Duke allowed nine runs, four earned tonight against the Marlins. His performance and his defense’s were in some ways typical of the season he had – Duke depends very heavily on his defense, and can’t succeed when his defense doesn’t make plays, as it didn’t tonight and as it largely hasn’t this season. Duke’s fortunes have turned very heavily on his defenses – the 2009 defense was one of the strongest in the Pirates’ recent past, and Duke’s numbers were reasonably good. The 2010 defense was horrible, thanks in part to poor results from Akinori Iwamura, Ryan Doumit, Neil Walker and Pedro Alvarez, and Duke’s numbers were wretched. Duke is very likely to be non-tendered after the season, meaning this was probably his last start as a Pirate. Hopefully, he’ll sign with a team that can catch the ball, because the Pirates certainly can’t. Dejan Kovacevic has more in this vein in his game recap for the Post-Gazette.
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