Carlos Santana homered for Milwaukee on Sunday.
My guess is that the first homer since the trade wasn’t as memorable as this home run one month ago.
About last night
That homer definitely seemed memorable for Josh Palacios. You can see the outfielder in the celebration video above. Two days later, Palacios went 2-for-4 with two doubles, breaking out a few dances of his own. He went 1-for-13 off the bench in the games to follow, and was sent to Indianapolis following prospect callups to the MLB club.
It didn’t take long for Palacios to get back on track as a starter following the demotion. After an 0-for-4 first game back in Triple-A, he hit his first homer the next night. Then, he added two hits the following night. Then, he homered again the next night. He homered again on the 25th. And again on July 26th — this one a walk-off homer for Indianapolis.
The hit. The reaction. The celebration. pic.twitter.com/sU3f8IErjb
— Indianapolis Indians (@indyindians) July 26, 2023
The Pirates traded Santana the next day, and called up Palacios on Friday to take his spot. Palacios singled in his lone at-bat off the bench on Friday. He got the start on Sunday afternoon, on his 28th birthday. It was also exactly one month after the Santana walk-off. Palacios delivered with his own version this time around.
THE BIRTHDAY BOY DOES IT
Earlier this week, Palacios was in the minors, about to turn 28-years-old, which is a really difficult age to get a chance in the majors. He was hitting walk-off homers, lifting up his teammates, and looking like he was living the dream — with a chance to replicate a veteran leader. Palacios took his new celebration to the big leagues on Sunday, truly living a dream that he probably imagined for many birthdays: Hitting a game winning home run in the majors.
QUICK PIRATES RECAP
The Pirates beat the Phillies 6-4 in ten innings, on the Josh Palacios walk-off.
Earlier in the game, Bryan Reynolds got the team on the board with a home run of his own. The two run shot evened the score in the sixth inning. Starting pitcher Rich Hill had already made his exit after giving up two runs in five innings. Dauri Moreta pitched a scoreless sixth, before Reynolds evened the score.
Jose Hernandez gave up two runs in the seventh, with both runners scoring against Carmen Mlodzinski. That put the Pirates down by two runs again. The offense didn’t quit.
Connor Joe reached on a fielding error in the bottom of the seventh with one out. It looked like he might have been able to make it to second base in hindsight with more hustle. He definitely showed hustle on the next play, scoring from first on a single from Reynolds, after an error from Johan Rojas. The effort from Joe cut the Phillies lead to one run.
Jared Triolo led off the eighth with a single, and moved to third on a double by Palacios. With one out, Nick Gonzales delivered a sacrifice fly to right field, bringing in Triolo easily to tie the game.
David Bednar pitched a scoreless ninth inning, striking out two batters. The Pirates had the winning run on second with no outs in the bottom of the ninth, but the trio of Andrew McCutchen, Henry Davis, and Triolo couldn’t get the run in. Angel Perdomo pitched a scoreless tenth inning, getting bailed out by the play highlighted below.
And of course, Palacios walked it off to lead off the bottom of the tenth.
DAILY VIDEO RUNDOWN
Sunday’s game could have gone a different direction. Angel Perdomo, pitching in his first game since his suspension, gave up an infield single to lead off the tenth, and runners moved to second and third after an error by Jared Triolo. The damage was erased after this double play from Henry Davis, Endy Rodriguez, and Nick Gonzales.
Imagine trying to run on Henry Davis
Henry Davis: The throw from Davis was enough to instantly deter Harper from running toward the plate. He made the catch, and instantly fired a bullet on a line to Rodriguez.
Endy Rodriguez: You can see the instincts from Rodriguez in this play. He is focused on the ball, and is almost reacting to what should/could be happening. He swipes blindly in the event Harper didn’t go back. He instinctively throws to second to get an out. I don’t know if that’s the best move with one out and a runner on third in the top of the tenth inning. It worked out because Endy has a cannon for an arm himself, getting the ball down to second quick enough for Harper to finally commit to the plate.
Nick Gonzalez: Showing a quick mind on the priorities of this play, Gonzales immediately cut off the throw and quickly returned a throw to the plate, where Rodriguez was already back, waiting to make the quick tag on Harper to complete the 9-2-4-2 double play.
AROUND THE SYSTEM
The Prospect Watch looks at the nightly results in the Pirates’ farm system. Below is a quick look at the standouts in each level.
INDIANAPOLIS
The Pirates saw an 11-3 victory in Triple-A, led by several players who could be depth options for the big league club down the stretch. Miguel Andujar has been one of the best hitters in the system this year, and now has three homers in his last four games.
ALTOONA
Tsung-Che Cheng hit his first homer for Altoona, and now has an eight game hitting streak.
GREENSBORO
The Grasshoppers lost 7-2, while pitching a bullpen game. The lead pitchers were Derek Diamond and Joshua Loeschorn, who were both recently promoted from Bradenton.
BRADENTON
Jesus Castillo stole his 25th base of the year, and Wilber Dotel continues to look impressive in the rotation. Check out the full Prospect Watch here.
Prospect Watch: Rodolfo Castro Hitting Righties, Tsung-Che Cheng Hitting
SITE UPDATE
You may have noticed that I’m writing on this site alone right now. There was also a break in publishing last week. The break was in large part because I knew I was about to take over full publishing on this site.
I’ve had a lot of discussions with contributors to this site throughout the year. They’ve also had a lot of discussions among themselves about starting something different on their own. Wilbur Miller presented the idea of starting something for everyone else back in May. I told him at the time that would be a good idea, and that I would support them. This site would continue with my plan.
What I’ve been finding, and what I’ve confirmed this week, is that my time on this site has been poorly spent. Let’s use June 28th as an example.
I published a column on June 28th. We had five other articles published that day. My column was the most read and the highest earning by far, even though it was quickly buried. It generated more money than the other five articles combined. Those articles required editing, planning, and additional writing from me. This work was all free. That amount of work prevented me from writing a second article. Plus, I knew that I would have 4-5 articles to edit the next day. And the next day. I didn’t write an article the next day. The five articles published on the 29th were again below my normal range for one article.
Each day is the same. I could write another article with the amount of time I’m spending editing everyone else’s articles. The site would make more revenue if it’s just me with a simple approach. That’s the theory. It has played out to be more than theory this week.
What I’ve found is that I’m doing 15-20 hours of work per week that is related to contributors. This is in addition to my writing time, and my duties as the owner of this site. This time benefits the contributors and the most hardcore readers of the site. If June 28th was a normal performance article for me, then I’m writing “normal” levels 5-6 times per week. Anthony Murphy has shown the best performance, but he hits my “normal” level once every other week with his articles. Everyone else is once a month, at best.
On July 12th, I told the contributors in an email the two scenarios in front of me: I could run this site on my own, it would cover my life, provide money to grow, and it would be much easier for me to live a more normal life. Or, I could run this site as a group effort with contributors, and it would be the struggle it has been all year, where my life is essentially trying to make this site work for others. They wanted answers right then, and I didn’t have a great way to explain it to them. I still don’t. A few days later, they started writing on Substack, which I think is best.
You can check out their work here.
This site will have a simple approach. Pirates Prospects Daily. The Prospect Watch. Eventually, a third daily article. All written by me. Published on a more normal schedule. After a few days of this, I’m starting to get to a point where that might be a reality. I’ll have more on this topic tomorrow in a site update. Because of the respect I have for the contributors, and because this has largely been my inability to explain a difficult business decision, I’ve been slow to update the readers on what is happening.
SONG OF THE DAY
