Pirates score 2 in the 1st and no more.........

Jason Bay's 1st inning homer (18) gave the Pirates a fast start and a 2-0 lead.
However,that was as good as it got,as Arizona chipped away and grabbed the lead for good in the seventh on their way to a 4-2 win.
Ian Snell allowed 2 runs over 6 innings in his best outing in a while and Freddie Sanchez added 3 hits including 2 doubles,but in the end it was the bullpen that again was the killer.
B.P.Chacon(4-3) allowed the winning run in the seventh and the normally reliable Damaso Marte allowed a 8th homer to Tony Clark.
The Bucs now travel to San Francisco for the weekend series.
From what I read,the Giants and their fans are looking forward to seeing Matt Morris again!

Pitching Matchup

Pittsburgh: Matt Morris (7-7) at San Francisco: Russ Ortiz (2-2) 10:15

Bullpen Notes

Looks like the poll thinks I am too harsh on the Hagerstown Suns.
Please remember my criticisms are about the Suns front office,not the players.

On the Suns,looks like a few people are coming and voting,but in a interesting note-none of them picked up the ball on telling me why I should be more positive.
On one hand,I am too negative,yet they cannot tell me anything to be more positive about.

Nice to see Cumberland's Aaron Laffey get his 1st big league win last night over the White Sox.
His little league district game vs Nick Adenhart was one of the two best little league games I have ever seen.

Finally,Our neighbors over at Wooden's world of baseball has a new post.
Always a good read over there!

Photo Credit
Bay-AP Photo-Matt York

Pirates start strong,finish slow

The Pirates jumped to a 2 run lead midway through the first,but then gave 4 runs back in the lower half on the way to a 10-6 loss in Phoenix to the Diamondbacks.
Paul Maholm allowed 6 runs (4 earned) in 5 innings to pick up the loss and fall to 7-14.
Adam LaRoche went 4 for 5 at the plate with an RBI and Nate McLouth hit his 5th homer of the year.
Other Pirates earning RBI were Freddie Sanchez,Ryan Doumit and Ronny Paulino.
Tonight's Pirate killer was Chris Snyder.
Snyder homered and finished with 4 RBI on the evening.
The Pirates conclude their visit to the valley of the sun tomorrow at 9:35

Pitching Matchup

Pittsburgh: Ian Snell (7-10) at Arizona: Doug Davis (8-10) 9:35

Bullpen Notes

A pet peeve on Baseball stats.
I absolutely hate situations like happened in tonight's game.
Paul Maholm gave the D-Backs 2 runs on a throwing error and yet due to the scoring rules,they are considered unearned.
IMO-if the pitcher makes the error,they should be considered earned runs.
After all,he did make the error and therefore he should be accountable for the runs.

As expected,Wake Forest did hire Dino Gaudio to become the new basketball coach at Wake Forest.
Best Wishes to Dino and the Deacons.

1982 Kentucky Derby winner Gato Del Sol was put down at the age of 28 at Stone Farm in Kentucky.
He had stood at stud in both the USA and Germany before returning here for his pension years.

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats (1-5) travel to Edmonton on Saturday to take on the Eskimos.
Here is hoping that it is televised,the back to back series vs Winnipeg were Canadian TV only.

And finally,in Indianapolis-Steven Pierce played right field instead of first base.
Could this be a possible way to make space for Pierce without removing Adam LaRoche from the lineup?
I am more willing to give that a chance.

Photo Credits
Baseball-AP Photo-Paul Connors
Gato Del Sol-Sharon Mathias

Gorzelanny dominates,Quinn finally signs.

Tom Gorzelanny fanned 9 Diamondbacks in 7 innings and was helped by quite a few Arizona miscues as the Pirates won the opener of their road trip in Arizona 8-3.
Gorzelanny allowed 3 hits to young newcomer Justin Upton,but only 1 to the rest of the Rattlers on his way to his 10th win of the year.
It was the first appearance since July 25 for the lefthander,who left that game with shoulder fatigue in the 3rd inning.
Tonight,he certainly looked sharp and rested.
The suddenly hot Ronny Paulino led the Pirates with 2 RBI,while teammates Jack Wilson,Nate McLouth,Jose Bautista and Freddy Sanchez all finished with 1 apiece.
Series continues at 9:35 in Phoenix.

