Bucs ground Birds 8-4 in ten innings!

The Pirates used a four run 10th inning to break a 4-4 tie and drop the St.Louis Cardinals 8-4 in the beginning game of the six day road trip.
Ronny Paulino's two run single gave the Pirates the lead and Adam LaRoche's following double added the four runs to the Pittsburgh total.
Nate McLouth fourth inning homer (10) gave the Pirates a 2-0 and after the Cardinals grabbed the lead back 3-2,a Paulino double scored two and handed the lead back to Pittsburgh.
The Cardinals tied the game in the eighth on the backs of a long (and I mean LONG) homer by Albert Pujols off John Grabow.
Marino Salas won his first game in his big league debut (1-0) as he survived the ninth without allowing a run despite walking three birds.
Salas was bought from Indianapolis earlier in the day as the Buccos demoted John Van Benschoten back to the I-Tribe.
Phil Dumatrait pitched reasonably well for five innings before allowing three runs in the sixth,but allowed only four hits over his work evening.

The downside of the evening thought was the loss of Ryan Doumit to a broken finger,which leads us to wondering this-Which Paulino are Pirates fans going to get,the guy that looked OK in 2006 or "Joggin Ronny"?
For the Pirates to continue to compete in the division,Paulino is going to have to pick up some of the slack that has been lost with the hot bat of Doumit and I am not sure that he can't do that at all,let alone if the lackluster player of 2007 arrives.

On Monday,the Buccos split a doubleheader with Atlanta,as the Pirates stretched their winning streak to six by winning Game 1 5-0 before the streak was snapped by a 8-1 Bravo win in the nightcap.
Neither game was televised,so since I could not watch the game,I stayed in bed and used the time to sleep!
Zach Duke tossed six shutout frames in Game One in moving to 2-2 on the season,despite walking five Braves.
Freddy Sanchez cleared the bases with a three run double in the fourth inning for all the runs that would be needed and Adam LaRoche added a two run homer (4) with a two run shot in the eighth inning.

John Van Benschoten was shelled in his spot start (0-2) in being chased with 7 runs (6 earned) in four innings of Game 2.
The start was an opportunity for JVB,but likely not a fair one after being used totally in relief since his recall from Indianapolis.
No Pirate RBI in the game as the only run was scored on a Brave error.

The Cardinal series resumes tonight by the Gateway Arch.

Pitching Matchup
Pittsburgh:Paul Maholm (2-3 4.79 ERA) at St.Louis:Todd Wellemeyer (3-1 3.56 ERA) 8:15

Bullpen Notes

Jack Wilson begins his rehab at Altoona on Wednesday.
Look for Wilson to be back in Pittsburgh early week and for Brian Bixler to be assigned to Indianapolis.

I will be serving as the Pirates scouting director for the mock draft at Minor League Ball.
Feel free to go over and offer any opinions or thoughts to me.
This is the second year in a row that I have been the Pirate representative and I hope to improve on last years showing,which has been hurt by the hand injury to my top pick there-Josh Vitters.

I will also do the Pirate shadow draft here after the actual draft.
That draft is looking much better for me and would have been better for the Pirates as well.

Minor League Baseball officials visited Richmond over the last two days to look at the facilities etc and consider what level of baseball that is best suited for the city.
Teams from AA,High A and Low A(Hagerstown) have all been rumored as interested in the Virginia capital.

Many states are slowly beginning to attempt to allow abandoned and hard to reach oil wells to return to production.
None of these places are going to produce enough crude oil to solve the problem,but whatever one can pull out of the ground is not going to hurt anyone.

Photo Credits
McLouth:Bill Boyce-AP Photo
Duke:Don Wright-AP Photo