Morning Pirates Buzz: Bedard, McCutchen, Walker & Upton

— Erik Bedard (5-10, 4.55 ERA) making his first start in 11 days, had a rebound start last night, pitching into the seventh inning, and Andrew McCutchen homered for the fifth time in six games and the Pirates (50-40) beat the Colorado Rockies 6-2 on Tuesday night to become the fifth team with at least 50 wins.

As the Pirates look to add another starter via trade, Bedard has earned himself at least one more start as he went 6 2/3 innings, allowing 5 hits and 1 earned run, earning his first win since June 8th. Bedard had much better command of his fastball, which has been an issue for him of late.

— Andrew McCutchen (.374 – 22 HR – 65 RBI) belted his 22nd home run of the season with a bomb in the 4th inning, 448 feet, the longest home run of the season for McCutchen. McCutchen who has 22 home runs in his last 61 games, leads the Majors in batting average (.374), slugging percentage (.657), OPS (1.083), and total bases (216).

— Neil Walker (.302 – 7 HR – 44 RBI) extended his hitting streak to 17 games, going 2-3 with a run scored and 2 walks in the Pirates 6-2 win. Walker who has his batting average over .300 for the first time this season, is hitting (32-66) .485 with 3 home runs, 14 RBIs and 8 doubles during his 17 game hitting streak. Walker has the second highest OPS in the Majors in the month of July at 1.357.

— Collecting their 50th win of the season last night, the Pirates joined the New York Yankees (56), Texas Rangers (54), Washington Nationals (52) and Cincinnati Reds (51), as team who have reached 50 wins this season. “It’s a mile marker along the way, ” Pirates manager Clint Hurdle said following last night’s win. THE PIRATES LAST SEASON RECORDED THEIR 50TH WIN ON JULY 18, 2011.

— Former MLB executive Keith Law of ESPN.com, is among those who feels Diamondbacks GM Kevin Towers is determined to move Justin Upton before the July 31st trade deadline. “I think they are very strongly motivated to trade him, and I just get the sense that Kevin Towers doesn’t like him,” Law told Arizona Sports 620’s on Tuesday. “Not even just as a player, but there’s something about Upton’s personality or demeanor that Towers just doesn’t like.” Law saws that 29 other teams think Towers is crazy. For whatever reason, Towers just doesn’t think Upton’s going to play up to his physical abilities,” Law said. “There’s an entire industry of people who look at Upton — even guys who’ve told me, ‘Yeah, you know maybe Upton isn’t quite going to be as good as we thought he was coming out of high school, but I’d still take him.There’s 29 other clubs out there that are looking at Justin Upton and thinking ‘is Arizona crazy, ” Law said.