Tonight the Bucs face soft-tossing eastern PA boy Jamie Moyer.
He's a bit unusual in that lefthanders have done a wee bit "better" against him the last four years. None of the current Pirates have a statistically significant record against him. Against lefties in general this year, Kendall, Craig Wilson, Ward, and Ruben Mateo have been great. Perhaps Mateo will get a start tonight.
Moyer is what STATS, inc. calls a "flyball" and "finesse" pitcher. (His groundball/flyball ratio has been under 1, and his K+BB/IP rate has been under .93). The splits for finesse pitchers show the Bucs have only seen about nine of them this year, and no one has a lot of at-bats against them.
Third base is the big question. Mackowiak will probably get the night off. Stynes has been especially bad against lefties this year (375 OPS), though he was once a little better against them, as you'd expect with a right-handed hiter. Stynes was better against flyball pitchers but worse against finesse guys the previous three years. So maybe Hill will play third. I'd like to see Bobby Hill start again. He switch-hits, he gets on base. The other choice is Abraham Nunez. Nunez has done better against flyball and finesee guys. Nunez supposedly "owns" Tom Glavine, a left-handed finesse guy (who generates way more grounders than Moyer, however). So maybe he starts at a third, with Castillo at second, and Bobby Hill and Rob Mackowiak paying attention from the bench as they wait their turn to pinch-hit. Hmm, Nunez's ownership of Glavine didn't amount to much two months ago, did it?
If I directed this soap opera, I'd run out something much like what we ran out the last two nights. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Bobby Hill started twice, the Pirates won twice, so rub the short guy's head, put him in the lineup, and see if it works again.
The Pirates start Ryan Vogelsong, who will probably be OK and silence all the talk about what to do with him. Still, we may need five or six or eight runs to win, so let's hope we score a lot of runs. I wouldn't put the all-hands team on the field expecting a low-scoring game. It's fireworks night, after all.
Also, there will be a huge crowd. For that reason, I'd rule out Simon or Stynes. Simon will get booed if grounds into another double play, which is always likely, and Stynes will get booed if he doesn't get a hit in his first at-bat. A manager could be stubborn and play them before an unusually large home crowd, believing he gets a sliver of an edge by doing so, but why add distractions when you've got a rookie pitcher on the mound? Neither guy had much of a role in the two victories. I'd start Kendall, Wilson, Ward, Wilson, then Mateo - get him in there, maybe he'll hit a home run, and we'll need some runs - with some mix of Hill, Redman, Castillo, Nunez, and Mackowiak filling out the lineup. Since Redman's getting it going, put him in center; flank him with Wilson and Mateo; put Ward at first.
I don't know; it's hard to say there's a 100% sure thing to do with the choice of two from Nunez, Hill, and Castillo. At some point maybe you just start the guy who cranks the most homers in BP. Or, you make them arm-wrestle for it. Or, you go with the guy who started in the two wins. Either way, Mac has plenty of options tonight and lots of homework to do before he sets the lineup.
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