Monday, April 29, 2013
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Do you think Jonathan Sanchez will continue to start?
“My understanding is, the suspension doesn't impact any potential roster moves,” GM Neal Huntington said.
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Sunday, April 21, 2013
Saturday, April 20, 2013
16 Games in and The Pirates are Heating Up
Remember that article back on April 6. It’s Déjà Vu All Over Again. Well that’s in the rearview mirror now. The Pirates are on an upswing and most of the
hitting questions are behind them. Their
lineup is producing and one of the last holdouts in the hitting slump, Pedro
Alvarez, doesn’t quite have anyone wanting for his batting average, but after
hitting two home runs, including one that left the building, the power is
arriving just as the rest as the team is coming around. Did someone say Adam LaRoche? How did it all turn around. First of all, it doesn’t hurt to have two
starting pitchers that compete with anyone in the league. If you go to Wikipedia and look up Staff Ace
you’ll find a picture of A.J. Burnett there.
Staff Ace:
A.J. Burnett –
The best pitcher on the staff who can shut down anything the opponent can throw
at him. He will begin and perpetuate
winning streaks, sometimes with no help at all, and will stop any losing streak
by the home team.
Staff Ace 2: Wandy Rodriguez
– Dominant in the World Baseball Classic and leads his team the
Championship. Returns to MLB and
continues his dominance. Three games and
an ERA .056.
On offense one player started hot and has propelled the ship. Normally, who would you think that player is
when you’re talking about the Pittsburgh Pirates. Andrew McCutchen, right? Yeah that’s who my choice would be, but in
this case that player is Starling Marte.
Marte in the leadoff position has been the sparkplug that has ignited
the team. He has already had an extended
hitting streak early in the season, he’s getting on base each game, he has the
speed that can kill, and he is armed and dangerous in left field. This is not to say that McCutchen is not the
star of the team still. I fully expect
Andrew to continue the performance he has given since coming to the Pirates and
the MVP type performance that he had through most of last season. There is room on the team for at least 2 guys
that can do it all and I for one can’t wait to see it on a nightly basis.
The rest of the team is coming around too. Those batting averages after 4 games are
history and the future looks bright.
Maybe Jay Bell could step in there and
play some shortstop to get the batting average at that position up to be
where it should be too.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Pirates Sweep-Steelers Resign Manny
Not a bad day in Pittsburgh. It started off slowly for the Buccos and the anticipation of what the Stillers would do. First of all, everyone was waiting to see what the Steelers would do with the prospect of losing Manny Sanders to the Patriots in free agency. He was a restricted free agent and the Patsies offered him 2.5 million for a year. The Stillers had til today to match the offer. Apparently they thought the prospect of losing another one of their receiving corps was too much to lose. So they matched the offer and kept him for another year.
How many fans turned the Pirates game off early only to check to see what happened in the last 2 innings. After down early by five, the Bucs put on an offensive show in the last 2 innings, thanks to 1 unlikely candidate and the rest of the regulars. It did not look positive, until Michael McKenry launched a Home Run . Matt Latos had controlled the game and had reduced the possible comeback to 2 innings. McKenry picked a great time to start building up his stats, including that Home Run and another in the next inning to tie it up. Starling Marte added another 2 runs to that with his own blast to left. At the end of the day the Pirates erased an early 5 run deficit and also added another 5 to that to win 10 - 7. They also managed to win three consecutive games and pull within 1 game of the Division leading Cards. A good day in The Burgh.
Saturday, April 13, 2013
This Curve Could Be in Pittsburgh Sooner Rather Than Later
While the surefire pick for the most anticipated flame thrower in the Pittsburgh Pirate organization is Gerrit Cole right now, there's another guy in the Altoona Curve rotation that is looking like he's not far behind. That someone is Jameson Taillon. Taillon recently struck out 10 in a game against the Harrisburg Senators. Although it was in a losing effort, it was not because of a lack of effort on Taillon's part.