Brady Quinn finally reached an agreement with the Browns and is expected to be in camp today.
Quinn agreed to a deal that is worth $20.2 million, with $7.75 million guaranteed and could reach $30 million with incentives.
Quinn got the money he wanted,but likely has lost any chance for a large amount of game action this year.
The process begins today.
Is Brady Quinn a player to build around?or another overrated Notre Dame player that is just the next in Cleveland disappointments?

Pitching Matchup

Pittsburgh: Paul Maholm (7-13) at Arizona: Byung-Hyun Kim (6-5)

Bullpen Notes

The New Jersey Devils signed former Islander forward Arron Asham to a 1 year deal.
Asham scored 11 goals and 12 assists last year on Long Island and adds grit to the New Jersey forwards.

Wake Forest is expected to name Dino Gaudio as the replacement for the late Skip Prosser tomorrow in Winston-Salem.
Gaudio was Prosser's top assistant at all levels,but was a failure as a head man at both Loyola (Md) and at Army.
Cannot bash Wake though at this point,simply no other candidates available at this time of year.
Wake Forest almost was forced to take someone off Prosser's staff.

On the signing front

Had a good evening last night in Frederick catching up with the Potomac Nationals.
Every player signed and had no problems doing so.
I had a chance to spend a few minutes each with pitchers Marco Estrada and Cory Van Allen and talk a bit.
Of course,both signed their Suns cards as well.
Both great guys and missed in Hagerstown for sure.
The game finally enabled me to get all the Suns stars from their team set that moved up to Potomac.
Chris Marrero,Justin Maxwell,Mike Daniel all signed their Suns and Potomac cards.
I asked Mike when their pictures were taken for the Potomac set and he said they were snapped on their 1st day with the P-Nats in Winston-Salem.
The odd thing was this-Brett McMillan was promoted with them on the same day and traveled with them to North Carolina,yet McMillan was not in the set.
Odd.
Another great catch was the Nationals 1st pick this year in Ross Detwiler.
Ross signed his USA baseball card and seemed like he was enjoying his first day in High A ball,as he was promoted earlier in the day.
Plus former Sun Marvin Lowrance,who I had no cards of when he was here,signed a few as well.
Marvin is a great guy with a cool sense of humor.
Plus,I love his choice in music for his plate appearances-"Big Bad John" by Jimmy Dean.
I wish I had asked him why he uses that,would have made a cool bullpen note.
Former Pirate and current Potomac pitching coach Randy Tomlin signed a few for me as well.
Always good to add Buccos to the collection.
Ryan was on television offering his opinions on Barry Bonds before the game on the Fox affiliate in Washington.
He is now quite the star.
The only downside of the day?
I couldn't stay for the game,got called into work early.
Bummer.

Thanks for a very helpful reader for their helpfulness in Frederick.
They wish to be unnamed,but I just wanted to thank them for their help.

Until next time

Photo Credits
Gorzelanny=AP Photo-Matt Yorl
Quinn-Icon SMI-Ron Schwane
Van Allen-Baylor University

Pirates fall in 10,Pirates and Suns rained out.

Rain canceled both the Pirates-Reds game today and the Hagerstown Suns-Greenville Drive battle as well.
The Pirates will make up their game on Aug 28,while the Suns will play Greenville in a doubleheader tomorrow beginning at 5:05.

The Pirates lost an exciting 9-8 10 inning game with Cincinnati on Saturday.
8 balls were hit out of PNC Park between the two teams,but the biggest was Adam Dunn's 2 run shot in the 10th off losing pitcher Matt Capps (4-5).
Capps earlier allowed a homer to the singles hitting Jeff Keppinger in the 9th to tie the game and allow the extra stanza.
Matt Morris allowed 5 runs (1 unearned) in 6 and a third in his Pittsburgh opener and hit a homer himself,his first of the year.
4 other Pirates hit homers,Jason Bay (17),Ronny Paulino (8),Jack Wilson (6) and Nate McLouth (4).
Paulino in particular is picking things up after his booing a few days back.
Whatever works as motivation to help a talented player reach his potential.

