James McDonald, who was acquired this weekend with outfielder Andrew Lambo from the Dodgers for Octavio Dotel, was brilliant in his first Pirates start tonight, striking out eight and scattering four singles and a walk in six shutout innings.
This reminds me of Jeff Karstens, who got very good results in his first Pirate start also, but McDonald is plainly much better than Karstens – he has a good 93 MPH fastball, a hard breaking pitch, and a decent change. Tonight’s start was tremendously promising.