The Pirates are bad at hitting.

Hopefully this tiny flaw won't stop us from achieving a winning record this season.

Tonight's lineup!
CF Duffy
SS Wilson
2B Sanchez
LF Bay
RF Nady
1B The New Guy
C Paulino
3B Bautista
P Gorzalanny

Gorzalanny was great in his first start against the Astros. I don't believe he will be anywhere near consistent this season, so I'm not expecting him to last long tonight.

The New Guy has been moved from fourth to seventh in the order because he's been so pathetic at the plate so far. Unfortunately, he's not the only guy hitting badly. He's just the guy for whom the bad hitting is surprising.

I'll be listening to tonight's game on MLB.com radio. A quick review of my MLB media history this season:

Before the season opener, I bought a month of MLB.tv with a free five-day trial. Of course this comes with MLB radio as well. It turned out that I can't watch Pirates games on MLB.tv because of blackout restrictions, even though I am not in a Pittsburgh or Houston TV area. So I sent an e-mail to cancel MLB.tv before the five days were up. The MLB radio is still working, well after the five days are up. I am not sure what the deal with this is. I suppose they will eventually charge me or stop giving me radio broadcasts.

Go Bucs!

UPDATE: In the bottom of the first, The New Guy was at the plate with the bases loaded. Result? Fly out to center field. That's why he's The New Guy. Following the typical Pirates way, we will collect three hits for the rest of the night.

Pirates on Easter

Well, the family gathering was fun today. Most of us guys sat around and watched the Pirates/Masters. Only about four of us are actual informed baseball fans, but everyone had some comments to make.

The Pirates salvaged a win out of the series to finish up a 4-2 road trip. I would have been elated with 2-4. Freddy Sanchez returned triumphantly, going 2-4. We had our best possible hitting line up today (although it's a terrible fielding line up). Duffy was out of CF, Nady got moved to CF, and Eldred started in RF. Neither man is fit to be playing those positions. But they both had a couple hits, so what the heck.

Tomorrow is opening day at PNC Park! The Cards looked pretty good today so it should be a tough test. Although the pitching matchup (Looper vs. Snell) favors us, and so will the home crowd. Too bad Albert Pujols doesn't favor us. Neither does The New Guy, who went 0-5 today.

Since 2004

I'm sure everyone wants to caution Pirates fans not to get too excited. Fair enough, but pay attention:

This is the first time the Pirates have been three games over .500 at any point in a season since early 2004.

TWO THOUSAND FOUR.

So just let us rant and enjoy our good opening series and just smile and nod when we talk about hope.

Duke, Snell, Gorzalanny and Maholm are all 25 or younger. They're bound to have plenty of rough starts this season. But oh man, do they have some exciting talent.

Now if only The New Guy could help us out.

(I think I will refer to LaRoche as The New Guy until he hits a really important home run.)

The Pirates are off Thursday after a hard-fought sweep. I'll post again Friday night.