Pittsburgh Pirates starting pitcher Jeff Locke pitched eight innings for the first time since April 18 and allowed his lowest hit total of the season in a 1-0 victory against the Cleveland Indians.
“The two guys that went out there and did that mound work were really good today,” manager Clint Hurdle said. “They both attacked the zone, and I can’t say enough about Locke’s outing today.”
Locke [5-4] pitched eight innings three times in 2014, as well. In his eight innings of work he surrendered two hits and a hit batsman. He threw 89 pitches, 60 of which were strikes.
Locke was tested when he hit lead-off batter Jason Kipnis with a pitch in the top of the first, however Francisco Lindor grounded into a double play. The same thing happened in the second inning when Yan Gomes singled to start the inning but the next batter Carlos Santana grounded into a double play.
The Pirates scored in the sixth inning. With one out, Josh Harrison doubled giving him his 26th multi-hit game of the season.
“I just wanted to be aggressive and thought I saw him pretty well,” Harrison said. “He threw a fastball that caught some of the plate and I put a good swing on it.”
Neil Walker then extended his hitting streak to seven games with his single off Cody Anderson [1-1] which scored Harrison.
“We want to get runs for our starters, they’ve done a great job all year, especially when a guy goes out and pitches like he does today,” said Harrison. “You definitely want to go out and get him a win.”
It was the lone blemish for Anderson, who pitched eight innings.
“[Anderson] was very effective,” Hurdle said. “I think what we saw from the guys up top is when they fired early, they had pitches and barreled them up. We had a lot of early fires today. At one point we had five or six and had one hit on first pitch swings. It’s getting that pitch, putting a barrel on it and we had some guys up top that were able to scratch out just enough to get us on the board and get one more than them.”
Locke ended his outing retiring the last 19 batters.
“Just trying to throw strike one,” said Locke. “When you get in your good rhythm, you just want to do everything you can to stay in that rhythm.”
Mark Melancon pitched the ninth inning and earned his 26th save of the season. It is his 24th consecutive save which is two off the team record for most consecutive saves in one season which was set by Joel Hanrahan in 2011. Melancon entered play with a 0.28 ERA in his last 32 appearances.
The game time was two hours and six minutes which is the shortest total all season at PNC Park.
This series concludes on Sunday when Gerrit Cole [11-3 2.20 ERA] takes on Danny Salazar [7-3 3.80 ERA]. Cole is 6-1 with a 2.79 ERA in nine career Interleague starts. Salazar is 0-2 with a 4.18 ERA in five Interleague starts.
Photo credit: Jared Wickerham/Getty Images
