Ketel Marte hit a home run and drove in three runs, while pinch hitter Joc Pederson smacked a two-run triple, helping the Arizona Diamondbacks extend their winning streak to four games with a 9-5 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates on Saturday night.
Jake McCarthy went 5 for 5 with an RBI, and Arizona collected 13 hits, marking their 10th win in the last 13 games. The Diamondbacks have either won or split their last eight series (7-0-1).
“That’s what we’ve been doing all year,” Arizona starter Brandon Pfaadt said. “We know the team we have and are becoming. If the batting stays hot and the pitching stays where it’s at, we can go on quite a run.”
The Diamondbacks took an early lead against the Pirates, going up 4-1 after Marte’s two-run homer and Corbin Carroll’s solo home run.
Oneil Cruz hit a 472-foot home run in the first inning, and the Pirates evened the score at 4 with three runs in the fifth inning off Pfaadt (5-6).
“We had good swings,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said. “We executed with runners in scoring position. We put the ball in play. Bae did it, Connor did it, Michael did it. We just couldn’t hold them.”
After that, the game was all Arizona.
Marte and Geraldo Perdomo each had sacrifice flies in the fifth inning, and Pederson hit a two-run triple off Quinn Priester (2-6) in the sixth.
“There’s a lot of winning players in that clubhouse and I think that that’s catalysts for some very, very good results,” Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said. “Even on bad days, I felt like there was always a positive side, something that was very encouraging, that was making us feel like it’s going to be OK.”
Both starters were delayed as a ceremony for Randy Johnson and Luis Gonzalez being inducted into the Diamondbacks’ first hall of fame class pushed the first pitch back by 20 minutes.
