PITTSBURGH (AP) \u2014 Rookie phenom Esmerlyn Valdez hit two home runs, including a go-ahead grand slam in the seventh inning, and drove in six runs to rally the Pittsburgh Pirates to a 7-6 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers on Saturday in the first game of a doubleheader.<\/p>\n
The 22-year-old right fielder has hit nine home runs and driven in 24 runs in his first 26 games. His first career grand slam came off Aaron Ashby (12-2), turning a 6-3 deficit into a 7-6 lead and keeping the Brewers from their 60th win of the season with their second loss in seven games.<\/p>\n
Valdez\u2019s first homer of the day was a solo shot in the third that put the Pirates ahead 3-2. He also hit a run-scoring single in a two-run first inning.<\/p>\n
Jake Bauers and Sal Frelick hit two-run home runs for the Brewers, who entered the day with a 7\u00bd-game lead in the NL Central.<\/p>\n
Bauers lined his home run into the right-field seats in the second inning to tie the game at 2-2. Frelick\u2019s blast capped a three-run fifth inning and put the Brewers ahead 5-3.<\/p>\n
The Brewers added a run on William Contreras\u2019 single in the top of the seventh, but Valdez answered with his grand slam in the bottom of the inning.<\/p>\n
Pittsburgh starter Braxton Ashcraft, who has been selected for Tuesday\u2019s All-Star Game, had one of his few poor outings this season. He allowed five runs in five innings.<\/p>\n
Carmen Mlodzinski (6-3) pitched one-run ball in three innings of relief and Gregory Soto pitched a scoreless ninth for his 12th save, getting Andrew Vaughn to ground into a game-ending double play with the bases loaded.<\/p>\n
Brewers rookie starter Brandon Sproat gave up three runs in three innings.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tUp next<\/p>\n
Brewers LHP Shane Drohan (4-2, 2.97 ERA) is scheduled to face RHP Bubba Chandler (3-8, 4.82) in the second game of the doubleheader in a matchup of rookies.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PITTSBURGH (AP) \u2014 Rookie phenom Esmerlyn Valdez hit two home runs, including a go-ahead grand slam in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":241169,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[33388,6811,73,75,74],"class_list":["post-241168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-ap-sports","tag-associated-press","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241168","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=241168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/241169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}