{"id":207208,"date":"2026-06-01T01:49:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T01:49:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/207208\/"},"modified":"2026-06-01T01:49:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T01:49:16","slug":"brooms-pirates-complete-sweep-of-twins-ashcraft-caps-off-stellar-month","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/207208\/","title":{"rendered":"BROOMS: Pirates Complete Sweep of Twins; Ashcraft Caps off Stellar Month"},"content":{"rendered":"

Braxton Ashcraft<\/a> had another strong start for the Pittsburgh Pirates<\/a>, who completed a three-game sweep of the Minnesota Twins<\/a> with a 9-3 win at PNC Park on Sunday afternoon.<\/p>\n

Scoring Plays<\/p>\n

Bottom 2nd, 2-0 PIT: In his first at-bat off the injured list, Ryan O\u2019Hearn<\/a> ripped a solo home run to right field off Zebby Matthews<\/a> (1-3). Later in the inning, the Pirates (32-28) tacked on another on Jared Triolo<\/a>\u2019s RBI single to right.<\/p>\n

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Bottom 3rd, 4-0 PIT: Nick Gonzales<\/a> belted his first home run of the season, a two-run shot off Matthews that landed in the bullpens in center field.<\/p>\n

Bottom 5th, 9-0 PIT: The Pirates erupted for five runs off Matthews and reliever Mike Paredes, who was making his MLB debut. Brandon Lowe<\/a> ripped an RBI single to right to start things off. With the bases loaded, Oneil Cruz<\/a> drew a walk to push across another run and Jake Mangum<\/a> followed with a sacrifice fly to center. Henry Davis<\/a> capped off the big inning with a two-run single to left.<\/p>\n

Top 6th, 9-2 PIT: Brooks Lee<\/a> got the Twins (27-33) on the board with a two-run home run to right field off Braxton Ashcraft (5-2).<\/p>\n

Bottom 9th, 9-3 PIT: Lee connected on his second home run of the game, a solo homer to right off Brandan Bidois.<\/p>\n

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Key Moment<\/p>\n

Nick Gonzales\u2019 two-run home run snapped a stretch of 412-homerless at-bats. It was the second-longest active drought in MLB, behind the Rays<\/a>\u2019 Chandler Simpson<\/a>, who entered Sunday\u2019s game with 629 at-bats without a home run.<\/p>\n

Player of the Game<\/p>\n

Pirates starter Braxton Ashcraft struck out a career-high 11 batters in six-strong innings. He went at least six innings in each of his six starts in May and closed the month with a 1.99 ERA.<\/p>\n

Stat to Know<\/p>\n

Braxton Ashcraft is the first Pirate and one of 11 major leaguers during the Modern ERA (since 1901) with at least 11 strikeouts and zero walks in an outing of 80 or fewer pitches.<\/p>\n

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Notable Performances<\/p>\n

Braxton Ashcraft: 6.0 innings, five hits, two runs, no walks, 11 strikeouts, 80 pitches\/60 strikes<\/p>\n

Ryan O\u2019Hearn: 2 for 4, one home run, one RBI, one run<\/p>\n

Nick Gonzales: 1 for 3, one home run, two RBI, one run, one walk<\/p>\n

Henry Davis: 1 for 3, two RBI, one walk<\/p>\n

Noteworthy<\/p>\n

Braxton Ashcraft ended his start ranked seventh in the National League with a 2.77 ERA and third in strikeouts with 81.<\/p>\n

Nick Gonzales\u2019 home run was his first since last season on July 28 against the San Francisco Giants<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Pirates reinstated OF\/1B Ryan O\u2019Hearn from the 10-day injured list and placed SS Konnor Griffin<\/a> on the 10-day IL with a right elbow strain.<\/p>\n

Up Next<\/p>\n

The Pirates are off on Monday and will start a three-game series against the Astros<\/a> in Houston<\/a> on Tuesday night. RHP Bubba Chandler<\/a> (1-6, 4.85 ERA) will start for Pittsburgh opposite former Pirate RHP Mike Burrows<\/a> (3-6, 5.40 ERA). First pitch: 8:10 p.m. ET.<\/p>\n

Around the Network<\/p>\n

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Pittsburgh Hockey Now: The Actual Trade Costs for Young RFA Defensemen<\/a><\/p>\n

Steelers Now: Steelers RB Rico Dowdle\u2019s Arrival in Pittsburgh Has Uncanny Backstory<\/a><\/p>\n

Pittsburgh Sports Now: Pitt Wins Recruiting Battles to Land Talented Florida Tight End<\/a><\/p>\n

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The post BROOMS: Pirates Complete Sweep of Twins; Ashcraft Caps off Stellar Month<\/a> appeared first on Pittsburgh Baseball Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Braxton Ashcraft had another strong start for the Pittsburgh Pirates, who completed a three-game sweep of the Minnesota…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":207209,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[90979,34879,71622,91038,31567,76216,69005,91039,63505,5000,34929,37448,34931,16736,57211,39531,73,75,74,10997,72836,39228,41208,26184,90947],"class_list":["post-207208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-astros","tag-brandon-lowe","tag-braxton-ashcraft","tag-brooks-lee","tag-bubba-chandler","tag-cam-sanders","tag-carmen-mlodzinski","tag-chandler-simpson","tag-henry-davis","tag-houston","tag-jake-mangum","tag-jared-triolo","tag-mike-burrows","tag-minnesota-twins","tag-nick-gonzales","tag-oneil-cruz","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news","tag-pittsburgh-pirates","tag-rays","tag-rico-dowdle","tag-ryan-ohearn","tag-san-francisco-giants","tag-zebby-matthews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}