PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Pirates starter Bailey Falter faced only the minimum over seven innings and Henry Davis and Oneil Cruz homered in a 6-1 win over the Nationals Wednesday night.
Falter allowed two singles and a walk, they were erased on a pair of double plays and a caught stealing. Falter struck out two while getting 11 fly ball and seven ground ball outs. Caleb Ferguson pitched a perfect eighth inning. Chase Shugart finished the game, giving up a run in the ninth inning.
“Both fastballs were in a really good spot,” Falter said. “I like the curveball a lot tonight, too. I think it was pretty sharp. I just feel like everything was working in our favor.”
"He was on top of it,” said Pirates manager Derek Shelton. “Like we saw in the start with Cincinnati, very uncharacteristic of him not throwing strikes, he came right out and attacked their lineup. I thought he was outstanding. That was about as good as we've seen him."
Davis hit his first home run since June 12, 2024 against St. Louis and first home run at PNC Park since July 15, 2023 against San Francisco. The fifth-inning homer bounced off the left field foul pole at 105.6 miles-an-hour traveling an estimated 392 feet.
“Little bit of relief for sure,” Davis said. “I knew it was hooking. I was just really glad to see it hit the foul pole. Just want to keep the momentum going forward, have good at-bats and help the team.”
"Yeah, big homer to get us started,” Shelton said. “And I think, to go back to that, every game that he's caught here so far, he's done an outstanding job with his pitch calling, his sequencing, him going back and forth. I mean big throw out in the first. That kinda alleviates it. It shows that they thought against Bailey they could run right away. It's the first pitch, and Henry makes a nice throw and Tri makes a really nice tag. But overall, an outstanding game by Henry."
The second RBI came on a broken-bat groundout scoring Isiah Kiner-Falefa for a 2-0 lead in the seventh. Cruz would come up later in the inning and hit a 105 mph, two-out grand slam into the right field stands for a 6-0 lead.
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Benches clear
After Bryan Reynolds was hit by a pitch by relief pitcher Jorge Lopez with two outs in the seventh inning, Andrew McCutchen dove out of the way of a pitch up by his head. A couple of seconds of McCutchen walking around, he became upset and started chirping back-and-forth. The benches and bullpens cleared. No punches were thrown, but McCutchen was clearly upset. The field cleared and play was about to resume, only then did the umpire eject Lopez. McCutchen would walk and score on the Cruz homer.
“It was way too close to his head,” Shelton said. “Bryan had gotten hit two pitches before. And then we go above Cutch's head? Not a fan of that. And I think the umpires did a really good job of controlling it, knowing the situation. I mean, if this stems from something from yesterday, Mitch did not try to hit Paul DeJong in the face in a 1-0 game.
It was totally accidental. If this was retribution for that, then that's just lack of awareness."
Lopez apologized for the situation after the game saying he wasn’t trying to make a purpose pitch.
Oddity
Bottom of the sixth inning with one out, Tommy Pham hit a looping liner to left. Outfielder James Wood came rushing in and appeared he made a shoestring catch. Cruz ran back to first and Pham didn’t run out the play until both realized the ball was trapped. Wood’s throw to first beat Pham who ran too late and since that happened first, Cruz was able to stand on first and even though he was tagged he was safe because the out of Pham was before the tag.
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Up Next
LHP Andrew Heaney looks for his first Pirates win (0-1, 3.00 ERA) against former Pirates RHP Trevor Williams (1-1, 7.36 ERA) with the North Shore Tavern Leadoff Show hosted by Paul Alexander on 100.1FM and AM 1020, KDKA at 11:35a and first pitch at 12:35p.