On the Signing Front

Greenville might have been the toughest team that I have seen over the course of the last two season.
Managed to get them all,but it took much more effort than the average team and lived up to the predictions of many,who thought that this would be the hardest team to do this season.
The crowd size were a little larger than the usual ones,but seemed to be more of a collector Red Sox nation crowd and that means harder time getting the signatures.
Gabe Kapler was not bad,2 cards over 3 nights,it was more that so many were asking for him and usually that is not a problem in Hagerstown.
One theory on the difficulty of the Drive is that farm teams of the Red Sox and Yankees get hammered everywhere they go and since many of them have multiple cards,it can get tiresome and some dont want to sign as much.
I can see the point,but the fact is that this is still Low A ball and signing should not be a huge deal.
I can honestly say that the Suns players this season have been terrific,as have most teams.
I will be missing the Drive finale as I am going to the Potomac-Frederick game instead.

Bullpen Notes

The Pirates called up the closer for the Indianapolis Indians,Franquelis Osoria and made Jonah Bayliss' return to Pittsburgh a brief one and sent him back to Indianapolis.
Osoria has struggled in his previous MLB trials,but has performed well enough in Indy to take a look.

Since this is a slow day,allow me a few lines to clarify some things for those of you that believe that I am too harsh on the Hagerstown Suns.
I can see how some may see it that way,really I can.
And I know from my hit and IP reports that our readership is picking up Suns fans every day,that is good news whether they agree with me or not.
So I will offer this to those of you out there that think things are fine with the Suns.
Comment,tell me what you would write about the Hagerstown Suns........
A few conditions,no talking about the field or stadium itself.
I am in the Suns corner about the field,they need a new one badly and the field condition is the city of Hagerstown's fault-NOT the Suns.
Other than the tarp night,I have not and will not criticize the Suns for the field conditions.
So,no bringing up the field because it is not needed,I am on their side already.
The other condition is this-be specific.
If there are things to be positive about-tell me.
Maybe I dont see something,I rarely go to the 3rd base side of the stadium.
Perhaps there are things going on that I never see.
If a specific employee is terrific,tell me so.
There are a few that are good people,name them.
Say why I should be more positive and give better reasons than just go Suns.
Dont give a Bush-like "You're doin a heck of a va job,Will".
Until tomorrow.

Photo Credit
Pirates field crew-Penn State University.

Pirates split two during a hiatus

I missed two games in Pittsburgh and the Bucs split both games.
On Thursday,the seldom used Jose Castillo stroked a pinch hit single in the 11th inning to score Ryan Doumit and give a 5-4 win to the Pirates.
Castillo rarely plays anymore,but chose a good time to step up!
Ronny Paulino hit another homer (7th) for the second night in a row for the only Pittsburgh long ball.
It seems that perhaps the PNC Park fans booing him Tuesday may have lit a fire under Paulino.
Lets hope he can keep it up as Paulino has the potential to be a good catcher.
The other Pirates earning RBI were Jack Wilson,Jose Bautista and Nate McLouth.
Salomon Torres got the win,his 1st, and moved to 1-3 on the year.

On Friday,the Cincinnati Reds came to the Steel City and hammered the Pirates 13-4.
Ian Snell was pounded for 6 runs in 5 innings in falling to 7-10.
Snell and pitching coach Jim Colborn appeared to have words in the dugout during the game,but both waved it off after the contest.
Ryan Doumit hit his 9th homer as part of a 2 RBI night.
Other Pirate RBI went to Adam LaRoche and Jose Bautista.
Matt Belisle continued his mastery of the Bucs in getting the win for the Reds.
Belisle had not won since May and of his 6 wins this year,3 are vs Pittsburgh.
Some guys just have your number,I guess.
Series continues tonight at 7:05,as Matt Morris makes his Pittsburgh Pirate premiere.

The Hagerstown Suns lost to the Greenville Drive last night 3-1 in a fast and well played game.
Ryan Phillips of Greenville fired 7 scoreless innings and allowed just 2 hits,while Zack Baldwin pitched well for the Suns,as he allowed just 1 run in a 6 and a third inning stint.
This was the best game that I have seen all season as far as both teams playing well.

Pitching Matchup

Cincinnati: Bobby Livingston (2-2) at Pittsburgh: Matt Morris (7-7) 7:05

Bullpen Notes

First,Quick note on the blog.
From now on,one must be Google registered to comment here.
All opinions are welcomed,whether or not you agree with me,but commenting anonymously is no longer allowed.
Feel free to state your opinion,lets just know where the opinion is coming from.
Anyone can still read,just not post unless registered.

