Game 149: Pirates 7 Cardinals 2

First things first: a win today ensures that the Pirates won't lose 100 games this year. It's always a perversely good feeling to know that we're bad but not AWFUL. Small victories are all we can get as Pirate fans.

This win was even better than that, though, because the win ensured a home sweep of the Cardinals while the Brewers collapse had given them hopes of rejoining the wild-card race. As things stand today, the Cardinals are 4.5 games behind the Phillies and Brewers. With a 7-10 record against the Pirates this year, they've got to be feeling like they should be a lot closer to that lead right now. Playing the spoiler is always the only consolation for a bad team, and swatting the playoff hopes of Tony La Russa is about as good as it gets in my book.

Even better from an actual Pirate fan standpoint is seeing Nate McLouth killing the ball again (.393/.460/.698 in September before today with two hits and a homer today), while Bone Crusher and Andy LaRoche chipped in five hits today (three for Andy). Actually, Freddy, Luis Cruz, and Adam LaRoche all had two hits for a fifteen hit attack that surpassed just about anything I had hoped to see for the rest of this season. I'd love to see this team come together a bit down the stretch here. It would make all of that losing seem like maybe it accomplished something. I realize that it rarely does, but it doesn't hurt to hope.