{"id":657162,"date":"2026-05-21T21:12:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-21T21:12:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/657162\/"},"modified":"2026-05-21T21:12:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-21T21:12:13","slug":"ashcrafts-strong-start-backed-by-offense-as-pirates-take-series-lowe-takes-walk-in-the-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/657162\/","title":{"rendered":"Ashcraft\u2019s Strong Start Backed by Offense as Pirates Take Series; Lowe Takes Walk in the Park"},"content":{"rendered":"

Braxton Ashcraft<\/a> delivered seven-strong innings and Brandon Lowe<\/a> hit an inside-the-park home run for the Pittsburgh Pirates<\/a> in their 6-2 rubber match win over the St. Louis Cardinals<\/a> at Busch Stadium on Thursday afternoon.<\/p>\n

Scoring Plays<\/p>\n

Top 1st, 1-0 PIT: Brandon Lowe hit an inside-the-park home run to left field off Dustin May<\/a> (4-4). The ball bounced off the very top of the fence towards left-center and away from left fielder Jos\u00e9\u00a0Fermin, allowing Lowe to score easily.<\/p>\n

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Bottom 3rd, 1-1: Iv\u00e1n Herrera<\/a> hit a solo home run to left-center on a first-pitch slider from Braxton Ashcraft to tie the game.<\/p>\n

Top 4th, 2-1 PIT: The Pirates (26-24) immediately took the lead back when Jake Mangum<\/a> bounced into a fielder\u2019s choice with runners on the corners and one out.<\/p>\n

Top 6th, 4-1 PIT: After Spencer Horwitz<\/a> walked and Konnor Griffin doubled to right, Marcell Ozuna<\/a> ripped a two-run single to left field to pad the lead.<\/p>\n

Top 7th, 6-1 PIT: Henry Davis<\/a> led off the inning with a home run to left off Justin Bruihl<\/a>. Later in the inning, Bryan Reynolds<\/a> brought home Oneil Cruz<\/a> on a groundout to short.<\/p>\n

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Bottom 8th, 6-2 PIT: Jordan Walker<\/a> plated Herrera on a single to left field against reliever Wilber Dotel.<\/p>\n

Key Moments<\/p>\n

Marcell Ozuna\u2019s two-run single in the sixth, which came on a 1-2 pitch, gave the Pirates enough breathing room.<\/p>\n

The Cardinals (28-21) twice had the tying run on-deck against Wilber Dotel in the eighth inning but the rookie right-hander struck out Nolan Gorman<\/a> and Masyn Winn<\/a> to end the threat.<\/p>\n

Player of the Game<\/p>\n

Braxton Ashcraft (3-2) tied a career-high with nine strikeouts across seven innings and held the Cardinals to one run. Ashcraft has worked into the seventh inning in each of his last four starts.<\/p>\n

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Stat to Know<\/p>\n

Brandon Lowe\u2019s inside-the-park home run was the first by a Pirate since Bryan Reynolds on May 21, 2022 (four years ago today), which was also came against the Cardinals but at PNC Park.<\/p>\n

Notable Performances<\/p>\n

Braxton Ashcraft: 7.0 innings, four hits, one run, two walk, nine strikeouts, 98 pitches\/68 strikes<\/p>\n

Brandon Lowe: 2 for 4, one home run, one RBI, one run, one walk<\/p>\n

Henry Davis: 1 for 3, one home run, one RBI, one run, one HBP<\/p>\n

Marcell Ozuna: 2 for 4, two RBI<\/p>\n

Konnor Griffin: 1 for 4, one double, two runs, one steal<\/p>\n

Noteworthy<\/p>\n

The Pirates have won each of their first four road series against National League Central opponents for the first time since the division formed in 1994.<\/p>\n

Braxton Ashcraft has a 1.97 ERA (7er\/32ip) in five road starts this season.<\/p>\n

Konnor Griffin extended his hitting streak to eight games with a double in the sixth inning. Spencer Horwitz extended his hit streak to six with a single in the fourth.<\/p>\n

Henry Davis\u2019 solo home run snapped an 0-for-16 slump at the plate.<\/p>\n

Up Next<\/p>\n

The Pirates head north of the border for the start of a weekend series with Toronto<\/a> on Friday night. RHP Bubba Chandler<\/a> (1-5, 5.14 ERA) will start for Pittsburgh. The Blue Jays will send out veteran RHP Kevin Gausman<\/a> (3-3, 3.45 ERA). First pitch: 7:07 p.m. ET on SportsNet Pittsburgh<\/a>, MLB Network\/93.7 The Fan.<\/p>\n

Around the Network<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh Baseball Now: Pirates Roster Moves: Isaac Mattson Optioned for Pitching Prospect<\/a><\/p>\n

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Pittsburgh Hockey Now: Penguins Trade Targets: Young Reclamations & Potential Breakouts<\/a><\/p>\n

Steelers Now: Steelers OTA Takeaways: OL Moves Explained, Welcome to the NFL Rookies<\/a><\/p>\n

Pittsburgh Sports Now: Pitt Baseball Advances to ACC Quarterfinals<\/a><\/p>\n

The post Ashcraft\u2019s Strong Start Backed by Offense as Pirates Take Series; Lowe Takes Walk in the Park<\/a> appeared first on Pittsburgh Baseball Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Braxton Ashcraft delivered seven-strong innings and Brandon Lowe hit an inside-the-park home run for the Pittsburgh Pirates in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":657163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[39904,69394,49761,65821,4283,49762,7649,102537,47670,123797,377,9892,48449,363,58861,9882,7383,2240,49763,99,1231,1329,12378],"class_list":["post-657162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-brandon-lowe","tag-braxton-ashcraft","tag-bryan-reynolds","tag-bubba-chandler","tag-dustin-may","tag-henry-davis","tag-ivan-herrera","tag-jake-mangum","tag-jordan-walker","tag-justin-bruihl","tag-kevin-gausman","tag-marcell-ozuna","tag-masyn-winn","tag-mlb","tag-nolan-gorman","tag-oneil-cruz","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-pirates","tag-spencer-horwitz","tag-sports","tag-st-louis-cardinals","tag-steelers","tag-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=657162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/657163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=657162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=657162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=657162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}