Game 60: Pirates 4 Astros 3

I will admit that one of the reasons that I feel reasonable optimistic about how Huntington and his staff are going to handle the draft this year is that they've done a pretty good job cobbling together a bench from the scrap heap. The two things don't really correlate at all, but it's just nice having a feeling that Huntington knows what he's doing.

Today one of his scrap heap moves payed off again, as Jason Michaels hit his second big homer of the week in the form of a 3-run job in the first inning that quickly erased the Astros early 1-0 lead. Paul Maholm gave the runs right back, but cruised from there on out, going eight strong in the way that he tantalizingly does sometimes. Tonight he only needed 84 pitches to get through those eight innings, holding the Astros to six singles and two doubles. When he really clicks like he does tonight, he just breezes through games in a way that not many pitchers can. Not to say he dominates, but the game literally flies by (TOG tonight was 2:24).

Anyways, the Pirates managed to win the series from the Astros, even though I'm not certain that the attendance from all three games combined would fill PNC Park to capacity. Still, they've managed to avoid the swoon that seems to doom them at this time of year so far, which is nice to see. I'll believe it's not coming when interleague play is over.