Rich Hill delivers deepest start for Pirates, who sweep Cardinals for 5th straight win
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An 11:35 a.m. start for a game streamed live on Peacock didn’t seem to bother Rich Hill, as the 43-year-old left-hander delivered his deepest start of the season for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Hill received a standing ovation Sunday afternoon from the 22,947 at PNC Park when he was pulled with two outs and a one-run lead in the seventh inning.
Behind Hill and Ji Hwan Bae’s two-run single in the first inning, the Pirates beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 2-1, to sweep the three-game series.
It was the fifth consecutive win for the Pirates (31-27), who moved into a temporary first-place tie in the NL Central with the Milwaukee Brewers (31-27), who play Sunday at the Cincinnati Reds.
It also marked the first time the Pirates swept the Cardinals at home since April 27-29, 2018, when Nick Kingham took a perfect game into the seventh inning of a 5-0 win in his major league debut.
The Pirates loaded the bases in the first inning against Miles Mikolas (4-2) with singles by Bryan Reynolds, Jack Suwinski and Ke’Bryan Hayes, and Bae hit a two-out bloop single to shallow center to drive in Reynolds and Suwinski for a 2-0 lead.
Hayes (3 for 4) and Bae (2 for 4) were stranded when Rodolfo Castro grounded out to first. The Pirates left nine runners on base, including runners at second and third in the fifth inning on another Castro groundout to first.
The Cardinals (25-35), however, couldn’t score against Hill (5-5) as he allowed only two hits through the first six innings. Hill retired 11 consecutive batters before giving up a two-out solo home run to Andrew Knizner, who drove a 1-0 cutter 419 feet to right to cut it to 2-1.
After Tommy Edman followed with a single to left, Pirates manager Derek Shelton replaced Hill with Dauri Moreta, who struck out Paul Goldschmidt to leave Edman stranded.
Hill struck out six while allowing four hits and three walks with one hit batsman while throwing 62 of his 96 pitches for strikes in 6 2/3 innings, his longest outing since striking out 11 in seven scoreless for Boston in a 5-1 win over Tampa Bay last Aug. 27.
The Pirates got a scoreless eighth from Yohan Ramirez and turned to closer David Bednar in the ninth. Bednar gave up a one-out single to Luken Baker, who had notched his first career hit in the second inning, but got Jordan Walker to fly out to right and struck out Knizner for his 13th save of the season.
Source: TribLIVE
