WE WILL: Dissect One Pitch

Cardinals 1

Pirates 15

fangraphs.com game chart

Tony Armas Jr. had not taken the mound to start a game since May 17. Given the current state of the Pirates' offense, it's been very important for their starter to get off to a good start, but it was even more imperative tonight for Armas.

Nothing gets you off to a good start
like Steven Seagal's energy drink

Armas needed a defensive gem to help him get one of the first two outs of the first inning. He rewarded the play of Dirty by pitching to Pujols like the monster he is. That brought up the Cards' #4 hitter, Chris Duncan. Armas fell behind but fought back to two strikes. He then lofted a hanging curveball that was destined to be crushed like a young Alicia Silverstone.

jailbait

Duncan, whose physique looks so much like that of a WWE wrestler that I will not be surprised when I hear he has killed his wife, kid then himself, found the hanging curve so pretty that he would not disturb it. He opted to take it for strike three; inning over.

Look, but no touch!

The bottom of the first played out like the top of the first. Cards starter Braden Looper needed a fantastic defensive play to help him get the first two outs, which the Pirates followed with singles from Dirty and LaRoche. Bay followed by falling in the hole before evening the count. Looper attempted the same pretty hanging curve that worked on Ducan. Bay stayed back and swatted it into centerfield, producing the first run of the night for the Pirates.

The pitch that Armas got away with and vaulted him to a very successful start turned out to be the doom of Looper. Can I get a witness to what followed next?

Kingdom Hall: Your one stop shop for all of your Witness needs

Looper overthrew his curve to Doumit in an attempt to keep the ball down. After getting two strikes on Doumit, Looper feared going back to the curve but he also feared leaving a fastball over the plate to the fastball crushing Doumit. Result: walk to load the bases.

Pitch with fear and Joe Rogan will get you

Looper could not have gotten a better chance to get out of the inning with only 1 run on the board when the goat of the week, Ronny Paulino, stepped into the batter's box next. Looper still had the hanging curve thrown to Bay in his head as his first curve was again overthrown and in the dirt. A blind man and a lethargic Puerto Rican wouldn't swing at that bad of a pitch, fortunately the latter held true.

1 in 3 batters swing at that pitch,
care to guess which one?

The curve away is Paulino's weakness, but Looper now had no confidence in the pitch. Two pitches later Paulino was ahead in the count and sitting on fastball. 5-0 Pirates and the route is on.

I've gone into depth on how just 1 pitch for both teams dictated the rest of the game. I don't want to overshadow the fact that this was probably the best game the Pirates played all year.

Freddy Sanchez played like he had a gold label on his glove.

Win a gold Glove and every glove you get from Rawlings for the
rest of your career has a gold label where the classic red
labels are on the gloves for the mere mortals

LaRoche dropped another bomb on the competition.

58 games since May 25
29 R, 11 HR, 36 RBI, .287 AVG, .912 OPS

JackWilson continued to be jacked up over all of the trade talk. The fan favorite gave a parting gift to a fan out in the left field stands. He gave his team 3 hits and 2 RBI.

Mike Maroth traded in his Cardinals uniform for that of a traveling carnival worker.

Maroth was in charge of watching the guys go around and around
and around the bases like they were on a merry-go-round

I hate to find something negative to talk about on such a wonderful night, but I have to. Tracy did not manage his team well once the lead became so large. Tracy used 3 relievers after Armas left game, even though the lead was 7 runs. This included only 2/3 of an inning from Grabow. In these cases you let someone (like LaRusa used Maroth) to eat up the final innings for you to keep the rest of bullpen available for the next game. Tracy also waited until the top of the 9th to get all the reserves in. Certain players, Jose Castillo especially, should have seen the field sooner.

Fan graphs believed nothing Tracy could do after the
5th inning could cause the Pirates to lose

It has been a while. Anyone remember where the flag is at? Find it and raise it.

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