Blogs

TAMPA — Three relievers recovering from injuries — Octavio Dotel (oblique), Joel Hanrahan (elbow) and Wil Ledezma (shoulder) — threw duirng workouts this morning at McKechnie Field. Dotel threw a 30-pitch side session, his first time off the mound since Feb. 21, and reported no problems. Dotel will throw a bullpen session Thursday. Hanrahan streched [...]

It’s a good thing the Pirates aren’t in the AL East. If they were, they’d see a lot more of Alfredo Aceves.

Catcher Erik Kratz is a bit of a throwback-type player. Friendly guy, no-nonsense approach, plays because he loves the game despite never yet spending a day in the majors.

In today’s 15-5 rout of the Twins, outfielder John Raynor doubled and tripled — raising his batting average to .400 — and drove in three runs.

As we enter the second week of spring training games, Ryan Church (.333 BA, 1 HR, 3 RBI), Andrew McCutchen (.500, 1 SB) and Tony Sanchez (he’s batting 1.000 — albeit in one at-bat) already playing at a high level.

Kevin Hart, battling for the No. 5 job in the starting rotation, threw just one rough inning Saturday, as the Pirates and Philadelphia Phillies played to a 3-3 tie in 10 innings.

BRADENTON, Fla. — Ramon Vazquez will get his first start in the infield this afternoon against the Phillies. There’s been speculation the Rangers, who recently voided infielder Khalil Greene’s contract, might be interested in trading for Vazquez, who played for them from 2007-08. Lineups for today’s game: Phillies: 1. Dewayne Wise cf, 2. Greg Dobbs [...]

Joe Starkey and I already have mentioned what a refreshing, glad-to-be-here guy Tony Sanchez is. Tonight, Sanchez got into his first spring training game and had quite a debut.

SARASOTA, Fla. — Daniel McCutchen’s first outing of the spring tonight went well: two innings, three hits, one run. “It’s good to get my feet wet,” McCutchen said. “I just wanted to throw strikes, not walk anybody and see how my pitches felt.” McCutchen was pleased with his two-seam fastball, which he said showed more [...]

Octavio Dotel (strained oblique) doesn’t expect to throw off a mound until sometime next week, putting him three weeks behind his normal spring training schedule. At that pace, Dotel, who prefers to pitch 10-15 innings in spring games, might not be ready for the start of the regular season.