82 Comments

Nick Gonzales; 3-4. 2 singles, 1 home run, 0 whiffs. The HR was off a slider.

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Huira, Keiboom, Downs all carbon copy swings who've failed for the same reason as Gonzo so far; would be a HUGE dev win if NickG was the first (only?) to adjust and figure it out.

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Jobu…..Maybe Nick called upon Jobu for help hitting the curve ball 😁

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Or he got hats.......for bats.....keep bats warm.....

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Yep, it would. Huira is not doing much this year at AAA.

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Skenes threw 71 piches over 4.1+ today.

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I bet after next week hes up

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That would be refreshing as opposed to waiting for Super Two, but I can't really fault the FO if they wait another month to potentially save millions, even 8 figures, by not having that 4th arb year.

When I think about the potential cost, not to mention the better odds of winning ROY and thus earning a full year of service, I think I'd be reluctantly waiting until June. I don't know how they rationalize that, though, now that he's up to 70+ pitches.

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They could also bring him up then sit him down down for a few weeks around the all star break for “load management”

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Well they brought up Jones to start the season so they have promoted and super 2 be damned. Why not Skenes too?

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At this point, Jones won't be Super Two, he'll just have one less year of control. But he'll also likely be easier to extend than will Skenes due to getting a smaller bonus at the time he signed.

I'm glad Jones is up and more than earning his right to stay. But we may have some regrets if we don't extend him and he's approaching free agency in 2029 that two weeks in 2024 cost us six months in 2030.

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The sky fell. Skenes gave up a run!

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2 runs now the end is Near!!!

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Shit hes washed

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Skenes gave up his 1st run, well struck triple and well struck single two batters later.

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I sense Skenes is a bust! All downhill from here……..

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He could still be a middle reliever…….

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Clearly he is not ready to face MLB hitters.....giving up a triple....sheesh....

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Interesting field alignment in Indy, Andres Alvarez at 1b instead of Nuñez. Gonzales with a hit up the middle off a Zach Davies curve.

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Feel like they've made it a point to avoid putting Nunez at first. Not sure why

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Nuñez now at 1b!!!

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This proves coaches and managers monitor our chats during games. WE ARE INFLUENCERS!

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I dont know if i feel better or worse thinking that i have some influence over the team lol

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I think he has played first, only when Lamb is not in. It makes you think it is not a high priority to get him to the majors too quickly.

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Two minor league games during day, two at night. The only thing that would be more perfect for me is if they scattered all of them throughout the day lol

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Bubba a hit batter, 2 walks, 2 outs. Then they take him out after 33 pitches. I'm curious why they took him out.

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Pitch count. General practice when someone in the minors gets to 30+ innings in the same inning.

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I never knew that, but it makes sense.

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Anyone else getting Jeff Locke vibes from Bailey?

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Maybe he can be like Kyle Hendricks level of Location out of no where for us circa Cubs of 7 years ago....

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You can't pull fat, Lonnie boy.

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Yeah, he doesn't like look a WR for PSU anymore

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SEASON'S BACK ON

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I don't mean to be a killjoy and am happy that they won yesterday, but this offense is putrid. Tobias Myers is a minor league pitcher called up in an emergency. The Pirates, with the exception of Cutch and Cruz, made him look like Greg Maddux in his prime yesterday.

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Falter is pitching like he doesn't want to be a placeholder for Paul Skenes....

Speaking of Skenes, wasn't he supposed to start last night? I thought this week was supposed to be the first week he pitched on 4 days rest? Or did I imagine that?

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That got mentioned somewhere. But he pitches this afternoon. And next week will be his Tues/Sun starts.

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Really hope Tellez can get a hot streak, like cutch and cruz just landed on, and if not, then hope he gets waived, then we can move the angst fully to Davis, with MAT battling to be that guy, and Triolo knocking on that door... Great thing about sports boards, neverending amount of players to make fun of, until they get hot,...SO...GET HOT TELLEZ🤣🤣

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Triolo is a keeper. When GG 3B Ke'Bryan Hayes was injured last year, Triolo, himself a 2 time "Best Tools" guy at 3B in the minors, moved in and the team never skipped a defensive beat. Everybody likes big offensive numbers, but this game is won primarily on pitching and defense.

He not only excelled defensively last year, but also posted a .786 OPS in 200+ Plate Appearances. He is struggling offensively at this point, but that has not affected his quality of contribution on the defensive side of the game. He's definitely earned his place.

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Jake Lamb has been red hot in AAA. I thought his career was done. But perhaps he has rekindled something.

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like better moving triolo to first base and calling up Nick

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I thought Lamb looked solid and very professional at Pirate City. Not an all-star, but someone that adds experience........ in a good way.

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The Pirates always appear to be hoping someone on the roster will "break out." Suwinski's middle name has to be Jack "ready to break out" Suwinski. People jump back on his bandwagon if he actually hits the ball hard a couple of times instead of watching called strikes. His "break outs" usually last a game or two and then back to the same pattern of watching and hoping the ump will call it a ball. Hoping Tellez has a "break out" in him isn't going to win many games until or unless he actually starts looking like a major league player at some point and so far there's been little hint of that happening.

