In the thick of the shortstop competition with Kevin Newman and Erik Gonzalez, Cole Tucker has found Newman’s play to be infectious.
Tucker is so convinced Newman’s hot bat can be contagious that he joked about following his Pittsburgh Pirates teammate around the cafeteria to see what he’s eating for breakfast.
“If he eats Cheerios, I’ll eat Cheerios,” Tucker said of Newman, who went 2 for 2 to raise his average to .688 (11 of 16) this spring. “It’s like he can’t (make an) out. It’s unbelievable. He’s on a different planet. It’s pretty cool. He just finds holes all the time. It’s pretty incredible.”
Tucker joined in the free-swinging style and aggressive baserunning Saturday afternoon against the Detroit Tigers with a performance that was symbolic of the Grapefruit League game.
Tucker smoked a triple to the gap but was later thrown out at the plate on a groundout in the Pirates’ 3-1 loss to the Tigers at Publix Field at Joker Marchant Stadium in Lakeland, Fla. It was the Pirates’ sixth triple this spring — tied with Toronto for most in Grapefruit League play — but Tucker was ticked the wind robbed him of a homer.
“I was bummed,” Tucker said. “I came back to the dugout, and I was like, ‘That’s probably a homer anywhere else on any other day,’ but just not today.”
Tucker was more upset, however, about missing a week of action with a thumb injury that affected his hitting. He is batting .176 (3 for 17) in six games but has a double and a triple.
“That really was kind of bummer because he have just a set amount of time, and missing 10 days or whatever it was, was really tough,” Tucker said. “I was really pushing to get back, but it’s hard to do what you want to do when you’re hurt or your hand’s swollen or whatever.”
In his absence, Newman has taken a stronghold at shortstop, although he started at second base before switching positions with Tucker mid-game.
The Pirates had runners in scoring position early but failed to capitalize not only on Tucker’s leadoff triple in the second but after Newman hit a two-out double in the third. Newman was caught in a rundown at third.
They finally got on the board in the fourth, taking a 1-0 lead when Phillip Evans led off with a double and scored on Colin Moran’s single. Moran reached second on a wild pitch and third on a Dustin Fowler groundout, but Oliva grounded out to second to end the inning.
Pirates starter Tyler Anderson allowed one run on two hits with no walks and four strikeouts in five innings, throwing 47 of his 66 pitches for strikes. He did surrender a solo home run to Miguel Cabrera in the bottom of the fourth that tied the score at 1-1.
The Tigers took a 2-1 lead in the sixth after back-to-back doubles by Robbie Grossman and Renato Nunez off Richard Rodriguez, who took the loss. Nunez added an RBI single to left to score Greg Garcia in the eighth for a 3-1 lead. The Pirates had a chance to tie it with the bases loaded before Andrew Susac grounded out to short to end the eighth.
Right-hander Wil Crowe, acquired from Washington in the Josh Bell trade, is scheduled to make his first start when the Pirates play the Boston Red Sox at 1:05 p.m. Sunday in Fort Myers.
