PITTSBURGH — Somewhere between impossible and a suggestion to seek medical help rests what transpired Thursday during the Pirates’ 8-7 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers at PNC Park.
A season-high five home runs, bringing to nine Pittsburgh’s total over the past two games, something the Pirates had not done since June 26-27, 2019.
Much crazier than ... well, pretty much anything was this: Three of them came off the suddenly red-hot bat of backup catcher Michael Perez, who entered this one hitting just .146 with a .386 OPS in June.
It was the second consecutive three-homer game for a Pirates player — and keep in mind no other MLB team has more than one of these this season. The Pirates now have three in 11 days after Jack Suwinski on June 19 and Bryan Reynolds on Wednesday.
It’s also the first time a Pirates catcher has hit three home runs in a game, and Perez is the 23rd player in franchise history to do it.
In addition to Perez’s outburst, the Pirates’ other two homers came in back-to-back fashion, the whole thing adding up to a Pirates victory over a Brewers club that had been streaking of late, winning 11 of 16 and eight of 11 overall, plus 21 of their past 30 at PNC Park.
Yeah, so much for that.
The home-run happy Pirates just can’t seem to stop, getting three from Perez and one apiece from Oneil Cruz and Jack Suwinski, as JT Brubaker and the bullpen combined for enough run prevention to make it work.
Of course, not without a scare. The Brewers scored three in the ninth off David Bednar, seeing his first action since Saturday. Designated hitter Willy Adames’ double scored one. So did a groundout from first baseman Rowdy Tellez. After the Pirates could not retired second baseman Kolten Wong, his infield single scoring a third running and making it an 8-7 game, manager Derek Shelton went to Yerry De Los Santos.
The youngster got shortstop Luis Urias to fly out to center field to end it.
Cruz got things started with a two-run homer in the second inning, the shortstop crushing a 2-0 change-up from Brewers starter Adrian Houser 431 feet at 110.6 mph for his second of the season.
Suwinski followed by blasting a full-count sinker from Houser 412 feet out to center, his solo shot landing a little to the left of the ball Cruz hit. It was the 13th of the season for Suwinski and his eighth this month.
Seven of Suwinski’s home runs this season have come with two strikes, tying him with Diego Castillo for the most by an MLB rookie this season.
Going back-to-back — or maybe back-to-butt considering we’re talking about the 6-foot-7 shortstop — represented the first time that’s happened for two Pirates rookies since Brandon Moss and Andy LaRoche did it on Sept. 2, 2008 at Cincinnati.
The Brewers battled back and tied the score with two runs in the third and one more in the fourth. Left fielder Christian Yelich, who has hit .321 over his past 20 games while operating out of the leadoff spot, tripled into the right-field corner on a 2-0 slider that Brubaker left over the middle of the plate.
Adames drove in a second Milwaukee run with his bouncer to second base before catcher Omar Narvaez pulled an inside slider from Brubaker to a similar place as Yelich’s triple: down the right-field line.
With the game tied at 3, the Michael Perez Show kicked into full gear, a spectacle as expected as a hockey game breaking out mid-inning on the Allegheny River.
Staring at a 2-2 count in the fourth inning, Perez turned on a fastball from Brewers reliever Brent Suter and knocked it over the right-field fence for a 5-3 Pirates lead, though Milwaukee would get one back when former Pirate Andrew McCutchen doubled and scored on Urias’ groundout to third in the sixth.
Looking to create some breathing room with that one-run advantage, Perez made it happen with another homer in the sixth, his first career multi-homer game and the fourth for the Pirates on the night.
This particular feat of strength came on a 1-1 slider from Jason Alexander, a pitch Perez sent screaming over the Clemente well and seemingly halfway to the Hamptons.
The run of long balls produced more interesting nuggets for the Pirates. The Pirates finished with 44 home runs this month, their second-most all-time behind the 45 they had in August 2007.
As for Perez, he’s the first Pirates catcher with two or more home runs in a game since Russell Martin on April 9, 2014, and he totaled a career-high four hits.
On the mound, it was another solid start for Brubaker, who had posted a 3.54 ERA over his last 13 starts since April 19 despite a 1-6 record.
Brubaker went six innings and allowed four earned runs on seven hits and two walks with six strikeouts, lowering his ERA on the season to 4.28.
Brubaker did a fine job of limiting free passes, and the Brewers, for the most part, earned what they got, amassing five doubles and a triple against Pittsburgh’s starting pitcher.
