The Grind Continues

Once again the Bucs leave the city of Milwaukee without having win. This streak goes back two years now and a total of 21games. That is unbelievable. One would think that the Bucs would win up there on accident. Baseball is one sport where one would not expect to have a streak such as this ever happen.

Then again when one looks at the Bucs inability to hit with runners in scoring position against the Brew Crew, one can easily understand where the team would lose that many in a row.

With the calendar changing that the team moving on to play a few doubleheaders, the Bucs are going to get to see more new teammates. The first new one, will be Daniel McCutchen. When the news was that the Bucs were going to send McCutchen to the World Cup in Europe, I could not believe it. After the season McCutchen had he deserved a shot at the big leagues, not more seasoning against top international talent. With him coming up we will see if there is yet another arm that will compete for the rotation next year. Things have worked out well for another McCutchen thus far, maybe Daniel will have success as well.

Replacing McCutchen on Team USA will be Brad Lincoln, which makes a great deal of sense. Lincoln has worked hard this season and made great strides. He is not on the 40 man roster and fits the mold of the type of player you would want the Bucs to send to Europe. He won't be facing lineups as tough as he did in the IL, but will be challenged in different ways and should be a good experience for him, as well as Pedro Alvarez.

The real debate coming up will be whether or not Neil Walker makes his debut in Pittsburgh. Jose Tabata most surely will not, as he is headed for the AFL. Walker has come on strong in the second half, after fighting lingering injuries, so calling him up may be very interesting. I am not sure how much time he would see, as the team will probably want to run out Andy LaRoche everyday, but he could be interesting.

And to conclude this rambling sort of post, Steve and I made up another top 30 list to take in account the new trades and draft picks. We put it up over at the Allegheny Armada. Just click on Top Prospects at the top. When we made it up, we were surprised at how much things had changed in the top 30. A majority of the players have come in this calendar year alone. Take a look at it, I am sure many will argue but it is our opinion.