News and Notes

 News and notes:

• Ke’Bryan Hayes was named NL Rookie of the Month for September. In 24 games, he batted .376 with 5 homers, 11 runs scored, 17 RBI, 202 OPS+ and +4 Defensive Runs Saved per Baseball Reference.

• Pittsburgh was pretty much equal opportunity in how they lost this year – the squad was 8-15 in one-run games and 4-12 in five+ run blowouts.
• The Pirates played nine different teams this year; seven made the playoffs. They played the two non-postseason clubs six times during the year (and were 0-6!).
• Hmmmm…the Bucs must be running low on numbers. C Andrew Susac (#80) and OF Jared Oliva (#76) were both issued first-time uni numbers this season, and there were three guys with that honor last year: Ps Williams Jerez (#79), Wei-Chung Wang (#78) and James Marvel (#74). There were only three other players before those five to have their own unshared number: P Joe Beimel (#97, 2011), OF Lastings Milledge (#85, 2009-10), and P Rick White (#88, 2005)
• Larry Broadway is no longer the Bucco senior director of minor league operations. He’s been relieved of that title, although expected to remain in the FO. His successor is yet to be named per Jason Mackey of the Post Gazette.
• The Oneil Cruz incident isn’t nearly as cut-and-dried as originally presented, according to Kevin Gorman of the Trib.
• The Game 7 Gang canceled the annual October 13th celebration outside the Forbes Field wall, citing Covid crowd regulations as being too much to work through.