Things Are Beginning To Look Up for the Pittsburgh Pirates

After two mid-year losing streaks, the Pittsburgh Pirates will have a record-setting 17th straight losing year in 2009. But they seem to be out of their mid-summer slump. And they have made some progress in the past year.

The sweep of the Milwaukee Brewers at home was encouraging. And Ross Ohlendorf and Paul Maholm (and their relievers) limited the Brewers to three runs in two games.

Only rookie Kevin Hart got off to a bad start, with a two run sixth inning after giving up only two runs in the first five. but Pirate bats were able to pull his chestnuts out of the fire.

A winning series against Cincinnati, which lost two of their last three, would be most encouraging. Cincinnati is 3-2 so far against the Pirates, having won all three by shut outs.

But the Pirates will have a different set of batters including Garrett Jones and Andrew Morton that can outhit the light-hitting Reds. And the Pirates dominate Cincinnati sabermetrically, having scored 13 more runs, and allowed 11 fewer on the season.

As for pitchers, the Reds' Johnny Cueto was hurt, and Micah Owings was called up from the minor league to start in his place tonight. And the other two weekend starters will not be among the team's best.

Then there will be a rematch with Philadelphia for the final three games of the home stand. The Pirates lost three to the defending World Series champions at Philly in July.

But two of them were close. Perhaps the home-field advantage and a set of rejuvenated bats may enable the Pirates to win at least one game, perhaps as many as two of three.

The tougher tests will be Milwaukee and Cincinnati on the road. These are now among the weaker teams in the National League Central.

But the Pirates' young players have one of the majors' worst road records. A 3-3 split on the road against these two teams outside of PNC park would represent a step forward.

September and (early) October will feature a tougher schedule, including games against the division leading Los Angeles Dodgers and St. Louis Cardinals, as well as the contending Chicago Cubs, who've had the best record in the Majors against the Pirates for the past two years, interspersed with weaker teams.

Despite a record plagued by trade "slippage" and just plain bad luck (sabermetrically), the Pirates are a structurally better team than they were a year ago. For one thing, they have 63 quality starts so far this year (versus 65 for all of last year).

That would have been enough to make the Pirates a potential 60-plus game winner at this stage, given better hitting.

Paul Maholm has continued to improve his FIP (sabermetric ERA) for the third straight year, although his actual ERA doesn't show it this year. Zach Duke's FIP has improved for the second straight year, although his actual ERA is now about half a run better, instead of worse, than his sabermetrics.

Ross Ohlendorf's winning record shows that he is better than the average back-of-rotation hurler, although he's not quite league average. The question marks are Charlie Morton and Kevin Hart, but both are young pitchers who look to be middle-of-rotation types when they develop more fully.

For the first time in a while, it looks like the Pirates will have a league-average rotation.

Open to question is the Pirates' still below average hitting. Andrew Morton and Garrett Jones are as good as Nate McLouth and Jason Bay. And Delwyn Young and Ronnie Cedeno are giving Freddy Sanchez and Jack Wilson runs for their money.

But Lastings Milledge is (so far) hitting more like a Brandon Moss or Steve Pearce than a Nyjer Morgan, which is to say that we should have traded one of the other two, with or without Ian Snell for him, rather than Morgan. (The Nationals apparently wanted "something" for Milledge, not necessarily Morgan.)

And back from injuries, Ryan Doumit isn't exactly his old self.

Even after all the changes, the Pirates aren't soon going to be contenders. But they may, at long last, be headed toward .500.