The Bucs rode the left arm of Paul Maholm and a big inning to a 5-3 victory this afternoon, brooming the Reds in front of nearly 14,000 fans.
Maholm went 6-2/3 frames, giving up two runs on four hits, a walk, and notching five Ks. Joel Hanrahan, Brendan Donnelly and Octavio Dotel polished it off. Dotel earned his third save, striking out the side but giving up a solo homer.
The Pirates didn't exactly bash the ball, collecting just five hits, but they bunched four of them together in the fifth inning, along with a walk and timely beaned batter, to score all their runs.
Delwyn Young, starting at second base, and Lastings Milledge singled, followed by a Garrett Jones walk. Ryan Church singled in a run, and Bobby Crosby took one for the team on an 0-2 pitch to bring home another tally.
Jason Jaramillo put the cherry on top with a bases-clearing double into left that Johnny Gomes ran a Great Circle Route trying to catch. Not a bad job for the getaway day lineup, hey? All the subs contributed.
The Pirates have won four of their last five games, and at 7-5, are 1/2 game behind the Cards, who play tonight, and a game better than 2009's 6-6 start.
-- Andrew McCutchen is back in the saddle again. After getting caught stealing yesterday, he came back and stole his seventh of the season today.
-- The Pirates went 53 innings without an error until the fourth frame today, when Ronny Cedeno's flip to second pulled Young off the bag.
-- This series marked the beginning of a 24-of-28 game stretch against NL Central teams. It's off to a pretty good start so far. They need to become competitive within the division; they were 24-52 in Central play in 2009.
-- The Pirates are off tomorrow. The Brewers came into town for a three-game stand starting on Tuesday.
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