Pittsburgh — Pirates’ manager Clint Hurdle always says you can’t take a team to lightly. The Pirates, winners of five in a row, faced the lowly Cubs, losers of three straight on Monday night and Hurdle’s words couldn’t have been more clear than they were tonight.<\/p>\n
Not only did the Cubs win 2-0, but the Pirates managed just two hits off Jeff Samardzija.<\/p>\n
“That’s why I’m going to do (tip his hat), and that’s what I’m going to encourage the guys to do,” Hurdle said. “You saw two guys out there with their pencil sharpeners.<\/p>\n
This marks the first time since June, 15, seventh total on the season, that the Pirates have been shutout; a stretch of 31 games.<\/p>\n
Erik Bedard took the mound for the Pirates and after a solid outing his last time out following a rough month and a half, Bedard was looking to show consistency with another good outing. He started out rough with a 19-pitch first inning with his location all over the place, but he settled in rather nicely especially with his curveball.<\/p>\n
“I was just throwing it for strikes and trying to get ahead of guys,” Bedard said. “They were just swinging it. When you throw it for strikes, sometimes when you go lower, they swing at it.”<\/p>\n
Bedard ended the game giving up just one run, an RBI double to Alfonso Soriano in the fourth inning, while striking out 11 batters.<\/p>\n
“I know we used a word in here yesterday ‘dominating,’ I think you saw two types of domination off the mound today. One guy with more velo, hard split and breaking ball. Our guy, boy he got in a rhythm somewhere between the second and third inning it was fun to watch him go to work too. It was a very well pitched game by both pitchers tonight.”<\/p>\n
Bedard went a little longer than Hurdle wanted him to go with his 113 pitches.<\/p>\n
“(He threw) probably a few more than I wanted,” Hurdle said. “But it would have been hard for me not to give him the opportunity to move forward. He said he had some left.”<\/p>\n
Bedard said that he felt great after throwing the number of pitches that he did.<\/p>\n
“That’s probably the most pitches I’ve thrown in five years,” Bedard said laughing. “I feel fine.”<\/p>\n
The lone Pirates’ hit hit before the ninth inning came in the fourth inning when Andrew McCutchen displayed his speed once again and legged out an infield hitting beating Samardzija to the bag.<\/p>\n
Bedard said while the lack of run support was frustrating, it’s not the end of the world.<\/p>\n
“I mean it’s frustrating, but I was pitching good,” Bedard said. “We all try to do our job and not give up runs.”<\/p>\n
The Cubs tallied their other run on another Soriano double in the ninth off of Tony Watson, but the run was charged to Chris Resop.<\/p>\n
With the loss, the Pirates fall to 54-41 and lose just their fifth home game in their past 26 efforts.<\/p>\n
Taking the mound tomorrow will be James McDonald (10-3, 2.93 ERA) who hasn’t had his best stuff in his past two starts. He’ll be looking to bounce back against a face that will be familiar to most, former Pirate Paul Maholm (8-6, 4.09 ERA). First pitch is slated for 7:05 p.m. ET.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Photo Credits: Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pittsburgh — Pirates’ manager Clint Hurdle always says you can’t take a team to lightly. The Pirates, winners of five in a row, faced the lowly Cubs, losers of three straight on Monday night and Hurdle’s words couldn’t have been more clear than they were tonight. Not only did the Cubs win 2-0, but the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12257,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[2055,1256,80,428,616,1767,496,2054,519,520,657,377],"class_list":["post-12255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-professional","tag-alfonso-soriano","tag-andrew-mcctuchen","tag-baseball","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-clint-hurdle","tag-erik-bedard","tag-james-mcdonald","tag-jeff-samardzija","tag-major-league-baseball","tag-mlb","tag-paul-maholm","tag-pittsburgh-pirates"],"yoast_head":"\n