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Right on cue👍

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🤣

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Grandall can get some reps at first base?

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I wanted Lamb to make the team out of ST and cut Tellez.

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Scrappy dahn on the north shore docks said he was getting reps at first base while in catcher's gear so he could block all of Cruz's errant throws

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I like that idea a lot.

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maybe we trade him to the Mets?

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Why? For how bad Rowdy has been, Grandal serves one purpose - backup veteran catcher. His hitting the last 2 years has been terrible so I don't know why we would think that would be an improvement over Rowdy who at least hits left handed (so far this year very poorly).

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Grandal probably has another week rehabbing - any word on whether he is running well? Could be time to think long and hard about Rowdy Tellez. I know the Pirates like to wait until the trading deadline, but I doubt anyone thought Connor Joe would be better than he was for the Pirates last year, and Bart, only 27, has hit well and is becoming a likeable target behind the plate.

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Joe is always good in the beginning of the season and then he tails off

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As of now Tellez isn't good at any part of the season, lol.

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He had that one homer in Miami lol

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That's puts him one ahead of Henry Davis, lol.

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And one ahead of Key!

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As 1979 noted last night, Fleming is starting today. Given that Holderman and Bednar are probably unavailable for tonight and Chapman's recent control issues, it doesn't seem like a good time for a bullpen game. So, like 1979 suggested, maybe they think Priester will perform better coming out of the pen? They'll need innings from someone.

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Those kinds of games seemed to work well in September last year, especially with the almost forgotten Andre Jackson.

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Lets see what happens, fun seeing how they will deal with Marcos absense, for 2nd time.... more fun reading what we should have done from posters later if there is an issue👍🤷‍♂️

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For the record, I am fully in favor of using Fleming as a swingman: long-reliever and 5th starter as needed.

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I got duped by the MiLB app. When I opened it and looked at Indy, it showed Lauer throwing 5 scoreless innings. Learned it doesn’t default to current date.

Nice to see Pirates win the first two of this series, but if they don’t start hitting better w RISP and getting more XBH’s, we’re in for a very frustrating season.

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That’s a real glitch in the app. The same thing has happened to me more than once this year. Why the heck wouldn’t it give you the score of the game on that day?

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I get annoyed when you can't switch between pages without restarting the whole search. Terrible app.

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0 - 4 in MiLB, and it was not anywhere near pretty. Indy managed 10 hits in their loss and that number of hits was not matched by the other 3 MiLB Teams added together. 2 hits at Altoona, 5 hits at GBO, and 2 Hits from BRD. Ercolani with a solid 5 inning start at A+.

Lots of big arms throwing tonight!

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Just like the big club, the MiLB teams hitting has been terrible. Great concern for the future. They need to draft bats, bats, and more bats.

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Or…make your bones developing arms and flip them for already established bats.

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Certainly the Pirates need more and better players especially in the outfield, but they do have some options worth trying given the ineptitude currently being displayed by some middle of the batting order types now in Pittsburgh. Some of the guys in Indy have been doing well lately. Gonzales is hitting .390 and has only struck out 15 times in 82 ABs. Lamb's currently hitting .400 but with just 50 ABs. Bae is rehabbing there and hitting .429 with 28 ABs so far.

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Technically Bae is no longer rehabbing. He is off the DL and demoted to Indy. So for now they do not consider him worthy of a 26-man slot.

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You mean develop. They have drafted many talented hitters, but they do a piss poor job of teaching them how to hit even mediocre pitching, let alone good pitching.

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especially they have a hard time developing the talented hitters.

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They also need to stay healthy. Lonnie White is hitting fine just can't stay healthy.

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Excellent numbers from Falter and I agree with your 1.73 ERA - 5 earned runs in his last 26 IP. Watching Quick Pitch they were flashing that he has a 1.57 ERA in his last 4 Starts. Regardless, he has returned to his 4 Seamer in 2024 after experimenting at Philly and then with the Pirates after the trade.

Liked the comments from Joey Bart about Falter pacing the dugout between innings, and Falter's comments that he likes following Jared Jones in the Rotation - "he speeds them up and I slow them down", but getting a low 90's 4 Seamer past MLB hitters is hard to do. Just another example of a pitcher coming to the Pirates and finding confidence in what he is throwing.

Hard to dispute the value of the trades made by BC to get Perez, Gonzales, and Falter for the Rotation, and adding FA's Chapman, Ryan, and Fleming to the BP.

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Falter may be the biggest surprise in all of MLB to this point in the season?

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Especially a big surprise to Dave Dombrowski

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He's up there but still only ranks 53rd in fWAR (and 4th on the Pirates), which is partly because until last night he just wasn't getting the K's.

How about Kutter Crawford? I don't follow other teams that closely and especially teams in the AL, but for me he seems to have come out of nowhere (that shows my lack of awareness as he had a good year last year but nothing like what he's doing this year) and leads the majors in both fWAR and bWAR.

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