Jung-ho Kang and Pedro Alvarez homer in Pirates’ opener

Jung-ho Kang hit his first Major League Spring Training home run Tuesday afternoon against the Toronto Blue Jays. The video from MLB.com shows that Kang didn’t square up the baseball. Greg Brown started to describe the homer as if it was a gap shot, but then the baseball kept carrying into the Dunedin sun.

Kang started and played shortstop for the Pirates.  Plenty of questions surround Jung Ho Kang and he started answering those questions with a walk and homer in the Grapefruit League opener.  Defense hasn’t been discussed much and Kang ensured it won’t come up today either.

Much like you want from offensive lineman in the NFL, Kang played short without drawing attention to himself.  Early on, he started a nice double play ball and handled the position in a solid manner.

Pedro Alvarez got the Pirates on the board in the first inning with a three-run, two out homer. El Toro will have plenty of eyes on him as Alvarez looks to polish his first base skills as co-editor Jason Rollison wrote about earlier.  It says here that if Alvarez keeps hitting bombs, the defense will come.

The winners of our #PickHR contest on Twitter were numerous.  Pat yourselves on the back.