As you may already know, the Pirates lost to Cincinnati Reds on Monday, March 6, which was also Opening Day in the MLB. The final score was 5-2 in favor of the Reds. Despite the loss, Pirates fans have much to take out of it.

The first thing that can be noticed is that resigning Francisco Liriano was definitely a good decision. Allowing the first run of the season by way of a balk was definitely cringe worthy, although it did not affect him too much after. In the end, he pitched a solid seven innings only giving up two of the five runs. The Pirates’ offense should have been able to take advantage of this. This brings up the next point.

The offense looked pretty good but had some holes in it. The Pirates did a good job of getting hits but could not string them together. This may have been because the five and six spots in the lineup went 0-8 and struck out five of those times. These players included: Starling Marte, Pedro Alvarez, and Sean Rodriguez, who pinch hit for Alvarez later in the game. Surely they will rebound as the season goes on but a big factor was also Johnny Cueto’s dominating performance throughout the game.

Cervelli, the catcher, who was brought in to replace Russel Martin’s spot in the lineup, had a pretty good game. He went 1 for 3 and drew a walk. Defensively speaking, he did not get much of a chance to show what he can do yet. Although he let Billy Hamilton of the Reds take third, that should surprise no one as he is one of the fastest people on the team.

It was McCutchen though that proved that he is still one of the best in the game right now. Josh Harrison and himself went 4 for 8 combined and surprised nobody as “Cutch” hit the clutch home run scoring the both of them. Their offensive production on Monday should have everybody excited for the season to come.

Sure the Pirates lost thanks to a mammoth home run from the Red’s third baseman Todd Frazier. The fans here in Pittsburgh can be sure to get over the loss of Russel Martin and Travis Snider quickly and get excited for the 2015 season if the Pirates can execute like they did on Opening day for the MLB.