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Logan Forsythe and Rene Rivera each singled with two out in the ninth off of Mark Melancon to give the Padres a 3-2 come-from-behind win at PNC on Wednesday night.
It erased a dominant performance by Charlie Morton as he allowed a single run over eight innings of work while giving up two hits and tying his career single-game strikeout total of nine. “I thought John [Buck] did a great job behind the plate and the defense made some great plays,” said Morton. “For the most part it was throwing strikes in sequence pretty good and the off-speed was pretty good.”
The lone run off of Morton came in the fourth inning. He walked Jedd Gyorko with one out then allowed the first Padre hit of the game, a Chase Headley infield single off of the diving glove of Justin Morneau. Tommy Medica would then hit in Gyorko a tough grounder to Pedro Alvarez, who was unable to get a good throw to Neil Walker, who was unable to turn the double play.
The Pirate offense was stagnant through six innings while only recording a single hit, a Morneau single in the second. The offense would awaken in the seventh when Neil Walker reached first by way of a strikeout-wild pitch. Andrew McCutchen would then come up and send a 3 – 0 fastball into the right-center field seats to give the Pirates the lead. “2 – 0 count, 3 – 0 count, different times you are looking for one pitch in one zone,” said Clint Hurdle. “He got a pitch in the zone and he nailed it.”
Morton would hand the ball over to Mark Melancon in the ninth. He gave up a lead-off single to Gyorko, but get Headley to fly to center and Medica to strikeout looking. That’s when the wheels would fall off. Pinch-hitters, Denorfia and Forsythe would both single to right field to give the Padres the lead.
Houston Street would come in and close out the Pirates 1 – 2 -3.
“You gotta meet the demands of the game over the long haul,” said Hurdle. “The challenge of sport goes right along those lines, the challenge of life goes along those lines. That’s why when you’re up you try not to get too high. You enjoy the moment, you know you got more work to do and when things don’t work your way, you say ‘hey, you got to be steadfast and you gotta keep plowin’.”
Final Score: Padres 3, Pirates 2
One good note that came from the night was that the Nationals lost to the Braves meaning the Pirates playoff magic number is now 5.
Starters Lines
Morton (ND): 8 IN, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 9 K’s. 99 Pitches (65 Strikes)
Ross (ND): 7 IN, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 7 K’s, 1 WP, 1 HP, 1 HR. 96 Pitches (59 Strikes)
The Pirates will look to salvage a game of the 4-game set tomorrow afternoon at 12:35.
Tomorrow’s Starters
(RHP) Gerrit Cole (PIT): 8 – 7, 3.33 ERA
(RHP) Ian Kennedy (SD): 6 – 9, 4.85 ERA
(Photo Credit: Gene J. Puskar / AP)
