The Pirates are one of the hottest teams in baseball after winning yet another series, this time against Arizona at PNC Park.
Greg Brown recaps Sunday’s win over the Diamondbacks.
The Pirates have won five of their last six games. They have climbed to within four games of .500 and are in third place in the NL Central, seven games behind the Brewers, 6-and-a-half behind the Cardinals, and 2-and-a-half ahead of the Cubs.
The Bucs are idle today and start a two-game series with Detroit tomorrow at PNC Park before heading off to play four on the road at Atlanta this weekend.
The Diamondbacks yesterday claimed infielder Cole Tucker off waivers from the Pirates. The 2014 first round draft choice is a Phoenix native. He was assigned to Arizona’s Triple-A farm club in Reno. Tucker hit .211 over four seasons with the Pirates and never found his stroke at the Major League level. He was hitting .175 this year when the Pirates sent him to Indianapolis. They designated him for assignment last Monday to make room on the roster for first baseman Yu Chang.
The Pirates yesterday called up 2018 first round draft choice Travis Swaggerty and sent down infielder Rodolpho Castro, who failed to run out an infield popup Saturday, leading the Diamondbacks to deliberately let it fall and turned it into a double play. He also committed an error that led to Arizona’s only run on Saturday. Swaggerty returned from shoulder surgery this season and after a slow start had raised his average to .280 at Indy, with four home runs. He arrived in Pittsburgh about an hour before the game and did not play.
Pitcher Max Kranick has had Tommy John surgery and is out for the rest of the season. The flame-throwing right-hander had been dealing with a right forearm strain this season and pitched in only five games for Indianapolis and Pittsburgh.
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