Marte’s ninth-inning homer lifts Pirates over Giants

Associated Press

PITTSBURGH

Starling Marte’s confidence can be an unwieldy weapon. There is nothing the Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder thinks he can’t do on a baseball diamond.

That mindset potentially cost the Pirates a valuable run on Saturday against the San Francisco Giants. A short time later, it won them the game.

Marte hit a solo home run off George Kontos into the sun-drenched bleachers in left field with two outs in the ninth inning, lifting the Pirates to a 3-2 victory on a brilliant afternoon that felt more like early October than late August.

“He’s an exciting player,” Pittsburgh manager Clint Hurdle said. “He sometimes tries to get some things done and make some things happen.”

Even when they don’t work out.

Marte’s second career walkoff came two innings after he was easily caught trying to steal third in a tie game. Jung Ho Kang’s second solo homer of the game shortly after Marte made his way back to the dugout erased some of the sting, sure, but then again Marte isn’t sure there was anything to apologize for.

“I’m going to keep doing it,” Marte said. “If they give me a base, I’m going to take it.”

Facing Kontos (2-2) in the ninth, Marte waited on a fastball and didn’t miss it to set a career high with his 16th homer of the season.

“I felt I was doing a good job of delivering my pitches, hitting my spots,” Kontos said. “But one pitch I didn’t execute as well I’d like and I think he was sitting on it and took advantage of it.”

Kang hit his 11th and 12th homers for the Pirates, who didn’t leave a runner on base. Mark Melancon (3-1) needed six pitches to get through the top of the ninth to set up Marte’s winner as the Pirates improved to 18-4 against the NL West this season. Pittsburgh’s bullpen has won 18 straight decisions, the longest streak in the majors since 1909.

“We were able to do some things we could play over and pitch over,” Hurdle said.

Having San Francisco starter Mike Leake take a relatively early exit helped.

Leake showed no ill effects from the left hamstring strain that landed him on the disabled list on Aug. 3. He allowed one hit — Kang’s lined shot to center in the fifth — and struck out six against one walk.

Giants manager Bruce Bochy, however, decided to pull Leake for pinch-hitter Kelby Tomlinson with one out in the seventh and the go ahead run on third even though Leake only needed 77 pitches to get 18 outs.

“He was done,” Bochy said. “It’d gone far enough. It had been a while since he last pitched.”

The move didn’t work out. Tomlinson lined out and Nori Aoki hit a grounder to end the threat. Pittsburgh starter Gerrit Cole, covering the bag, gave a fist pump as he collected the throw from Pedro Alvarez to finish off his best start in nearly a month.