Reds 7 – Pirates 4

Eugenio Suarez hit a tiebreaking three-run homer in the eighth inning, as the Cincinnati Reds dealt the Pittsburgh Pirates their second loss of the season with a 7-4 Reds win on Saturday night.

The Pirates are a surprising 6-2 on the season but this was a tough loss to take with the bullpen imploding late.

Pittsburgh has arguably one of the top-5 closers in the game but getting the ball to him is going to be a season long problem. The bullpen situation kinds of resembles the lack out outfield depth last season where the Pirates were often rolling out just two legitimate outfielders on a daily basis.

PIRATES GETTING IMMEDIATE IMPACT FROM NEWCOMERS

Corey Dickerson drove in 2-runs in the Pirates 7-4 loss to the Reds Saturday night and the Pirates are getting an immediate impact from Dickerson and Morgan, which has been a best case scenario for the Pirates, combined with Gregory Polanco’s hot start, before it was groundhog day again and Polanco was injured with right foot discomfort.

Dickerson is batting 310/.333/.517 through the first eight games of the season and the Pirates kind of knew what they were getting with him. He’s a pretty good ball player.

Moran thus far has been the biggest surprise with a line of 320/.370/.520 to go with 1 home run and 8 RBIs.

So far, so good for the newcomers…..

Reds vs Pirates, 1:35 PM

— Jameson Taillon takes the hill today to conclude the series with Cincinnati. For the Pirates to be respectable this season, they have to keep doing when they’ve done in starting out 6-2, by beating teams they should.

— After hitting .249 last season, Francisco Cervelli is off to another slow start in hitting .160 through the first seven games he’s appeared in. He was given the night off on Saturday as Elias Diaz got the start.