Blogs

CHICAGO — Ryan Doumit went 4 for 4 with four RBI on Wednesday night, powering the Pirates past the Chicago Cubs, 8-2. The Pirates also won the day’s first game, 4-0, giving them their first doubleheader sweep at Wrigley Field since June 20, 1983.
“I can’t remember the last time we won at Wrigley Field, let alone [...]

CHICAGO — Charlie Morton got a measure of payback Wednesday afternoon against the Chicago Cubs.
Morton tossed his first career shutout, scattering four hits to pace the Pirates to a 4-0 victory in the first game of a doubleheader.
“It was very impressive,” manager John Russell said. “Everything worked for him today. He was down in [...]

CHICAGO — The Pirates remain on track to set a franchise record for fewest errors in a season — but they’ve been putting it to test the past couple of days.
Monday, the Pirates made two errors against the Dodgers. Yesterday, they made a season-high three blunders over the first four innings against the Cubs. [...]

Pitching coach Joe Kerrigan today confirmed he will return for the 2010 season.
“It’s been a great experience here because of the young pitchers and their personalities,” Kerrigan said. “I’ve really enjoyed it as much as any year I’ve spent as a pitching coach.”
Exact terms of Kerrigan’s contract were not released, but it’s likely he [...]

CHICAGO — The Pirates will not renew the contract of Rich Donnelly for 2010. Donnelly served the past two years as an instructor/advisor to the Baseball Operations department. He spent most of this year as an extra coach on the major league staff. Donnelly is not with the team for this final road trip of [...]

The Pirates’ flight tonight to Chicago should be a lot more … um, colorful than usual. An annual rite at season’s end is rookie hazing, which usually involves embarrassing costumes. Today, the players arrived in the clubhouse to find costume bags hanging in more than a dozen lockers.
Ross Ohlendorf, Jason Jaramillo and Brian Bixler will [...]

There are a lot of guys in the Pirates’ clubhouse who need the offseason to hurry up and get here so they can put an awful 2009 behind them. Perhaps no one needs it more than Matt Capps (3-8, 26 saves, five blown saves, 5.68 ERA), who is wrapping up his worst season since [...]

One night after dominating the Dodgers, the Pirates’ bullpen collapsed Saturday amid an 8-4 loss.
With the victory, the Dodgers clinched a playoff berth for the third time in four years – the first time they’ve done that since 1963, ‘65 and ‘66 – and for the fourth time in the past six seasons. Los [...]

Jeff Karstens will make one more start this season – Wednesday – in one of the games of the day-night doubleheader against the Cubs. This afternoon, manager John Russell said Karstens might get a shot at making the rotation in 2010.
“We’ll probably build him up as a starter in spring training,” Russell said, noting [...]

Three unearned runs and a “bullpen game” enabled the Pirates to slip past the Los Angeles Dodgers, 3-1, and snap a six-game losing skid.
“It’s been a while coming,” manager John Russell said. “We played these guys tough (last week) in L.A. The guys were really into this one tonight because they didn’t want it [...]