Sanchez leads Bucs' win

Thursday, August 24, 2006 His tie-breaking homer in the seventh beat Atlanta, 5-4. ATLANTA (AP) — Freddy Sanchez hit a tiebreaking homer in the seventh inning to hand Atlanta another loss at Turner Field, giving the Pittsburgh Pirates a 5-4 victory over the Braves on Wednesday night. Jason Bay also homered for the Pirates, who won two of three in Atlanta after coming into the series with baseball's worst record on the road. They won only their third series away from PNC Park, having lost 17 and split another. This is hardly the same Braves team that came into the season with a record 14 straight division titles and hasn't had a losing record at home since 1990 — the year before the streak began. They dropped to 26-33 at Turner Field, the majors' second-worst home record. Suburban Atlanta native Matt Capps (4-1) struck out Matt Diaz with the bases loaded to end the sixth and wound up with the win when Sanchez homered off Chad Paronto (1-1) with two outs in the seventh, snapping a 4-all tie. Mike Gonzalez worked the ninth for his 23rd save in as many chances. Jones gets 350th Atlanta's Chipper Jones hit the 350th homer of his career to tie Chili Davis for the third-most by a switch-hitter in baseball history. Only Mickey Mantle (536) and Eddie Murray (504) have more. Bay led off the second with his 28th homer, and the Pirates made it 2-0 in the fourth on Bay's run-scoring double. That began a stretch of four straight innings in which Pittsburgh scored, but they squandered several chances for a bigger lead against Atlanta starter Tim Hudson. Jose Castillo grounded into an inning-ending double play with the bases loaded in the fourth. Sanchez did the same with runners at first and third in the fifth. Weak-hitting pitcher Ian Snell struck out to end the sixth with runners at second and third. Hudson, bothered by a respiratory bug going through the Braves clubhouse, was lifted after his final escape act. He gave up eight hits, walked two and threw 93 pitches. Snell gave up only three baserunners through the first five innings, but the Braves made their hits count. In the fourth, Jones homered over the center-field wall to cut the Pirates' lead to 2-1. Adam LaRoche went deep the next inning, driving it over the right-field wall to bring the Braves within 3-2. After Pittsburgh made it 4-2 in the sixth on Castillo's sacrifice fly, Atlanta knocked out Snell in the bottom half. Brian McCann, mired in an 0-for-11 slump, went the opposite way for a two-out, run-scoring single. Free-swinging Jeff Francoeur loaded the bases by working hard for a rare walk, fouling off two straight 3-2 pitches before taking ball four. Copyright 2006 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.