San Diego 3, Pittsburgh 0

by Charlie Wilmoth on Sep 18, 2007 2:22 AM EDT in News

I watched this game from about seven stories away and thus didn't get a good view of the pitches coming to the plate, but I'm a little confused as to why only Brian Giles seemed to get the memo about how to deal with John Van Benschoten: just don't take the bat off your shoulders. Van Benschoten "only" allowed three walks - two to Giles and one to Mike Cameron - and three runs in five innings, reducing his ERA to 10.06. (Jim Tracy described Van Benschoten's performance as "very adequate," which, you know, whatever. The Padres have a 3.03 ERA this year at home, so three runs in five innings in PETCO Park doesn't get the job done.)

Offensively, the Pirates had nothing, thus making Jack Cassel the latest opposing pitcher to look like Walter Johnson. (It's like it's May all over again.) Only Van Benschoten managed an extra-base hit.

San Diego moved a game closer to the Diamondbacks in the NL West - Arizona lost to the Giants. The Brewers and Cubs both won, leaving Milwaukee one game back. The Yankees won and Detroit lost (in eleven innings to the Indians), increasing the Yankees' wild-card lead to three and a half games. The Red Sox, Angels and Indians all look like playoff locks, and the Yankees are getting there - the AL playoff teams could be settled fairly soon. But with the close races in the NL Central and NL West and the Phillies surging (they held off St. Louis last night and remained a game and a half back in the Wild Card race), the NL playoff teams probably won't be decided until the last few games of the season. By the way, Frank Thomas hit three homers last night against the Red Sox.

Sorry, I'm not sure what this has to do with the Pirates.

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They'll be in the news when the DBacks accused them of collusion for starting JVB against the Padres last night.

by Zadoras on Sep 18, 2007 9:05 AM EDT reply actions

Elimination

Purely for the historical record, it's probably worth noting that last night's loss officially eliminated the Pirates from the playoff races. But wait 'til next year!!!

by Buckyburgh on Sep 18, 2007 12:44 PM EDT reply actions

SI carrying water for Bernazard

Specifically, Jon Heyman. Link.

by Vlad on Sep 18, 2007 6:22 PM EDT reply actions

Don't get it

Heyman's reason is that "scouting is his strength." How much scouting is the GM going to do? He needs to hire good scouts. Whether he is one himself isn't exactly the point. A lot of people in MLB consider Bonifay a good scout. I think it's just one of a number of skills that are useful to a GM, and not one of the more critical ones.

I'm also not sure exactly how helping the Mets spend stacks of big bills is good experience for the Pirates. At some point, Nutting said he wanted to find somebody with experience at succeeding in a smaller market. He was probably talking about the CEO, but it seems at least as applicable to the GM to me.

by WTM on Sep 18, 2007 7:11 PM EDT up reply actions