Giant Innings Doom Pirates, Lose 14-4 (26-27)

5/29/23- By Michael Castrignano – @412DoublePlay on Twitter

The Giants dropped 5 runs on starter Rich Hill in the 2nd and pushed across 8 runs against reliever Cody Bolton in the 7th en route to a thrashing against the Bucs in the series opener. The loss moved the Pirates to a game under .500 for the first time in 8 weeks.

Everything that could go wrong did go wrong as the Pirates struggled on defense, had inconsistent pitching and couldn’t string together hits – which has been their unfortunate anthem during this disappointing month of May, where they have dropped 18 of 24 games.

News & Notes

• Tucupita Marcano notched his first 3-hit game of the season – and the third of his career – as he is now posting a .284/.351/.500 triple slash over 36 games this season
• Jack Suwinski hit a pair of home runs into McCovey Cove. He became the third Pirate to put one into the cove after Adam Laroche (8/11/07) and Garrett Jones (8/22/13). It was Suwinski’s 2nd multi-homer game in the past week and third one of the season.
• The game got so out of hand that the Pirates turned to position player Chris Owings to handle the 8th inning. First time the Pirates used a position player to pitch since July 6, 2022 – when Josh VanMeter pitched against the Yankees.
• Pirates try to right the ship with game 2 tomorrow night with Johan Oviedo on the mound. First pitch is scheduled for 9:45pm. Let’s Go Bucs!