The Pirates lost to the Toronto Blue Jays 8-6 Wednesday afternoon, with Brad Lincoln and Jeff Locke taking most of the damage. Six runs is pretty nice, however, particularly given that there were three homers, including one by Pedro Alvarez, who began the month of March hitting like September hadn't ended. (Alvarez's shot was a wind-aided, opposite-field blast.) The other two homers were by Garrett Jones and Starling Marte. Josh Harrison had two doubles. Also, Jeff Karstens pitched three scoreless innings, allowing two hits, striking out one and walking none.

UPDATE: Via Pirates Prospects and the comments, Marte now has seven straight hits after going 3-for-3 on Monday and 2-for-2 each of the last two days. I missed the game yesterday, so I missed that.