SAN DIEGO — The Pittsburgh Pirates are heading east as their batters start looking at southpaws.
The Pirates wrapped a three-game series in San Diego and travel to the Arizona Diamondbacks where they open a three-game series on Friday.
After seeing their first lefty starter on the year in the Padres’ series, they’ll eye-ball two more in the Valley of the Sun.
They hope the next two outings against left-handers will go better than the first one.
Pittsburgh was dominated by lefty Drew Pomeranz in losing to the Padres on Wednesday night. Pomeranz had a career-high 10 strikeouts over 6 2/3 nearly spotless innings. Pomeranz’s curveball had the Pirates befuddled for most of his appearance.
“We hadn’t matched up like anything like that in spring training,” Pirates manager Clint Hurdle said.
Of course the Pirates haven’t seen much of all from that side from starters
But that changes starting on Friday night when they face Patrick Corbin (1-1, 2.75 ERA).
The Pirates get a righty on Saturday in Rubby De La Rosa (1-3, 8.44 ERA). But for Sunday’s series finale, the Diamondbacks trot out another lefty in Robbie Ray (1-0, 1.96 ERA).
So after the Pirates went 14 straight games without going against a lefty starter, they will see three in four games.