The Magic Number 13,000
I was checking out stats for the Pittsburgh Sports Buzz the other day. No, not Andrew McCutchen's on base percentage or Starling Marte's Batting Average, but just several stats related to who's reading the blog and how many page views and such. While there are some YouTube videos that will get millions of views in an a day, hour or minute, I was happy to see that the Pittsburgh Sports Buzz just topped the 13,000 pageview mark. I just want to thank all that are reading. I really appreciate your support and I am always happy to listen to comments. I don't really like those spammy ones that try to get links for their websites, but because I take all comments those get through very often. That's why the computer guys invented the delete button though. I'm ecstatic there are all those Pittsburgh Sports fans that have given my blog a chance and I hope they and many more will keep reading. I also hope I can find the time to write more and more stories about my favorite teams. Just for the heck of it I googled 13,000 and surprisingly enough, 13,000 isn't a terribly interesting number. I'd much rather read the Pittsburgh Sports Buzz. So, once again thanks for joining me.
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Saturday, April 6, 2013
It's like Deja Vu All Over Again for the Buccos
Don't jump off the ship. We've seen this before.
After one time through the rotation, shortened to a 4 man rotation because of the off day, the Pirates are pulling an Adam LaRoche special. That is, they're not hitting early in the season. Let's hope they don't pull a real Adam LaRoche and wait til the second half to start hitting. I was curious as to how they compared to the last 2 years in the first four games. It's obvious that they are not quick starters out of the gate. Take out Andrew McCutchen and a hot 4 games by Jose Tabata in 2011 and the numbers would be sickening. But, take away McCutchen at any time during the season and it would not be good news. He is the foundation of this team and we saw last year that when he gets hot the sky is the limit.
Of course there has to be a reason for them to get off to this slow start. I know what it is. It's the weather. They played those first three games in Pittsburgh and it is spring and not even in the 60s on a regular basis. I could almost go for that reasoning, but they were playing the Cubs, so any disadvantage from the weather should be offset by the fact that IT'S THE CUBS. I know the Pirates don't have that much to be proud of the last 20 years, but IT'S THE CUBS. My parents weren't born the last time they won the World Series. So, yeah the weather, that's why they started off with 1 win in their first 4. Wait, they're playing in LA now and they still didn't hit. I don't think there's a coldspell happening in lalaland right now, but I could be wrong, didn't check the weather yesterday. Let's go to weather.com.
Doesn't look too bad. A balmy 56 at the worst. Not exactly The Bahamas, but not Alaska either. I can't see how that would affect their hitting. They did spend a while in Florida this Spring. That should have warmed them up sufficiently. Ok, enough of the joking around. The Pirates are fishing for their first winning season in a couple of decades. They need to take advantage of every quality pitching start they have this year and so far they have wasted 3 and barely mustered enough offense to pull the 4th out. Their offense really has to start clicking. They will not hit home runs on a regular basis. McCutchen will hit them consistently, Jones will continue to go on home run tears here and there, Alvarez will continue to mature and increase his home run numbers and Marte will hopefully show some power. Don't count on significant power from the rest, although Walker could break out and that would be a huge bonus. I'm counting on him just to hit somewhere near .300 and hit alot of doubles.
Yeah the Pirates are off to a slow start, and they can't really afford to continue it if they have any design on winning the NL Central. But we are only 4 games into the season and, as they say, there is a lot of baseball left. Let's see where we are after 10 games. Maybe more than the weather will be heating up in Pittsburgh, namely the bats of those Buccos.
Beat the Streak
Here's a fun thing to do. Even though I'm not into Rotisserie Baseball because I don't really like to follow other teams unless I'm watching them in the NL Central Standings, this is something everyone can find the time to do and you can pick up 5.6 million if you're lucky enough to win. Major League Baseball has a Beat the Streak contest on their website. You can pick 2 players a day who you think will get a hit. If somehow you're able to pick a player for 57 times and you're the first one to do it, you win the grand prize. If you miss one day you have to start over again.
Here is the link to the MLB website and the contest. Go for it. Oh I forgot the most important part. If you win I get half for letting you know about it. It's only fair, right.
http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/fantasy/bts/y2013/splash_index.jsp
Here is the link to the MLB website and the contest. Go for it. Oh I forgot the most important part. If you win I get half for letting you know about it. It's only fair, right.
http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/fantasy/bts/y2013/splash_index.jsp
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