Behind a pair of home runs, Padres hand Pirates 4th consecutive loss
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Zach Thompson cruised through the heart of the San Diego Padres batting order, but the Pittsburgh Pirates right-hander ran into trouble against their seventh, eighth and ninth hitters.
Ha-Seong Kim hit a two-run homer and Trayce Thompson a two-run single to spark the Padres to a 7-3 win Friday night before an announced crowd of 9,755 at PNC Park.
“That’s not the best, but I just have to move into it going forward knowing that I have to attack one through nine the exact same way,” said Zach Thompson, who dropped to 0-3. “It doesn’t matter who it is.”
After returning for a six-game homestand coming off a series win at the Chicago Cubs, with a .500 record and optimism that their bullpen could overcome their starting pitching, the Pirates were swept by the Milwaukee Brewers and got off to a bad start in their weekend series.
They lost their fourth consecutive game, their longest losing streak of the season, and continued a disturbing trend. Through the first 20 games, they haven’t had a starting pitcher earn a victory. Only the 1988 Baltimore Orioles, who lost their first 21 games, went longer without a starter winning a game in baseball history.
Despite getting 10 hits against the Padres, the Pirates have only one extra-base hit in their past three games. Some of that has to do with bad breaks, including one hard-hit ball that went off Padres starter Yu Darvish and another that led to an unassisted double play.
The Pirates got to Darvish in the first inning, when Bryan Reynolds drew a one-out walk and Ke’Bryan Hayes singled to right. Daniel Vogelbach lined a comebacker to Darvish that could have been a double-play ball; instead it bounced off Darvish’s glove and allowed Reynolds to score from third for a 1-0 Pirates lead. Diego Castillo followed with a single to right to score Hayes for a 2-0 lead.
After Trayce Thompson drew a one-out walk, Kim drove a 2-1 fastball 425 feet onto the left-field patio for his third home run to tie the score 2-2 in the third inning.
Zach Thompson, who allowed four runs on three hits and two walks with three strikeouts on 80 pitches in 4⅓ innings, walked Matt Beaty to start the fifth and was pulled after giving up a one-out single to Kim.
“I think the thing that hurt him is when he walked the seven-hole hitter, he walked the eight-hole hitter, then he gave up a two-run home run to the nine-hole hitter,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said. “That’s not taking away anything from those hitters, but when you’ve got the guys who hit one through five for them, you’ve got to be able to execute at the bottom of the order. He didn’t do that.”
Lefty reliever Aaron Fletcher hit Trent Grisham with a pitch to load the bases, then Jake Cronenworth lined one up the middle that hit second base umpire Jansen Visconti. That was a break for the Pirates, as the single by rule was a dead ball. Instead of driving in two runs, only Beaty scored for a 3-2 Padres lead. Manny Machado followed with a sacrifice fly to deep center to score Kim to give the Padres a 4-2 lead.
The Pirates got a bad break when Hayes lined a comebacker off Darvish and Machado fielded it and threw him out. Vogelbach singled to right to score Reynolds from second and cut it to 4-3 in the fifth, but Jack Suwinski grounded into a forceout with runners on first and second.
The Padres responded with a two-run sixth to increase their lead to 6-3. After Eric Hosmer drew a leadoff walk, Heath Hembree replaced Fletcher but gave up a double to Austin Nola and a two-run single to left to Trayce Thompson.
After fouling off three pitches, Cronenworth hit Sam Howard’s 2-2 slider 405 feet to right-center for a solo homer and a 7-3 lead in the seventh.
The Pirates got another bad break when Reynolds drew a walk but was doubled up when Hosmer snagged a Hayes line drive. With runners on first and second and two outs, Reynolds hit a 101.4 mph liner directly at Machado at third base for the final out.
“We got to keep swinging the bats,” Shelton said. “It’s no excuse, we really haven’t caught a break. We need to find some offense and maybe find it in some different ways. Sometimes, when we’re in deficit games, it’s hard to be a little more creative in terms of if we’re going to hit-and-run, if we’re going to move. We’re searching a little bit for the slug right now.”