OnlyBucs

1. Adam Frazier (L) 2B

2. Starling Marte (R) CF

3. Gregory Polanco (L) RF

4. Josh Bell (S) 1B

5. Melky Cabrera (S) LF

6. Colin Moran (L) 3B

7. Francisco Cervelli (R) C

8. Cole Tucker (S) SS

9. Chris Archer (R) P



At last a game I may be able to watch in its entirety without falling asleep.

This starts a run of 15 games in 14 days, and they only have three starting pitchers. Hopefully Williams is back next week, I guess they could do the opener thing twice, with Kingham and Brault piggybacking in back to back games.

They are gonna need to call somebody up from the Minors at some point to start here especially with the doubleheader in Cincy on Memorial Day. If they have to call Mitch Keller up to do so then so be it. This team is 24-20 and 2 games out of 1st place behind the Cubs and currently is the 2nd wildcard you can’t afford to sit around and twiddle your thumbs and hope you get by with 3 starting pitchers these next 2-3 weeks and Steven Brault who stinks. Make a move and call somebody up.

Stated very simply --- It is (past) time for Archer to step up!



Six innings and no more than 2 runs.



Chris, your teammates and all Pirate fans need you.

It sure would have been nice if they had signed Gio Gonzalez or SOMEONE with a major league pedigree in the preseason (or, heck, RIGHT NOW) instead of entering this stretch with Brault, Kingham and Openers. We don't have nearly enough starting pitching depth, but it seems like management is just fine without it ... just like last season they were perfectly fine with two outfielders.

1D3F2C313237303F1C2B3D3D315E0 wrote: It sure would have been nice if they had signed Gio Gonzalez or SOMEONE with a major league pedigree in the preseason (or, heck, RIGHT NOW) instead of entering this stretch with Brault, Kingham and Openers. We don't have nearly enough starting pitching depth, but it seems like management is just fine without it ... just like last season they were perfectly fine with two outfielders.
And that is the problem. TBMTIB would love to see their minimalist efforts pay off with a winning team. But the bottom line is that they will do no more than make minimal effort. They were fine with 2 legit OFers last year. This year they were fine with no pitching depth and uncertainty at 3B and SS. It just doesn't seem important to them to put together a complete team.

183A29343732353A192E3838345B0 wrote: It sure would have been nice if they had signed Gio Gonzalez or SOMEONE with a major league pedigree in the preseason (or, heck, RIGHT NOW) instead of entering this stretch with Brault, Kingham and Openers. We don't have nearly enough starting pitching depth, but it seems like management is just fine without it ... just like last season they were perfectly fine with two outfielders.


No to nitpick, but wasn't it two years ago when they basically played with two outfielders? Last year Dickerson, Marte, and Polanco were in there pretty much daily. I'm pretty sure it was two years ago when Marte got suspended for PEDs where Cutch and and Polanco were the only real outfielders on the team.



#signkeuchel

This is right around the time last year at the 43-44 game mark where the Pirates were I believe 26-17 where they went something like 14-31 in 45 games from mid May to late June that totally screwed their season. Hopefully this team learned from that last season and don’t let it happen again because they would have probably made the playoffs had it not happen. I want Hurdle treating these 13 out of 17 games at home these next few weeks like these are games in late August early September and not rest guys and do everything possible to win every single game on that particular day. It could be the difference between them missing and making the playoffs like it was last season when they went into the tank right around this time.

5A767E797255627464170 wrote: Stated very simply --- It is (past) time for Archer to step up!



Six innings and no more than 2 runs.



Chris, your teammates and all Pirate fans need you.


Yep. It’s this simple: the team and all fans need him to step up. It’s time.

Tomorrow night is likely some combination of Stratton and Kingham or Stratton and Brault as the starting combo.



As such, the immediate future is not that bright.



Time to take care of winning tonight. Don't put it off because tomorrow night could get really ugly really fast. The Rockies have a host of hitters who can take someone deep.