LAKELAND, Fla. — In the Pirates’ first opportunity to treat the exhibition games like the real thing (not counting an abbreviated scrimmage Monday), their offense acquitted itself well.
Jordy Mercer went 2 for 3 with a homer, Francisco Cervelli homered and the Pirates beat the Tigers, 4-2, at Joker Marchant Stadium.
The Pirates had 10 hits, and six of them came from players who either will or could make the opening-day roster.
“We’re going with full metal jacket from an offensive standpoint,” said Clint Hurdle, who noted that the players are picking up signs well and squaring up mistakes. He also said the Pirates have put on five hit-and-runs in the first 141/2 innings of live ball.
Cervelli de-emphasized the team’s April struggles last year (they started 18-22) and said everyone needs to stick to what they do rather than press.
“People worry about the way we start, but we won 98 games,” Cervelli said. “In the middle of the season, we never think about that. We jut took the positive things about struggling offensively. We took the positive things and we fixed it and we started playing good games. That’s baseball. I think you can not be frustrated with some moment because it’s like a roller coaster. Some weeks are going to be good and the other ones, not.”
**********
Kyle Lobstein pitched two scoreless innings against what amounted to the Tigers’ opening-day lineup. He walked two and allowed one hit.
“Quite honestly, I think at this point they’re letting me go out there and just kind of get settled in a little bit,” Lobstein said. “There hasn’t been a lot of talk with Ray or Clint. Really, I think just to get settled in, especially with the club, a new organization. Learn all the guys, learn how they are, how we can play together. I think as we go on in spring training there will definitely be a little more talk on what kind of things you can work on and what we see from you.”
The Pirates are stretching out Lobstein, who has two minor league options remaining and will likely start the season in the Class AAA Indianapolis rotation.
“We’re not as comfortable that any of the guys moving from double-A to triple-A or a little bit of triple-A experience last year are going to be able to help us in April or May,” Neal Huntington said Monday. “Hopefully we’re wrong. It comes back to readiness compared to need. If we have a need early, that’s Nicasio or Lobstein or Boscan or some of the other guys that we’ve signed.”
**********
For the second day in a row, Gift Ngoepe made two great plays at short.
**********
Some other news from around baseball ...
Yankees closer Aroldis Chapman became the first player suspended under MLB’s new domestic violence policy. He will miss the first 30 games of the regular season. This is an important precedent, as Jose Reyes and Yasiel Puig still have investigations pending.
After Ian Desmond signed with the Rangers, the 2016 draft order is set.
Really interesting stuff from ESPN’s Buster Olney and Keith Law on the Baseball Tonight podcast, applicable to Gerrit Cole’s recent displeasure with his salary. They are talking about the possibility of Salvador Perez and the Royals agreeing to terms on a new contract (this was a few days ago) and there is an anecdote about the reaction to the Cardinals giving Albert Pujols a much higher salary than usual for a pre-arbitration player (more about why that’s relevant here).
Sports Illustrated’s spring training preview hits the NL Central.
First Published: March 10, 2016, 11:55 p.m.
