PITTSBURGH (AP) \u2014 Esmerlyn Valdez hit his third home run of the day, and the Pittsburgh Pirates edged the NL Central-leading Milwaukee Brewers 3-2 on Saturday to sweep a doubleheader.<\/p>\n
The Pirates won the first game 7-6, as Valdez hit two home runs \u2014 including a go-ahead grand slam in the seventh inning \u2014 and drove in six runs.<\/p>\n
The rookie right fielder had eight RBIs in the two games and now has homered 10 times and driven in 26 runs in his first 27 career games.<\/p>\n
Valdez\u2019s two-run shot in the fourth inning of the nightcap opened the scoring. Brice Turang\u2019s two-run double in the fifth pulled the Brewers even.<\/p>\n
Bryan Reynolds singled in the go-ahead run in the sixth off rookie left-hander Shane Drohan (4-3), who allowed three runs and five hits over 6 1\/3 innings while striking out six and walking none.<\/p>\n
Yohan Ramirez (6-2) pitched a scoreless sixth. Mason Montgomery protected a one-run lead in the ninth inning for his first save of the season and the second of his career.<\/p>\n
Pirates rookie starter Bubba Chandler lasted 4 2\/3 innings, allowing two runs and five hits. He struck out six and walked three.<\/p>\n
The Brewers missed the chance to win their 60th game of the season, a feat they have never accomplished before the All-Star break. <\/p>\n
The doubleheader was necessitated by Friday night\u2019s scheduled game being rained out.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tUp next<\/p>\n
The three-game series concludes on Sunday with a matchup of All-Stars as Brewers RHP Jacob Misiorowski (10-4, 1.62 ERA) faces Pirates RHP Paul Skenes (7-8, 3.58).<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PITTSBURGH (AP) \u2014 Esmerlyn Valdez hit his third home run of the day, and the Pittsburgh Pirates edged…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":241290,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[33388,6811,73,75,74],"class_list":["post-241289","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\/241289","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=241289"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241289\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/241290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}