Can The Cubs Fix The Pirates Road Woes?

The Pittsburgh Pirates have no road victories this month. Yeh, that hurts. The Pittsburgh Pirates limp into Chicago for a division series with the Cubs.  Chicago might as well be PNC Park for the Pirates. The Bucs played very well in Wrigley last month. The Cubs were struggling at the time, but that isn’t entirely the case this time around.

One fundamental difference

jumps out at us.  The Cubs young talent is playing very well right now.  The Pirates youngsters still seem to have Elvis legs.

Sarlin Castro made contact in the White Sox series and collected three hits.  Tyler Colvin was huge.  He hit a three-run bomb, and had an impressive series.  Geovanny Soto has also been an on-base machine from the catching position.

In the pitching matchup, the Cubs will send Randy Wells (5.21ERA, 1.50WHIP) to face Paul Maholm.  Wells has pitched seven innings against the Bucs this year. He allowed six runs and eight hits. The Cubs dropped both games, 11-1 and 2-1.

The Pirates left hander is coming off the worst start of his career when he pitched 1.0+ innings.  Sorry for the flashback Pirates fans.  It was ugly.  Now comes the good news.

Maholm will face the Cubs for the third time this season.  He is 2-0 against the Cubs this season pitching 12 innings and allowing four earned runs.  On May 15, with RumBunter in attendance, he threw six innings and allowed two earned runs at Wrigley Field. 

Maholm needs to bounce back, step up, and finally get the Pirates a road victory this month. I wish we were confident enough to say it was possible. From the Cubs blogosphere a few links for you.

Despio might have one of the best titles for a post in the history of the blogosphere:  Why They Suck.  Carlos Marmol (despite giving up three earned runs yesterday) and Sean Marshall escaped.  Jill Wagner looks delicious too, but Kurt from Goat Riders mentions it’s time for the Cubs to Shut Her Down in his column that focuses on the number of death, ten games under .500.   Cubbies Crib always does a fine job of covering the team from Wrigleyville.