Rookie right-hander Clay Holmes pitched six scoreless innings for his first career win as the Pittsburgh Pirates topped the visiting Milwaukee Brewers 6-2 Saturday for a doubleheader sweep and a five-game winning streak.
Max Moroff, Jordan Luplow (two), Starling Marte and Gregory Polanco hit solo homers, and David Freese added a two-out RBI double for the Pirates, who have won seven of eight.
Jesus Aguilar had a two-run single in the ninth for the Brewers, who have a season-worst five-game losing streak, have lost seven of nine and have been knocked out of first in the National League Central.
The 25-year-old Holmes (1-1), called up to make his second major league start, gave up four hits -- a double and three singles -- with six strikeouts and two walks.
Felipe Vazquez got the final out for his 23rd save and second of the day.
Milwaukee left-hander Brent Suter (8-6), who came off the disabled list to start, pitched five innings. He allowed two hits, including Moroff's homer, struck out three and walked one.
Leading off the third, Moroff hit his third homer, down the line in left, for a 1-0 Pittsburgh lead.
Against reliever Jeremy Jeffress in the sixth, Marte hit a one-out double to right to extend his hitting streak to 11 games. He moved to third on Polanco's flyout and scored on Freese's single up the middle to make it 2-0.
Luplow led off the seventh with his first homer, a shot to center off reliever Dan Jennings, to make it 3-0.
Against Aaron Wilkerson in the eighth, Marte hit his 13th homer, to left, and Polanco followed with his 16th, to right, to boost the lead to 5-0. Those two also hit back-to-back homers in the first game of the doubleheader.
Two outs later, Luplow went 441 feet to left-center for his second homer in as many innings.
Aguilar's two-out, bases-loaded single in the ninth against Michael Feliz broke up the shutout.
--Field Level Media
Milwaukee | Pittsburgh | |
Brent Suter | Player | Clay Holmes |
Loss | W/L | Win |
5.0 | IP | 6.0 |
3 | Strikeouts | 6 |
2 | Hits | 4 |
1.80 | ERA | 0.00 |
Milwaukee | Pittsburgh | |
Hernan Perez | Player | Jordan Luplow |
2 | Hits | 2 |
0 | RBI | 2 |
0 | HR | 2 |
2 | TB | 8 |
.500 | Avg | .500 |
Team | Hits | HR | TB | Avg | LOB | K | RBI | BB | SB | Errors |
Milwaukee | 9 | 0 | 10 | .265 | 26 | 13 | 2 | 6 | 1 | 0 |
Pittsburgh | 8 | 5 | 24 | .250 | 7 | 8 | 6 | 2 | 0 | 0 |