Pittsburgh Pirates of the Week: August 15-21

Each Monday for the rest of the season, Pirates Breakdown will give you their Pittsburgh Pirates of the Week. This week we picked the four players who did an outstanding job from August 15-21.

The Pittsburgh Pirates started last week with a sweep of the Giants in San Francisco and then came by to PNC Park only to lose all three games to the Miami Marlins. Between the three wins and three losses, the team did receive some good performances, especially from a rookie starting pitcher and the three outfielders.

Taillon

Jameson Taillon once again makes the list after delivering his seventh consecutive quality start. Taillon did not factor into the decision, but went six innings against the Giants on August 16th and only allowed three runs. He continues to show fantastic command as he only issued one walk, and he added five more strikeouts to his season total. Taillon also notched his first career hit in his start last week, so he can check that off the list now. He’ll face a tough opponent tonight when he takes on the Houston Astros, but if there is one pitcher that can get the Pirates back to their winning ways, it’s Taillon.

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Jameson Taillon Weekly Snapshot

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McCutchen

Andrew McCutchen has started to turn his season around in a very serious way in the last few weeks. He had a great series in San Francisco, collecting two hits in each game on the bay. Two of these hits went for extra bases, a tripe in the second game and a home run in the series finale. While he did go hitless in two of the three games against Miami, the series in San Francisco showed what McCutchen is capable of when he is swinging a hot bat. With the team’s playoff hopes in a precarious situation heading into the series against Houston, McCutchen’s performance could help get them closer to one of the Wild Card positions.

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Andrew McCutchen Weekly Snapshot

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Marte

Starling Marte may have had a few games where he was held hitless last week, but he made the list for his bat and his arm. He may not have collected as many hits as some of his teammates, but he showed why opponents should not run on him in the August 19th game against the Marlins when he nailed J.T. Realmuto at home. He also added his 41st stolen base of the season last week, tying his personal best that he set back in 2013.

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Starling Marte Weekly Snapshot

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Polanco

Our final entry this week is Gregory Polanco, who has been putting together a great year so far. Like McCutchen, Polanco added another home run to his season total last week. And like Marte, he also showed off his great arm with a bullet to home to throw out Xavier Scruggs. While his batting average has been slipping over the last week, he still has shown tremendous power at the bat, and opponents are going to learn soon that Marte is not the only outfielder that you shouldn’t test when playing the Pirates.

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Gregory Polanco Weekly Snapshot

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Your Player of the Week

Over on our Twitter feed, we asked you who your Player of the Week would be. Here now are the results:

After a very up and down week for the #Pirates, who is your Player Of The Week?

— Jason Rollison (@jrollisonpgh) August 22, 2016

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Featured Photo Credit – Daniel Decker Photography