Pirates Finding Ways to Win

As the Pirates get set to start a three game series with the Milwaukee Brewers tonight at PNC Park, a team that has owned the Pirates in recent seasons, the hometown club is 7-5 and only one game behind the St. Louis Cardinals in the National League Central. According to Dejan Kovacevic of the Post Gazette (article), the latest the Pirates have even shared the division lead since 2001 is April 25th, 2002 when they were 13-7. Of all the negative statistics and anecdotes you can pull from the 17 consecutive years of futility, that has to be one of the most depressing facts.

So how have the Pirates won seven of their first twelve? That is a great question, and one that is at least a bit easier to answer after the Pirates played their best baseball of the season during their weekend sweep of their division rival, the Cincinnati Reds. Still, the Pirates are being outscored 75-53 on the year and it doesn’t take a math wizard to figure out that a run differential like that does not point toward future success.

Even if you take away the 14 earned runs given up by Hayden Penn and Brian Burres, two players that have no business in the major leagues right now, the Pirates have still been outscored by eight runs on the season and their team ERA (without those two) of 5.45 would still rank near the bottom of the National League. The Pirates have won seven of their first twelve by winning close games, including a 4-0 record in one run games. History shows that winning one run games is usually a matter of circumstance and tends to even out over time, so the Pirates cannot count on continued success in these tight games. They must start playing better baseball in every facet of the game.

That was the encouraging part of the weekend series with the Reds. Yes, the Pirates had two ninth inning wins, but the Buccos got solid pitching (only 10 runs in the three games), timely hitting through the order and played the best defense they have played so far this season. If the Pirates had won seven of twelve in mid-June most would not notice, but that’s what makes the beginning of the baseball season so much fun. Let’s hope the Pirates can carry their solid play from the weekend over to the three game set with the Brewers, a team they have really struggled with in recent seasons. Who knows, a strong performance in this series and Pirate fans may be able to get their hopes up just a bit.