Series: Three games at PNC Park, Pittsburgh First pitch: 1:35 p.m. Monday; 7:05 p.m. Tuesday-Wednesday TV/radio: FSD/97.1 Monday and Tuesday; FSD Plus/97.1 Wednesday Probables: Monday — RHP Anibal Sanchez (1-0, 0.00) vs. RHP Gerrit Cole (0-0, 5.40); Tuesday — RHP Shane Greene (1-0, 0.00) vs. RHP A.J. Burnett (0-0, 3.38);Wednesday — RHP Alfredo Simon (1-0, 5.06) vs. LHP Francisco Liriano (0-0, 2.57) Gonna be hard to sweep this series with Simon against Liriano. I'll take 2-1 every series, of course.
Are the Pirates a natural rival from back in the day, seems like we play them every year in inter league play. Thought that sched was rotating
No. As a leading expert in "back in the day", they have never been a rival. Seems like someone is force feeding it.
Our most natural NL rivals would be the Reds or the Brewers, as we have no history with Pittsburgh, but those teams have interleague rivals already in Cleveland and Minnesota. There is no basis for the Pirates to be our rival aside from geographical proximity, but as a set yearly fixture they make more sense than our two prior interleague "rivals," the Diamondbacks and the Rockies.
Gamecast says we're done batting in the first inning and we don't have 3 runs yet. This feels different.
Stopped in to say I love the thread title... For this the Brewers always play the Twins as their every year inter-league rival, and I'm sure Cinci gets the Indians. So I could see Detroit/Pittsburgh being considered the natural rivals by default.
I like this Greene fellow. Pitches like Fister and physically kinda looks like Fister. Might even have a little more juice on his fastball. He'll have his ups and downs, but he's got solid 3rd starter potential. And Soria is the best closer we've had since Henneman.
If he can just be what Porcello's been for us the last few years, that seems like it would be a massive win, considering what we gave up for him.
Honestly, I'm expecting better than Porcello. Although that's party because the infield defense is better than anything Rick saw, and partly because I'm high on bleach fumes.
I'm probably just being a baseball snob here, but it's just hard to see the Fister stuff (even though I've thrown it around in the past). Fister was a top 10-15 pitcher in baseball when he was here. I just don't see that as being realistic for Greene. If he's Porcello (a 3ish win pitcher who gives us 180-200 IP), that's a massive hole in the rotation filled for the foreseeable future. That guy just got $20m a year from Boston.
Porcello was never a three win pitcher. I think Greene will be better than him over years 2-5 of his career, with the understanding that Porcello probably got rushed and his development suffered because of it. I think Boston overpaid for consistent innings hoping Rick takes the next step. Greene might never have a 5 WAR season in his pocket like the one Fister put together, but he throws strikes, gets ground balls and scouts like his stuff. He's slightly further along 70-ish innings into his career than Fister was at 26.
I just you're underrating how hard it is to get to Fister's level, and underrating the value Porcello generally produced here because he was the #5 starter in arguably the best rotation since the mid-90s Braves. We're probably not very far apart here, ultimately. It's unlikely Greene ever reaches Fister's peak seasons (IMO, at least) where he was a legit ace and a top 15 starter, but Greene's ceiling is possibly higher than what Porcello was while he was here. If we're able to legitimately have this same discussion 4 months from now where it looks like you are going to be right, it would be all kinds of awesome.
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/shane-greene-committing-to-the-changeup/ Good article on Greene and the changed emphasis on the change.
Austin says not injury-related, just a regular day off. Seems like bullshit after sitting out the Pitt series.
I went in to this season mentally prepared for this to be the season everything goes wrong. So far, I'm pleased to be so misguided.
i felt it was really important to get off to a hot start. not that it isn't always, but i was ready for Iglesias/Gose/Avila to bat .150 for a month ...
So what are your guys thoughts on JV? Will he even pitch this year? It wouldn't be a bad thing if he gets Tommy John, and misses this season, and next. Not sure if we get his whole salary back with the insurance, but it would essentially eat 2 years of what is going to go down as the worst contract in baseball history.
He's shown no signs of improvement in about 5 weeks now. Just look at Darvish. He had triceps injury in ST, ended up having to get Tommy John. Tigers are going to trade for a starter regardless at the deadline, so we'll be fine if we need Lobstein/Farmer for about 10 starts combined.
Why the fuck don't they give him an MRI? Continued soreness every time he throws... we'll just wait longer! TJ in April vs TJ and June could be a big difference in recovery. If he needs surgery and gets it now he could be our deadline acquisition in '16. Maybe that leg tendon in his arm could get him back 2-3 mph on his fastball.
Calm yourself. They did an MRI last week and confirmed a triceps strain. Let's not start cutting shit just yet.