Last night’s win was a good thing for the Pirates, because over the next two afternoons they’re going to face Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander, who combined to strike them out 27 times in 16 innings last month. It’s true that this Pirate team is a bit different from the Pirate team that Verlander and Scherzer so thoroughly dominated, in that it looks like they can generally hit baseballs a little bit, but they still tend to seem overmatched against hard-throwing strikeout pitchers. These next two games, especially with Lincoln and Correia going for the Pirates, are pretty dangerous territory for our Buccos.
The first pitch today is at 4:05, to avoid the FOX primetime blackout.
