Bucs win in the Emerald City,Sad day in Steeltown.

Sorry,I missed yesterday.
I get so run down on Tuesdays,it makes it hard to find time,especially since the Bucs were off traveling to beautiful Seattle.
The Pacific Northwest is the only part of the USA that I have a huge desire to visit that I have never been to and might be the first thing that I liked about inter-league play.
Seattle and Portland seem like such beautiful cities from what I have seen and some of their progressive policies on environmental issues,to mention just one thing,make it a terrific place to visit,if not live.

Anyway onto the game,as the Pirates won their 1st visit to Safeco Field 5-3 behind another great outing by Tom Gorzelanny.
Gorzo twirled 7 excellent innings,allowing two runs, to earn his first victory in over a month.
It shows you just how poor this team is when one looks at Gorzelanny's numbers and he had not won a game in that long.
Gorzelanny was pitching on short rest,as this was the scheduled start for Ian Snell.
Snell,of course,had the noted battle with his finger taking on a hot stove.
The key to the game could have came in the eighth,as Masumi Kuwata retired Ben Broussard on a weak grounder,with both the tying run on base and Ichiro on deck.
Good work for the import and even B.P Chacon pitched in as he got the final two outs to earn his 1st save of the season.
The Bullpen is short handed as closer Matt Capps is serving his suspension for plunking Prince Fielder a while back.
4 different Pirates had 1 RBI during the game.
The series continues tonight at 10.
If the Pirates can get a split of these next two games in Seattle,it would be their first win of a series this season over a team with a winning record.

The Indians fell to the visitors from Philadelphia 9-6.
Ryan Howard had 4 runs batted in for the Phils,including a homer that was measured at 451 feet off Jason Stanford.
Stanford allowed 6 runs in his 6+ innings off work.
Ryan Garko hit his 9th homer of the year to pace the Tribe.
Garko could be getting more playing time,as David DeLucci appeared to injure a hamstring in the game.
Manager Eric Wedge was quoted as saying that it looked like a DL type injury.
Kyle Kendrick was the winning pitcher and got his 1st win for the Phillies.
Why mention that?
Kendrick is a favorite here,as we met and talked to Kyle a bit last year in his visit to Hagerstown as a member of the Lakewood Blue Claws.
Way to go,Kyle!

Pitching Matchups
Pittsburgh-Paul Maholm 3-9 at Seattle-Jeff Weaver-0-6-10;00.
Philadelphia-Jon Lieber 3-5 at Cleveland-C.C.Sabathia-9-2.- 7;00

Bullpen Notes

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats are moving on.
The Cats released veterans Rob Hitchcock and Mike Morreale yesterday.
Both were offered jobs in the organization,but both chose to be released in case they decided to play with another team.
Both players release bothers me,but Hitchcock bothers me more than Morreale.
The hard-hitting defensive back from Weber State was a career long Tabbie and my favorite Cats player.
Hitchcock holds the Hamilton record for career tackles on both defense and special teams.
I think Rob can still be a productive player in the CFL,but I hope he calls it a career.
I would hate to see Rob in other colors,especially the Double blue of the Argos.
Hitchcock has the makings of a good coach,even maybe way down the road,he could even have the Hamilton head job.
Sorry to see Rob go and here is hoping to see him teaching his style of aggressive football in Steeltown for years to come.
Here is a link to the emotional press conference.

Sorry to hear about the passing of Terry Hoeppner,the head football coach at Indiana.
I always have a soft spot for coaches that move up from the MAC,especially those that try to do the almost impossible and try to win at Indiana.
Indiana may be the worst football job in the Big 10,Hoeppner tried to win there,but simply ran out of time health wise.
Terry was most noted for having this huge rock brought into the Indiana stadium to try to build some tradition there.
Hoeppner arrived at Indiana from Miami,Ohio,where he was the college coach of Ben Rothlisberger.
He was 59.

Does anyone have any ideas why Joe Girardi might want the Oriole job?
A poor farm system that rushes and ruins most prospects that do have promise,a bunch of fading DH types on the team and a meddling owner that will not allow baseball people to make the baseball decisions do not add up to a desirable job to me.

Reggie Theus is the new head coach of the Sacramento Kings.
Theus was an excellent player at UNLV and during many years in the NBA as a player.
Theus most recently spent two years as head coach at New Mexico State and took them to the NCAA Tournament last year.
Plus he was a actor playing a coach on NBC's Saturday morning kids show "Hang Time".
Considering the guys he will be coaching with the Kings,he might want to sign up for " Saved by the Bell-Detention".

Photo Credits
Seattle-QT Luong-TerraGalleria.com
Gorzelanny and Kuwata-AP Photo-John Froschauer
Kendrick-AP Photo-Mark Duncan
Press Conference-Gary Yokoyama-Hamilton Spectator
Hitchcock-CP Photo
Hoeppner-IUHoosiers.com