Game Review 6/8 W 6-4

The Pirates take their first game of the four game series against the Arizona Diamondbacks. I'll be honest, I'd be real happy with a split of this series. The Pirates have to be going through a four game stretch against opposing starting pitchers like they haven't gone through this year. Possibly like they won't go through again this year either. Just look at the stats for Brandon Webb, Dan Haren, Doug Davis and Randy Johnson.

Mark Reynolds has to drive the D'Backs fans crazy. The guy is more streaky than a pet-store window. Hopefully they get out of town while he's just getting hot. I'm not sure what the big fuss about Chris Young is. He hits some home runs and is young, but he looks to have a lot of holes in his swing. For the first time in a long time, I can say I like our outfield better than theirs.

I also think they've rushed Max Scherzer. The guy's gonne be crazy good, but this isn't the year. Especially not with their starting rotation. They probably won't need a long man very often, so you have to wonder if he wouldn't be better off getting a regular turn in AAA. Seems to me he's got some control issues to work out.

Every time I think about the Pirates lineup I get excited for Andrew McCutchen. Come to think about it, there's not much that doesn't make me excited about Cutch. Assuming he can hold down hitting leadoff, we can move Freddy Sanchez to the second spot, and Jack Wilson will FINALLY have no reason to show his face batting second. In all honesty, I think that gives us a huge advantage over what we have now. Even putting McLouth second in the order would be a huge step up from Sanchez/Wilson, McLouth/Sanchez or McLouth/Wilson.

I also wonder what management is going to do with Adam LaRoche. I was much in favor of trading for him from the Braves, even at the expense of a guy like Mike Gonzalez, however I can now understand why Atlanta made this trade. I would be curious to find out if LaRoche had this same early season slump problem in the minor leagues. I'd imagine LaRoche's trade value has dropped significantly in his time with the Pirates, since this is now turning into an annual problem.

While I may be getting ahead of myself here, the Pirates seem to be falling in love with veterans again. Doug Mientiewicz is a fine first baseman, but offensively he lacks quite a bit of what Jose Bautista has. It now seems as though the Bucs learned their lesson, and can stick with Jose Bautista for a while. I predict a similar outcome with Ronny Paulino. Raul Chavez is nothing more than a AAAA player. I mean, the guy hit .221 last year in AAA and .255 the year before in AA. And now, all of the sudden, because he has a decent arm and "handles pitchers extraordinarily well" he is better than Ronny Paulino? Has Paulino played poorly enough to get sent to the minor leagues?

Most fans (and apparently management too) say yes. I disagree. If you look at Paulino's stats from the last week he was with the club, here's what he hit: .357 with 2 home runs and 5 RBI in 14 AB's. So what happened? Paulino promptly went down and has hit .700 in 10 AB's with 2 doubles and 2 HR's since his demotion. I'm not suggesting he would have done this in the majors, but it sure would be nice to have that bat on the bench right about now. Especially since Chavez really hasn't been all that great defensively, consider in roughly 10 games he's had 2 passed balls, 2 wild pitches and an error. Paulino's stats are these: 30 games, 1 passed ball, 8 wild pitches and an error. The only place Chavez looks better is on wild pitches, which are on the pitcher, and not the catcher! It's also been proven that CERA (catcher's ERA) is not indicative of anything, so there goes that idea. Paulino may be lazy, he may not be playing to his capability, and he may not be a good catcher. But he is a better option than Raul Chavez.