Pirates 9 Cards 7

Tonight was a good win for lots of purely abstract reasons. Duke clearly didn't have it tonight, but he managed to keep it together long enough to keep his team in the game, something Sidney Ponson couldn't do. Duke also made up for his deficiency on the mound tonight with 2 hits and 3 RBIs, which gives him something like 5 RBIs in his last four starts. I've gotta say, I love it when pitchers hit, it's like a special bonus that the other team can't get. The offense was keyed tonight by the absence of Joe Randa. Without him in the lineup, Craig was flipped up from 7 to 5 and Jose Castillo was allowed to play, inserted in the 7 slot. The CWilson/Sanchez/Castillo threesome acted as a second top of the order tonight, with Craig and Freddy scoring three runs apiece and Castillo driving in four (including a three run homer). Of course, it would be brilliant to actually see those guys at the top of the lineup, but I suppose I can settle for them all batting together. The nice part about tonight was that the Cards clearly weren't playing well, and we managed to take advantage of it. We didn't let an early deficit bother us and we even held on at the end after Rolen's homer that halved the deficit in the 9th. In general, it was a game that would've been painful to lose, but a game that it feels like we lose all the time (not in the 9th, but earlier by never actually stemming the tide at 5 like Duke, Torres, Marte, and Hernandez managed to do after the 3rd inning). As we've all said before, winning is nice, and it's nice to see the Pirates do it a little more often. And the Cubbies lost again, pulling us to within one game from emerging from our exile in the cellar. It wouldn't mean much in the long run to come out of 6th place, but it would sure feel good after the way this season started.

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