22-16

Today is May 12th 2018 and the Pittsburgh Pirates have a record of 22-16 as they are one game back in their division in the NL Central as both the Cardinals and Brewers are ahead of the Pirates in the division.

A lot of Pirates fans probably never thought that the Pirates would have a winning record in their first 38 games of the season. I would have thought that in their first 38 games the Pirates would have a record of 10-28 but they are actually doing so good it is amazing.

I think what Pirates fans and the players had to learn is that they could not win games just because one elite player on their team had to do good and that in order to win games every single player had to contribute. Let's be honest when we saw Andrew McCutchen not playing his best baseball while he was with the Pirates it looked like the other players on the team thought they could not play good either because if their star player in McCutchen did not play well what would have made them think the others player on their team could play well. Now with McCutchen gone all the Pirates players maybe realized that there is no leader or captain so they decided to play together and every game everybody should step up.

The last two seasons the Pirates did not have a winning record and I honestly think the Pirates did not have a good record during the last two seasons not because the players they had on the team were bad and could not play but because not every single player would all play good at the same time. Like there were times that Marte would play good and everyone else would not or McCutchen would play good and and everyone else would not.

But now all of a sudden this year all of the Pirates players are playing good at the same time and they know that now if they want to win more games and even win the division. Yes I said "win the division". They all have to contribute every single game. This team has potential even though Pirates pitcher Jameson Taillon left yesterday's game with a finger location. It's fine because this team has other starting pitchers that can win games for the Pirates like Ivan Nova, Trevor Williams, Chad Kuhl and Steven Brault. If Taillon has to go on the disabled list then all the Pirates would have to do is bring up Nick Kingham from the minor leagues. And Kingham is 2-0 in his two starts this year as he had wins against the Cardinals and the Brewers which is good knowing that the Pirates have a pitcher that can beat teams in their division.

Colin Moran is playing well this season and Corey Dickerson is leading the Pirates with the highest batting average as his BA is .323 as of today. Starling Marte is leading the team with 45 hits and I think Marte will continue to play good this year as I think he was embarrased last year that he was caught with using performance enhancing drugs and he wants to show everybody that he really is a good player without PED's. Some people might have thought Marte was not actually good at baseball this whole time he has been playing when they heard he was caught using PED's but Marte is showing those people this year that he can play at a high level without drugs as he worked hard this offseason to prove himself to everyone.

What I like about the Pirates this year is they are beating teams in their division as they have won series's against the Reds at home, the Cubs away, the Brewers away and they even swept the Cardinals in a 3 game series at home this season. The Pirates are even beating teams that they are supposed to beat in the first place like the Marlins, the Tigers and the Whitesox. The Pirates were known in the past to not beat teams they were supposed to beat, known for not winning a lot of division games and known for not knowing how to win a single game in Milwaukee but they have changed that around so far in the first 38 games.

The Pirates still have to get better as they have to beat teams that are better than them and elite like the Nationals and the Phillies as they both swept the Pirates earlier this season.

Jung-Ho Kang has returned to the United States as the Pirates might except to return to the team at maybe the end of May or in the beginning of June which is good because Kang was playing good before he got arrested in his home country of South Korea in December of 2016 for a DUI that kept him in South Korea for over a year. When Kang returns he will probably not start at third base because Colin Moran is playing good at third base. But the Pirates would feel good if they had Kang on the bench as a pinch hitter.

Who would have thought that McCutchen's departure is bringing the Pirates closer as a team but let's see if the Pirates can continue playing good baseball for the rest of the season as the record of 22-16 is so nice for this team to begin the season.