Oneil Cruz Day

 Well, Father's Day young Buc was Jack Suwinsky with his 3 homers, including a walk off.  Then yesterday there were more young Buc sightings.  O'Neil Cruz showed up with his bat and finished 2 of 5 with 4 RBIs.  In the 3rd inning he put on a little show with his arm.  A ball was hit to the third base side of him.  It wasn't hit exceptionally and wasn't a difficult play, but what followed made you think maybe the outfield isn't a bad place for him.  He backhanded it easily, double clutched as he moved toward first base and uncorked a fireball to Michael Chavis at first.  Chavis extended and easily made the play, but I'm wondering if he expected the ball to drill a hole in his glove when it was released.  Hopefully he has practiced with Cruz and knew that it was a possibility.  The throw was clocked at 96.7 mph.  

As I said about Jack Suwinski the other day, I hope his potential is as good as the flashes of talent he's shown in his highlights and I hope they find a spot where he is comfortable.  

It also didn't escape my attention that JT Brubaker was finally able to put together a win and a scoreless 6 innings.  It didn't hurt that the offense scored 12 runs too.  It's a little easier to pitch with some offensive help.  

I'm a little disappointed in Jack Suwinsky.  C'mon Jack, I expected at least 1 HR after the hat trick.

Yet another Bucco made his Major League debut in the game in pretty impressive fashion, Bligh Madris.  He contributed 3 hits, 2 RBIs and a stolen base.  Quite a debut, what's he going to do next? hit 3 home runs in a game.  We can only hope.

SUWINSKY!

 

One thing I love about sports is you get to watch a group of players become a team and hopefully succeed with each other.  You get to know the players and their strengths and weaknesses.  You hope that players will develop and be stars.  As a fan of the Pirates it seems like they always have some promising players but they have had huge problems developing any talent to the point where we have superstars.  

Right now we have Bryan Reynolds, and Ke'Bryan Hayes.  They both have provided the leather and Reynolds has hit for average and power, but it seems like there's another level to hit before he's considered one of the best in the game.  He's young though and maybe it will happen at some point.  Hayes will definitely provide the defense that we need from the hot corner, but he hasn't been an offensive machine that you want from a third baseman.  Again, though, these guys are still young and maybe it will happen soon.  

The reason I'm talking about this is the next group of hopefuls have been making appearances in the field and at the plate.  The latest of which provided the fireworks during the game.  Jack Suwinski picked Father's day with his Dad present at the game to give a show at the plate.  He smacked 3 home runs with the last one being a walk off shot in the 9th to finish things off.  He even walked on his other plate appearance.   Pretty good Father's day present, I'd say.  He's now tied with Reynolds for the home run lead for the Pirates.  There are other players I'm looking forward to see grow with the Pirates, but for now Suwinski was the man for one night early in this season and gives us some hope that the new guys have potential to achieve something in this league.