Pittsburgh Pirates: Altoona and Bradenton Get Strong Starts

The Pittsburgh Pirates lost their game yesterday against the Colorado Rockies.  However, they did receive a couple of good starts in the minors.

Yesterday, the Pittsburgh Pirates took another tough loss to the Colorado Rockies.  The team did not receive much from their pitching staff or bats.  While the Bucs had some poor pitching, they did see a couple of their minor league affiliates get a couple of strong starts.

The Altoona Curve took on the New Hampshire Fisher Cats of the Toronto Blue Jays’ organization.  The Curve, unfortunately, lost in a close game by a score of 2-1.  Obviously, they received a heck of a pitching effort from their staff.  Starting the game was former sixth round pick Cam Vieaux.  The left-handed starter added to his already strong season with six strong innings.  He only allowed two earned runs, which ended up giving him the loss, but he did strike out 10 batters.  The former Michigan State Spartan is now 2-3 on the year but has a 2.86 ERA.

Following Vieaux was 2016 fifth round pick Blake Cederlind.  Cederlind started the year in High-A Bradenton and threw to a 1.17 ERA, and the team moved him up to Double-A recently.  So far he has thrown in six games and has accumulated 10.1 total innings.  Last night he threw two shutout innings and has yet to give up a run since joining the Curve.

Meanwhile, down in Bradenton, the Marauders took on the Fort Myers Miracle of the Minnesota Twins’ organization.  The Miracle have a pretty solid team built around two former first-round picks in Trevor Larnach and Royce Lewis.  However, the Marauders were able to stifle the Miracles’ offense.  The Pittsburgh Pirates High-A affiliate won by a score of 2-1.

Starting the game for the Marauders was Scranton, Pennsylvania native Max Kranick.  Kranick was an 11th round pick in 2016 and was given a large bonus to sign with the team.  His year has been up and down, but he got back on track last night. The 6’3” right-hander threw seven innings of one run baseball and struck out three batters.  He only gave up one hit and it came via a solo home run.  Kranick’s ERA is now 4.79 and he has a record of 2-5.

While neither team’s offense did much last night, the Pittsburgh Pirates have to be happy to see so many strong pitching performances in the minors.  Last night was just another night of good pitching, which has been the theme of the year in the minors.  The team has had some really good pitching performances and looks like they could have a lot of pitching depth in a few years.