Baseball as it should be, with an unfortunate ending.

Pirates 1, Tigers 0

I’ve been banging the Rick Porcello (2-2, 51 IP, 5.29 ERA, 3.93 FIP, 0.7 WAR) drum pretty hard for a long time, and as recently as two weeks ago, and it was so much fun to watch him walk out onto the mound after a rain delay tonight and deliver the best performance of his career.  He was brilliant from the start and finished with 8 innings, 3 hits, 0 runs, 1 BB, and 11 K. Only two balls were hit in the air against him all night, both of which were caught. The three hits were groundball singles up the middle. Nothing else of any substance came off the bats of the Pirates hitters and Porcello (as you can see below) continued his march toward his breakout year.

For their part, the Tigers offense made him sweat and didn’t deliver anything, even into the 11th inning, when Neil Walker’s solo HR gave the Pirates a 1-0 lead that would hold.The loss gives the Tigers a 4-2 homestand and a 29-21 record so far on the year as they pack up and head to Pittsburgh to play the second half of the home and home series. Anibal Sanchez (5-4, 64.1 IP, 2.38 ERA, 1.78 FIP, 2.8 WAR) will start game one Wednesday looking to continue his great season and keep his near no-hitter stuff going.

The Moment: Porcello strikes out his 11th batter to set a new career best.