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Game 65 Recap: Bucs Get Maholm Enough Runs for a W

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Maholm pitched shutout baseball and got the win.

There was more mayhem on the basepaths. There was a continued lack of offense from the Pirates. Thankfully, Paul Maholm continued to pitch very well. He tossed seven shutout innings and the Pirates scored three times to win 3-1.

The Pirates scored early against Mike Pelfrey. Jose Tabata, Xavier Paul and Neil Walker all singled, with Tabata scoring on Walker’s knock. But Paul was picked off second for the first out. Pelfrey settled in to get Garrett Jones and Lyle Overbay to end the threat. Pittsburgh didn’t get another base runner until Brandon Wood led off the fifth with a solo dinger. The Bucs were aided by an obstruction called against Jose Reyes that erased Tabata being thrown out at third on Paul’s single.

The Mets got only five base runners against Maholm in seven innings and scored no runs.

But it got interesting in the eighth. Jose Veras relieved Maholm and got into trouble from the outset. He walked Ruben Tejada and gave up a single to Lucas Duda. Tim Wood was called on to clean up the mess. He gave up a sac fly to Jose Reyes, but Duda was out at first as Tabata made a diving catch. Wood got Justin Turner on a fly ball to end it.

The Pirates got that run back in the home half of the eighth. Manny Acosta gave up singles to Ronny Cedeno, Andrew McCutchen and Tabata. Tim Byrdak relieved and gave up a two out walk to Walker to force in the final run.

Joel Hanrahan tossed a perfect ninth for the save.

Maholm yielded three hits and two walks in his seven innings. He struck out four. Mike Pelfrey gave up three singles, a homer and no walks in his seven innings. He whiffed six. Hanrahan has seven saves.

The Good
Maholm was excellent, again.

Welcome the recently acquired Mike McKenry. In the fifth inning, he picked off Daniel Murphy from second base to help suppress a rally.

McCutchen entered as part of a double switch after being giving the day off. He singled to extend his hitting streak.

Tabata had two more hits.

One game under .500!

The Bad
Only seven hits and three runs.

The Rest
As was reported in the AP game recap, the Pirates have used six catchers in 2011 – Chris Snyder, Ryan Doumit, Jason Jaramillo, Dusty Brown, Wyatt Toregas and McKenry. The last time the Pirates used that many catchers in a season was 1988 when Mike LaValliere, Junior Ortiz, Tom Prince, Ruben Rodriguez, Mike Diaz and Dave Hostetler all spent time behind the plate.

In case you are looking for some very obscure trivia, the aforementioned Ruben Rodriguez is one of 16 players (according to baseball-reference.com) who have just one hit in their career with that hit being a triple. Former Bucco Alberto Lois is also on that list.

Maholm is 4-3 against the Mets. Pelfrey is now 3-2 against Pittsburgh.

Although they are both Panamanian, I don’t believe Manny Acosta is related to former Pirate hurler Ed Acosta.

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