Jeff Karstens loves pitching at PNC Park. It’s as simple as that. In his three starts at home, including today, Karstens has allowed just one run on the season. To start the day however, Karstens looked flustered as he allowed two walks and two hits in the first, but managed to leave the inning without giving up a run. The rest of the way, Karstens looked like his old self and the three Pirates runs would be enough to give him his third win and the Pirates the sweep of the Marlins.
“I feel like I was at a good rhythm,” Karstens said. “I’m trying not to change too much from what I did last year. I’m kind of playing wiffle ball out there you know like when I was a little kid trying to make them take unorthodox swings and really bad swings. That’s all I’m trying to do. I’m just trying to keep them off balance.”
After the 28-pitch first inning, Karstens would need just 64 pitches to get him through seven innings of scoreless work, striking out three.
“It’s just one of those things where you have to keep battling like Mac (McKenry) did with me tonight,” Karstens said. “Our game plan didn’t stay the same throughout the whole game. He’s right here beside me so we talk all of the time. We have a good relationship and it carries out onto the field.”
Hurdle was impressed with the way his starter came back after the rough first inning.
“He found his rhythm after the first inning,” Hurdle said. “That and the seventh inning were the two challenges he faced and he was able to navigate he way through both of them. In between, it was efficient, quick, very good change of speeds. Very, very well pitched game from both sides.”
The big inning came in the seventh as after Logan Morrison stole second base, Greg Dobbs hit a shot to left field where Alex Presley appeared to make the catch. Marlins manager Ozzie Guillen came out to argue the call and after the umpires got together, they reversed the call to say that Presley trapped the ball, which was the correct call. The next batter Omar Infante came to bat and hit into a 5-4-3 double play to end the inning.
“Awesome, abolutely,” Hurdle said about the magnitude of the double play pitch. “One of the biggest pitches of the game. Absolutely.”
While the umpires got the call right, Morrison was frustrated as he argued that he should have at least gotten third during the fiasco.
Hurdle explained why they overruled the call.
“The umpire making the play, he was blocked. All he saw was Presley’s back,” Hurdle said. “It’s his play to start. I thought we might have problems when their bullpen threw everything around they had after the call was made because I think everybody behind Alex saw what happened.”
Presley said he tried to sell it, but it ended up working out for the Pirates.
“I did (have it) then I didn’t,” Presley said laughing. “I tried to sell it as good as I could, but if I could have brought my glove up with the ball in it, I think I would have been fine. It worked out being good for us regardless for us. It got the double play for us. It was good either way if they called the out or the result we got.”
With the Pirates mustering just one run off of Marlins starter Anibal Sanchez going into the bottom half of the seventh, the bats woke up a bit. Casey McGehee led off the inning with a double down in the right field corner and then Pedro Alvarez came up and hit his 21st home run of the year atop the Clemente Wall.
“You won’t find two better back-to-back at bats,” Hurdle said. “Casey put the two strike swing putting that ball in the corner for a double and Pedro can’t hit a ball any harder than that on the breaking ball that he hit to drill the ball into the seats.”
For the Pirates, the win sealed their fourth series sweep of the season and their first five-game winning streak since 2010. They welcome in the Chicago Cubs who are 38-55 on the year and are in the thick of trade rumors all around their team. The next three series will have the Pirates facing the Cubs twice and the Astros once. The two teams have a combined 72-116 record.
Jeff Samardzija (6-8, 4.57 ERA) and Erik Bedard (5-10, 4.55 ERA) will kick the series off at 7:05 p.m. ET.
Photo Credits: Associated Press
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