Last night, with Pirate legends Bill Virdon and Bill Mazeroski on the bench as “Honorary” coaches (though Clint Hurdle insists they’re there to coach, not watch), the Pirates downed the Minnesota Twins 7-2,  spoiling Ryan Doumit’s return to PNC. The Buccos were led by Josh  Harrison, whose first-inning-Josh-Willingham-aided homer (see video) staked the Pirates to a lead they would not relinquish. J-Hay would finish the night 3-for-5, with 3 runs scored and 2 stolen bases (!), the second being the front end of a double-steal with Andrew McCutchen, who ended up 3-for-4 with a HR, SB and 2 RBI for the game.

The Twins started lefty Scott Diamond on the mound, who entered the game with a 5-2 record and a 2.13 ERA, but got smacked for 8 hits and 4 ER in his 5.1 IP, as the Bucs continued to feast on left handed pitching.

Kevin Correia started for the Pirates, and ended up with his first win in PNC in nearly a year – since June 22, 2011. Correia walked one and struck out two, and only allowed the Twinkies four hits over his own 5.1 IP, inducing 12 groundouts against 2 flyouts (!) in the win. He tired in the sixth, leaving two men on before making way for Tony Watson, who got Justin Morneau to pop out to shallow center before issuing a walk to load the bases. Watson then whiffed ex-Pirate Ryan Doumit to end the mini-threat.

“That was huge right there,” Correia said of Watson’s work. “To have him come in and pick me up with what was still a small lead was huge. Then we scored some more runs, and that kinda insured my win.”

Did KC secure another start in the Pirates rotation with this outing? Time will tell. We’re still not very high on Correia, but until Jeff Karstens (who went went seven innings, allowing one run on six hits and a walk, while fanning five, with 59 of 78 pitches for strikes in a rehab start at Altoona) returns, the Pirates SP focus is on whether or not Brad Lincoln will get another start.

#AlwaysSmooth Clint Barmes went 3-for4, but the only really solid ball he hit was the double to the right-center gap, which plated Pedro Alvarez, scoring from first on a successful hit-and-run play that was shown from a fantastic angle by ROOT Sports, almost surely by accident. El Toro went 2-for-3, with an opposite-field double off of lefty Brian Deunsing that missed being another PedroBomb™ by about 6 feet.

For anyone who watched the game, though, the real tension was on the bench, with James McDonald exacting bubblegum revenge on Brad Lincoln in retaliation for this:

JMac affixed a cup to the top of Lincoln’s cap with the aid of some gum, which went unnoticed by Lincoln for some time, and became a running series of cutaways by ROOT to see how long it would stay there (it ended up being more than an inning):

This resulted in a post-game twitter exchange between Lincoln & McDonald, with Lincoln declaring that JMac “may have just started a war he can’t win! He got me tonight though. #revenge” and McDonald replying “you got me first”

Stay tuned  – the “War Of The Wads” will undoubtedly continue.

June 10, 2012; Pittsburgh, PA, USA; Pittsburgh Pirates second baseman Neil Walker (18) prepares to bat in the on-deck circle against the Kansas City Royals during the first inning at PNC Park. The Pittsburgh Pirates won 3-2. Mandatory Credit: Charles LeClaire-US PRESSWIRE

For how surprisingly good the Pirates have been this year, the Twins have probably been that surprisingly bad. Through the first two months of the season the Twins were 18-32, easily the worst record in baseball at the time. The team has since rebounded a bit with an 8-7 record in June thus far, but they still aren’t a team that scares you when they come into your home ballpark. While nobody expected the Twins to win their division, they certainly didn’t foresee this bad of a start for them.

Your Pirates are 34-31 as they host the Twins who now sit at 26-39. These are big home games for the Pirates; you always want to capitalize when you have a weaker opponent come into your home ballpark. They did a nice job of that recently with sweeps of the Cubs and Royals, and they will look to replicate those performances this week. So let’s take a look at the team they’re going to be trying to do it against.

The Twins aren’t the worst offensive team around, they hit .257 as a team but struggle to hit for power. There’s only four teams in the league with less homers than the Twins, but that might have something to do with their home ballpark. The problem with Minnesota is the pitching, as is with most last place teams. They have a team ERA of 5.05 and a WHIP of 1.41. They’ve been getting some recent help however.

Scott Diamond is on the hill for the Twins in game one, and he has been just phenomenal recently. He’s a 25 year old kid who made his 2012 debut on May 8th. Since then he has a 2.13 ERA in eight starts. He’s gotten through four starts without allowing an earned run and the Twins are 6-2 in games he starts. It sounds even worse when you see that he’s matched up with Kevin Correia. Not looking great on the pitching matchup side of things tonight, but you’ve still gotta feel decently confident with a rejuvenated Pirates offense against an all around bad Twins team.

Wednesday’s pitching matchup is Francisco Liriano against Erik Bedard. Liriano is the picture of inconsistency. This guy has thrown a no-hitter in his career and even got Cy Young votes in 2010, but the last two years his ERA has looked just horrible. His 5.09 mark in 2011 was disappointing and he’s off to an even worse start this year with a 6.24 mark. He’s been better of late with 3.03 ERA and 29 strikeouts in his last four starts (23.2 innings). Batters are hitting .148 against him in that time. He’s still striking guys out this year with a 9.2 K/9 mark on the season, but he has had a lot of control problems with 5.6 BB/9. Bedard had a rough go of it in Baltimore last week and will look to bounce back. Two inconsistent pitchers should make for a very hard to predict baseball game.

The series finale will feature Liam Hendriks and James McDonald. He’s made just five starts this year but has a 7.83 ERA. He gave up six runs to the Angels in 2.1 innings two starts ago but gave up just two earned in five innings against the Brewers last week. The Twins are 1-4 when he starts, but at the age of 23 he has some upside. He was signed a free agent in 2007 out of Australia, which makes him an interesting story. We’ll have more on him when that game comes around.

For now you have to like the Pirates chances of winning this series. They have scored 18 runs in their last two games, and 31 in their last six games. That’s over five a game which is going to win you a ton of baseball games when you pitch well. Unfortunately the Pirates didn’t pitch all that well on the road trip, but you still have to be confident.

I’m penciling in two wins for the Pirates right now, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I had to use my eraser to make that three.

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