The Poll is moving along and even though,for now,more of you out there disagree with my take on the Suns than agree-I am still encouraged.
For there to be negative votes out there means that more people are reading here than I thought and that is why I write.

In a surprise,the Pirates are removing Shane Youman from the rotation for Matt Morris.
I figured it would be Tony Armas,but between the solid performance of Armas vs the Cardinals and the fact that Youman might be better suited for bullpen work,I cannot complain too much.
Not sure how well this will work,but it is worth a short term look.

Jesse Lumsden ran for 211 yards and Jason Maas tossed 3 touchdowns as the Hamilton Tiger-Cats avenged their loss to Winnipeg last week with a 43-22 victory .
The win improved the Cats to 1-5 and gave Charlie Taffe his 1st win as Hamilton coach.
Congrats to Taffe and the Tabbies!

Got some Greenville players last night and will work on more tonight,so look for a on the signing front tomorrow.
Finally got Tommy Herr to sign his two Hagerstown cards vs Augusta on Thursday,so you will not be reading any further complaints about Herr from me.
I will leave anything about him to others from now on-promise!

And finally Cumberland's Aaron Laffey will make his MLB debut for the Indians today in Minnesota vs the Twins.
Laffey has been dominant this season at both AA Akron and AAA Buffalo,so he has earned his shot in the bigs.

Photo Credit
Doumit-AP Photo-Keith Srakocic

Welcome to Bizarro World!

The title says it all.
The Pirates blasted the visiting Birdos into the Ohio River 15-1 and how they did that was just amazing.
A grand slam homer from Ronny Paulino?
A 1 run,4 hit pitching performance from Tony Armas?
A total of 3 homers on the night with 15 runs and 20 hits?
Nothing negative that I can say tonight other than it was just one of those nights that the world turns upside down.
Tony Armas pitched like we thought he could after his signing and picked up his first win as a Pirate (1-3).
Armas fanned 5 in his 6 and a third inning stint and most importantly only walked one.
Armas has seemed to have problems getting the ball where he needed to all season and tonight was able to avoid those problems.
Armas made the most of his only start as Matt Morris will likely grab that spot in the rotation.
Ronny Paulino(6) quickly changed the boos left over from the night before into cheers with his 1st inning homer with the bases loaded to deep left.
Adam LaRoche(15) and Jack Wilson (5) also hit homers for the Buccos.
I would not want to say that this is the turning point or anything,but for one night-things were not quite so bad for Pirate fans.
The series ends today at 12:35.

The Hagerstown Suns beat the visiting Augusta Greenjackets in both games of a twin-bill by the same score of 3-2.
Our favorite Sun Erik Arnesen allowed just 1 run over 5 innings to win Game 2 and even his season tally at 5-5.
I missed the games due to personal issues,but I will be there tonight to see the finale vs Augusta.

Pitching Matchup

St.Louis: Anthony Reyes (1-10) at Pittsburgh: Shane Youman (2-3) 12:35

Bullpen Notes

Two great reads from the Post -Gazette on the trade deadline.
This is analyzing the nuts and bolts of the Matt Morris deal and the other about the failed swap that would have moved Jack Wilson to Detroit.

The thing that I am puzzled by on yesterday's dealings is this-the Tigers were apparently offering 2 nice prospects,but the Captain wanted to haggle over dollars.
But from all reports had no trouble giving the Giants everything they wanted on the Morris contract.
Add them up and what do you get?
A panicked GM that is playing for the last 2 months,not the long term.

Over in Rice a Roni land-the Giants fans are ecstatic over moving Morris and his hefty salary and GM Brian Sabean was quoted from a radio chat that the "PTBNL will be a pretty good player".
Scary stuff.

All-around nice guy Buddy Bell resigned from managing the Royals at the end of the year.
I will always like Buddy and believe that he managed some of the worst teams(talent-wise) of the last 25 years between these Royals teams and the Tigers teams he managed in the past.

The New Jersey Devils locked promising forward Zach Parise up for the next few years with a multi-year contract.
Great move keeping the young scorer for a decent period of time.
Defenseman Paul Martin still needs to be re-signed and then GM Lou Lamoriello can work on a few role players to finish up the roster.

