Brewers bounce back to throttle Pirates, 9-0
More evidence surfaced Wednesday night that baseball is a strange, unpredictable game. Day to day, there’s no telling what might happen.
One night after scoring double-digit runs (12) for the second time in the previous five games and slugging five home runs among their 11 hits, the Pirates managed only four hits in a 9-0 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers, the team’s first shutout loss since May 29. Brewers rookie starting pitcher Tobias Myers struck out six in eight innings, each one going down while looking at strike three.
The Pirates (44-48) entered the game at American Family Field with a twogame winning streak, but they haven’t won three in a row since May 4-6. The Brewers (54-39 and sitting in first place in the National League Central) stretched their advantage over the Pirates to 9 1/2 games.
The only Pirates scoring threat surfaced in the seventh inning when Rowdy Tellez doubled and went to third on Josh Palacios’ single before Ke’Bryan Hayes grounded into a 3-6-3 double play to end the inning. Myers recorded five threeup, three-down innings.
Martin Perez, making his third start for the Pirates since coming off the injured list, came into the game with an 8.31 ERA in four games against the Brewers (20 earned runs in 21 2/3 innings). That was almost a run per inning, but the Brewers actually improved that stat by scoring five against Perez in 4 2/3 innings. He threw 107 pitches, allowing nine hits and three walks and losing his fifth game in six decisions. His season ERA is 5.15.
The Brewers led wire-towire after the meat of their batting order scored two runs in the first inning on singles by Christian Yelich and Sal Frelick around a double by Willy Adames.
In the fourth inning, the bottom of the Brewers order started a rally when Andruw Monasterio and Brice Turang singled before William Contreras chased them home with a double.
Rhys Hoskins’ 417-foot home run in the fifth led to Perez’s departure before the end of the inning.
Relief pitcher Brent Honeywell allowed a sixth run on Monasterio’s RBI single in the seventh, and Ryder Ryan gave up three more in the eighth on Adames’ three-run homer.
