Darwin Barney & Friends Bomb Bucs on Clint Hurdle’s Birthday

Happy Birthday, Clint!   The Bucs got blown out by the Cubs, giving up the most runs they have all season.  The team gave up nine runs in one inning–the most all season.  The icing on Clint’s cake was the team lost by the largest margin all year.

We talked about this crucial 13 game stretch last week.  We just felt it was crucial for the Pittsburgh Pirates to play well against the also-rans of the NL heading into a big weekend series against the Reds, the Cubs series screamed trouble.

"“There aren’t any layups in the big leagues,” Hurdle said after the game."

Especially with the concerns we talked about today.  Now we could add another one if you think Erik Bedard has lost it a bit.  The Canadian did strikeout seven, but eight earned runs is the most he has allowed since 2008 against the New York Yankees.

The team had a couple bright spots in Michael McKenry driving in two, and Starling Marte got three hits including a beautiful bunt single.  But it wasn’t enough to beat a Chicago Cubs team that traded three players during the game.

Darwin Barney hit the go-ahead bomb in the fourth inning.  I swear it was strike three against Baker and he was out of that inning, but the squeeze has been on all season, enough bitching about it.  Bedard needs to pitch better for this rotation to be successful –  he will pitch better in Cincy, right?  Yeah, that’s a lot for Ray to ponder.

Two more Cubs got into the slugging action when Anthony Rizzo and Starlin Castro slugged three and two-run homers into the Chicago breeze in an awful nine-run Cubs fifth inning.

Cocktailsfor2 was at the game.  We blame him for the loss along with the fact the Pirates failed to hit a homer, breaking a streak of 19 straight games with a homer on the road for the Pirates.

The Pirates are tied for the wild card lead with Atlanta who picked up two of the Cubs traded during the game–Paul Maholm and Reed Johnson.

We blame Cocktails for that too.

Cocktailsfor2 responds: Fine. Blame me. Blame me all you want, but I did EVERYTHING IN MY POWER, short of running out on the field and kicking Bedard in his ass, to get a Bucs’ win. I even stopped down at the field level and wished Hurdle a Happy Birthday and a “Rumbunter says ‘let’s get ’em!’ ” before the game. Why he still allowed Presley to steal – and get thrown out, of course – down 9 runs remains a mystery. Also, Bedard needs to have a turn skipped or summat. Or some extra love and care from Searage. Because he was throwing freaking BP out there in the 5th.

I sat higher up in the stands than I’ve ever sat at Wrigley, and they’re still pretty good seats. Pretty good, that is, except for the MASSIVE FUCKING GIRDER RIGHT IN FRONT OF MY SEAT.

That said, some observations: I don’t understand why there’s a constant parade of people up and down the aisles for the ENTIRE GAME… do you not want to watch baseball?

The Cubs’ fans didn’t start the “Let’s go, Cub-bies” chant until after they got a double-digit lead. Talk about knowing that your team could just hand the game over at any time…

When the Pirates loaded the bases, and got the walked-in run in the 6th, I could feel the Cubs fans’ sphincters tightening, and razored them mercilessly with “You know this is gonna be tied up real soon, don’tcha?” taunts. Most of them laughed nervously. A few got downright hostile. A simple response of “1908” shut them up.

I’ll be back tonight, and we’ll get ’em. You’ll see.