Wednesday: Pirates & Reds, JT v Rookie Davis, Lineup, Notes

Tonight: The four-game set at Cincinnati will begin round three at 7:10. The contest will be aired by Root Sports and 93.7 The Fan.

Lineup: Josh Harrison 3B, John Jaso RF, Cutch CF, Gregory Polanco LF, Josh Bell 1B, Elias Diaz C, Jordy Mercer SS, Gift Ngoepe 2B & Jameson Taillon P. Still no Amore and hey, another day, another second baseman. JJ moves up to second after a pair of knocks last night; he’s 4-for-11 in his last three starts.

Pitchers: Jameson Taillon (2-0, 2.08) fires it up against Rookie Davis (0-1, 11.17). Taillon has been pretty strong in four of his five starts; a couple more swing-and-misses and a couple less walks are the major items on his to-do list. JT is 1-0/3.18 in three career starts v the Reds. He’s faced them once this year, getting a no-decision after tossing six innings and giving up a pair of runs. Rookie has three starts; the longest he’s lasted was four innings and that was against the Bucs in the only game he wasn’t fricasseed in. The Bucs got just one run on two hits off him with four walks, but they did square up fairly well without much hitters’ luck for their effort. We’ll see if his BABIP and the Reds Buc luck continue to favor him again.

Notes:

• Ivan Nova was named NL Pitcher of the Month for April after going 3-2/1.50 with two complete games, one shutout, 22 strikeouts, one walk and a .198 OBA. Gerrit Cole was the last to win the honor in April of 2015.

• J-Hay is an unlikely #1 hitter, but he’s batting .351 in nine games as the leadoff man.
• Pittsburgh’s starting pitchers go into tonight’s match with a 3.64 ERA, seventh in MLB and third in the NL.
• Cutch has reached base safely in his last 21 games. J-Bell’s 15 gamer came to an end with an 0-fer last night.
• Tom Gatto of The Sporting News isn’t quite sold on Cutch in CF yet.
• C John Bormann’s stay on the 40-man was short; he was outrighted back to Bradenton today. That leaves the Bucs with two open (Marte & Kang) spots.
• Top prospect Austin Meadows is 22 today.