It would figure that in order to finally win a game against the Cubbies, it wouldn't be an easy contest. As it turned out, we needed Nate the Great to do something - well, great. Most know we here at The White Flag consider Carlos Marmol to have the best stuff of any reliever in our division. He had it today, and so did McLouth. This win could prove to be ginormous. Tomorrow, the Bucs go for their third straight series win. They'll send Phil Dumatrait (1-1 3.96) to the mound against Jason Marquis (1-3 5.26).
Marquis is just the type of pitcher the Pirates seem to have trouble with. He's as mediocre as they come, in the same vein as Brett Tomko and countless others. In fact, looking at his baseball-reference page lists the following players as most similar, among others: Joel Pineiro, Gil Meche, Armando Reynoso, Kris Benson, Adam Eaton, Jaret Wright, Ted Lilly, Mark Clark, Rodrigo Lopez, Pedro Astacio, Todd Stottlemyre, Jason Schmidt, Vicente Padilla, Jack Wilson (?!), Sterling Hitchcock, and Kip Wells. Now if that's not enough to convince you of the mediocrity, consider the fact that almost half of them have played for the Pirates during the Streak at some point. That should do the trick.
I'm telling you, one of the other Central teams could make a killing by just signing Marquis, Tomko, Matt Belisle, Rich Hill and Doug Davis. We'd never win a game against them. However the Pirates normally do well against ace pitchers. Today was no exception. Good thing we've got Carlos Zambrano's number!
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To be 100% honest with you...I would like to see them finish above .500, thats all. They have been flirting with that for some time and I think that they can do it if they stick to their guns. As I said somewhere, we need some serious pitching help. The bats are OK, but pitching is a higher priority in my book.
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