Photo credits
Pirates-AP Photo-Gene Puskar
Bell-AP Photo-Chris O'Meara
Parise-Getty Images-Jamie Squire

Pirates lose,Paulino booed,Matt Morris on his way and an interesting comment

It is late,I cannot doze off,so to take my mind off things-I thought I would pound a post out.

The Pirates continue to puzzle me.
Not only did the Captain fail to trade Shawn Chacon and/or Damaso Marte when they are at the peak of their value,he seems to have made a desperation "hail mary" on San Francisco veteran Matt Morris.
Littlefield traded Rajai Davis and a player to be named later for Morris.
Now I have zero problem with moving Rajai Davis.
As those of you that read my Pirates GM series know,the Bucs had a few too many speedy,slap hitting center fielders of the same ability(Duffy,McLouth,Davis and Nyjer Morgan) and I advised moving one of them,so that is not a problem and the likely PTBNL will not be a high level prospect as the Pirates took ALL of Morris' salary on.
That is right-the Pirates are going to pay ALL 9.5 million of Morris 2008 salary next year,so unless the Pirates did this to move Morris by the August deadline,the Pirates will be paying close to 20% of their projected team salary next year to a 3 or 4 starter!
Check our friends over at Cot's Baseball Contracts for all the numbers on Morris.

And this is a starter that has been pummeled over the last two months,with no wins over that period and an ERA over 8!
This is not about my being upset about Matt Morris.
He is a average pitcher,might even help the Pirates and the Captain did not have to give up much for him,so no problem there.
But here is my problem-You thought that the demands of a possible impact player from the draft were too high for a player that you control the rights to for 6 years,but you almost double that for a year of a journeyman like Matt Morris???
If Littlefield had just gotten the Giants to pay a small chunk of this,I would be behind this even more.
Morris at 6 million sure beats 9.5 does it not???
It is just stunning to think that with all the great players in Pirate history that Matt Morris is now our highest paid player ever.
So,quite a gamble today in Pittsburgh,Littlefield has shoved everything into the pot.
If Morris turns things around,maybe DL gets another year,but if Morris pitches similarly to his Giant efforts-Littlefield gets the axe......

Now onto the game,where the visiting Redbirds defeated the Bucs 6-4 in a game noted for more defensive lapses from "Loafing" Ronny Paulino.
Paulino barely got out of his crouch on a catchable pop-up and in the same inning dropped an on the money relay throw from Jack Wilson that had Scott Rolen dead to rights out.
Instead,the run scored and the Cardinals had the lead that they would hold for the distance.
When is this guy going to pay for his lack of effort?
Go to the bench?To Indianapolis? A release?
Anything than watching this act EVERY night!!!!!!!!!
I know that Ryan Doumit is far from Johnny Bench as a backstop,but he brings a better bat and far more hustle than Paulino.
"Loafing Ronny" must have a dozen get out of jail free cards in his locker to continue to be run out there every night.
Paul Maholm pitched well again in the loss that dropped him to 7-13.
Paul has become quite dependable after a horrible start and has deserved better support over this span.
Doumit hit a homer (8th) to snap an 0 for 20 drought in the eighth inning.

Pitching Matchup

St.Louis: Braden Looper (8-8) at Pittsburgh: Tony Armas (0-3) 7:05

Bullpen Notes

Here is a link to Will Smith's incredible response to the Monday "rainout".
Simply head shaking.

Also Will and the Suns want a new playing surface for Municipal Stadium.
I am in Smith's corner on this one.
It needs it,the team deserves it and frankly it reflects poorly on the City to visiting fans and teams that come here to see that bad of a surface.

Erik Arnesen pitches tomorrow,I spoke to Erik before today's game and he will be starting one of the two seven inning games.
Due to personal issues,I will miss at minimum 1 and possibly both games tomorrow,but will be there for the Augusta finale on Thursday for sure.

One final note on the Suns.
An anonymous reader posted in a response to a post that maybe I am negative on the Suns and their management.
You can read his post and my response here.
But it got me thinking,am I too hard on them or just too honest?
So I am putting a new poll up on this-vote on this please,I am interested to see what you think and feel free to comment too..........

I may be back tomorrow,if I have time.

Photo credits
Morris-Getty Images
Paulino-AP Photo-Gene Puskar