Carlos Santana's walk-off homer in 9th caps Pirates' comeback win over Brewers
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After rallying from a four-run deficit to sweep the San Diego Padres, the Pittsburgh Pirates’ attempt at another comeback against the NL Central-leading Milwaukee Brewers looked bleak.
Then the Pirates trimmed their deficit to one run in the bottom of the ninth inning, when Andrew McCutchen doubled off the bullpen fence in left-center to drive in Ji Hwan Bae.
With McCutchen standing on second, Carlos Santana crushed a 431-foot home run over the right-field seats to boost the Pirates to an 8-7 walk-off win Friday night before 29,179 at PNC Park.
“I feel great for that at-bat,” Santana said. “I didn’t try to do too much and tried to get my pitch. I had a good swing, hit a home run and won the game.”
It was the eighth career walk-off homer for Santana and the second walk-off homer of the day to boot the Brewers out of first place. The Brewers (43-39) dropped a spot in the standings as the Cincinnati Reds beat the Padres, 7-5, on Spencer Steer’s two-run, walk-off home run in the 11th inning. The Pirates (39-42) won their fourth consecutive game to move into third place, a half-game ahead of the Chicago Cubs.
Santana went 3 for 5 with two doubles, two RBIs and two runs scored, and McCutchen was 3 for 5 with a homer, three RBIs and two runs.
“I think you saw the two veterans do it: Cutch comes up and hits the double and makes us within one, then Carlos with the big hit,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said. “The game doesn’t go fast for those guys, regardless of the situation. That’s what good veteran players do, and we’ve got two good ones.”
After retiring six of the first seven batters, Pirates starter Osvaldo Bido allowed four runs in a 35-pitch third inning. Bido hit leadoff batter Joey Wiemer in the left shoulder to start the third. Raimel Tapia laid a bunt down the third-base line to put runners on first and second with no outs. Christian Yelich hit a line drive to right field that skipped off the glove of Henry Davis, allowing Wiemer to score for a 1-0 Brewers lead.
William Contreras hit a bouncer down the third-base line that Jared Triolo scooped, but his throw to home plate was high and Raimel Tapia slid past the tag of catcher Austin Hedges to make it 2-0.
Rowdy Tellez singled to center to drive in Yelich for a 3-0 lead, and Willy Adames followed with a sacrifice fly to center to score Contreras to make it 4-0.
When Bido walked Tapia with one out in the fourth, Shelton turned to the bullpen and brought in lefty Ryan Borucki.
Through the first three innings, Peralta allowed only a Santana double to start the second. But McCutchen led off the fourth by drilling a 1-2 curveball 364 feet and off the left-field foul pole for his 10th home run to cut it to 4-1.
It was the 297th career home run for McCutchen — his first since June 14 at the Chicago Cubs — and marked another milestone for the 36-year-old designated hitter. He has double-digit homers in all of his 15 seasons in the majors, the only active player to do so every year since 2009.
That appeared to rattle Peralta, who threw 39 pitches in the fourth. He walked Henry Davis, who advanced to second on a wild pitch, and Jack Suwinski. Nick Gonzales worked an eight-pitch at-bat before smacking a full-count fastball off the Clemente Wall for a two-run double to cut it to 4-3.
The Brewers, however, stretched their lead to 7-3 with a three-run seventh. The Pirates got off to a shaky start when Gonzales was charged with an error when Yelich’s grounder skipped off his glove and lefty Angel Perdomo hit Contreras with a pitch.
With two runners on and no outs, Shelton brought in Dauri Moreta, and the righty got pinch hitter Brian Anderson to pop up and struck out Adames. But Owen Miller doubled to left to score Yelich, and Brice Turang drilled a two-run double down to the right-field corner.
The Pirates rallied in the bottom of the seventh, when McCutchen hit a two-out single that skipped past Miller at third to score Tucupita Marcano to cut it to 7-4. But Brewers lefty reliever Thomas Pannone struck out Davis to leave a pair of runners stranded.
Santana started the eighth with a double to deep center — marking the 10th time in his 14-year career that he’s had 20 or more doubles in a season — and scored on Suwinski’s single to right to make it 7-5. Pannone retired the next three batters, getting Jared Triolo looking at a called third strike to strand Suwinski at second base.
Carmen Mlodzinski (1-1) pitched scoreless innings in the eighth and ninth to earn his first major-league victory, but the Pirates still trailed by two runs going into the bottom of the ninth.
Shelton took a risk by having Bae pinch-hit for Jason Delay, meaning that Davis would make his major league debut at catcher if the game went into extra innings. It paid off when Bae singled and advanced to second on a groundout by Josh Palacios.
McCutchen doubled to score Bae and stayed put when Davis grounded out to third for the second out. Then Santana came to the plate and swung at Bush’s first-pitch fastball at the letters.
“I was just hoping it would stay fair,” Shelton said of Santana’s game-winner. “It was definitely far enough. It was just how much it was going to hook because he got it flush.”
Source: TribLIVE
