Let’s get this over with

Let’s briefly put on our time-traveling pants and go back to the magical, crazy days of last Friday. It was then that I wrote this:

What I am here to say is that it would be incredibly encouraging to see the Pirates beat the Brewers twice this weekend, just to prove to themselves (and to me) that they can actually play on the road at a level similar to the one that they showed at PNC Park over the previous nine games.

In the six games the Pirates have played since then, they’ve failed to win once. Watching the Pirates play on the road is kind of like jabbing a needle in your eye, so this afternoon game is a bonus for everyone who’s a fan of eyesight this afternoon. Zach Duke and Homer Bailey, who destroyed us at PNC last time he pitched against us go at it at 12:35.

Neil Walker is getting his first big league start at third base, batting second. He will undoubtedly get two hits, including a key RBI double. That will cause people to tell me I’m an idiot for doubting him yesterday, which will cause me to respond with a post arguing that Andy LaRoche is better third baseman than Walker is, which will leave half of the people out there angry that I’ve defended LaRoche over Walker and the other half (me included) feeling kind of nauseous that we’re having this conversation at all and hoping that Pedro Alvarez will keep it from being necessary in the future. So at least we’ll have something to talk about for the remainder of this week.