Move over, Bryan Reynolds and Jack Suwinski, and make room for Michael Perez.
The catcher became the third Pittsburgh Pirates player this season — and second in as many days — to hit three home runs in a game with a trio of blasts to right field against the Milwaukee Brewers.
The lefty-hitting Perez smashed a pair of two-run homers and a solo shot to give the Pirates a four-run cushion before they hung on to beat the Brewers, 8-7, on Thursday night before an announced crowd of 14,134 at PNC Park.
“Three really good swings. He didn’t miss any of them. He got all three of them flush,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said. “Big night for Mikey. We needed every one of them. It was a nice night for him.”
The Brewers rallied for three runs in the top of the ninth against David Bednar, who was pitching for the first time since Sunday after dealing with discomfort in his lower back, before Yerry De Los Santos got Luis Urias to pop out to short for the final out and his second save.
It was the first career multi-homer game for Perez, who entered with a .129 batting average and finished with a career-best four hits and placed himself in the record books in the process.
Per Elias Sports Bureau, the Pirates became the first team in major league history to have three different players record three-homer games in the same calendar month. Reynolds homered three times Wednesday in an 8-7 win over the Washington Nationals. Suwinski accomplished the feat, including the game winner, in a 4-3 walk-off win over the San Francisco Giants on June 19.
“That’s strange,” Shelton said. “I don’t know. I think since I’ve got here, I’ve seen a ton of stuff that’s different. Why not just add three guys hitting three homers in the same month to it? That’s kind of interesting that it’s never happened before. I’m glad it happened in all three instances, because in all three instances, we’ve needed all three of them.”
No wonder the Pirates set club records for most home runs in June (44) and most by rookies (19) of any month in franchise history. The Pirates hit nine homers in the last two days of the month alone, and their five homers against the Brewers are a season high.
The power surge supplied by their rookies came to the forefront after Oneil Cruz and Suwinski provided a second-inning spark by crushing back-to-back jacks to give the Pirates a three-run lead.
Cruz followed a Josh VanMeter single by crushing Adrian Houser’s 2-0 changeup 431 feet to center for a two-run homer with an exit velocity of 110.6 mph to give the Pirates a 2-0 lead. It broke the franchise record for most homers in June (the previous was 39, in 2012 and 1975).
Suwinski made it back-to-back by hitting Houser’s full-count sinker 412 feet to straightaway center for his 13th homer and eighth in June, which trails only Garrett Jones (10 in July 2009).
“The ball Oneil hit was an absolute laser beam, and then Jack to come up right behind him,” Shelton said. “We see Jack continue to take good swings and continue to get his top hand involved and get the ball in the air. That was an important lift for us.”
It’s the second time the Pirates have gone back-to-back this season. The first came against the Reds on May 7 in Game 2 of the doubleheader at GABP. Yoshi Tsutsugo and Diego Castillo hit back-to-back homers off Dauri Moreta in the first inning of an 8-5 win.
The last Pirates rookies to hit back-to-back homers were Brandon Moss and Andy LaRoche on Sept. 2, 2008, at at the Cincinnati Reds. It was the first time a pair of rookies hit successive homers at home since Ben Shelton and Carlos Garcia did so against the Atlanta Braves on July 24, 1993, at Three Rivers Stadium.
“It doesn’t surprise me because Suwinski’s got, what, 13 homers total?” Shelton said. “We’ve talked all along, the kids are going to have to contribute. They’re going to have to play. Hearing that stat, it shows they’re doing a really good job of contributing.”
The Brewers answered in the top of the third, as Jace Peterson hit a laser off Hoy Park’s glove for a leadoff double, and Christian Yelich followed with an RBI triple to right. Willy Adames grounded out to score Yelich and cut it to 3-2.
Houser left after 2 1/3 innings after experiencing right elbow tightness, and the Brewers tied it at 3-3 in the fourth when Kolten Wong hit a ground-rule double to left and scored on a double to right by Omar Narvaez.
Perez, who singled in his first at bat, answered with a 377-foot shot to right to lift the Pirates to a 5-3 lead in the fourth.
Andrew McCutchen hit his second double, reached third on Wong’s fly out to right and scored on a groundout by Urias to cut it to 5-4.
In the sixth, Perez sent Jason Alexander’s 1-1 slider 391 feet — it almost cleared the right field seats before hitting the top of the fence — for a 7-4 lead.
But he wasn’t finished.
With two outs in the eighth, Perez crushed Jandel Gustave’s 1-0 sinker 408 feet for a no-doubter that sailed over the head of McCutchen, who didn’t even bother to move.
“It feels good,” Perez said. “I tried to hit a good pitch. I put a good swing on it. All I saw in the dugout when I rounded third base was everybody smiling.”
The Pirates mobbed Perez in the dugout, celebrating his career game.
“It looked like he was just overwhelmed with emotion, just happiness,” Suwinski said. “Like he was having a ton of fun, a smile on his face coming down the dugout and trying to high-five. Everyone was super-pumped for him.”
The Brewers scored a pair of runs in the ninth against Bednar on an Adames double and Rowdy Tellez’s groundout to cut it to 8-6. McCutchen drew a walk to put runners on first and third for Wong, who worked a full count before hitting a liner off the glove of first baseman Michael Chavis to score Adames and make it a one-run game.
But this night belonged to Perez, who went deep three times in a row.
“He has the ability to drive the baseball, especially on the pull side,” Shelton said. “He hits the ball hard. It’s just making sure that he’s on time to get there, and tonight, he was on time.”
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