got is this: 

As if yesterday wasn't crazy enough, today we move right into the trade deadline. Here's where things currently stand:  Early in the day yesterday, we heard the Pirates were very interested in Bud Norris and "close" to a deal on Alex Rios. By the time the second game started, there were reports out that the […]

When Jordy Mercer singled home Starling Marte after Marte's leadoff triple in the bottom of the fifth inning,