Field Level Media
May 24, 2018
Eugenio Suarez hit his third career grand slam and Jesse Winker added a solo homer Thursday as the Cincinnati Reds hung on to top the visiting Pittsburgh Pirates 5-4.
Cincinnati's Brandon Dixon was 3-for-4 with two singles and a double, his first three major league hits.
The Reds have won two straight and took the series after the teams split the first two games.
Pittsburgh has lost five of its past six games.
Reds starter Luis Castillo (4-4) gave up two runs and four hits in six innings, with five strikeouts and two walks. He is 3-1 in five May starts.
Reliever Jared Hughes got the final two outs for his second save.
Pittsburgh starter Ivan Nova (2-5) allowed five runs, four of them earned, and seven hits in 5 1/3 innings, with four strikeouts and two walks. He has not won since April 15, going 0-4 with three no-decisions in that span.
Nova had a rough third inning.
After giving up just eight walks in 56 1/3 innings entering the game, he walked his counterpart Castillo on five pitches to begin the third. Winker followed with a base hit, moving Castillo to second.
An out later, Nova loaded the bases with a throwing error -- his third, the most among National League pitchers -- on Scooter Gennett's grounder. That set up Suarez, who hit a 2-2 hanging curveball into the stands in left for his eighth homer and a 4-0 Reds lead. Suarez is among the NL leaders with 38 RBIs.
Winker led off the fifth with his first homer of the season, to left-center, to make it 5-0.
In the sixth, Adam Frazier walked with one out for the Pirates, and David Freese followed with his fourth homer to cut the lead to 5-2.
In the ninth, Corey Dickerson opened with an infield hit for the Pirates. After Jose Osuna struck out, rookie Austin Meadows hit his third homer to close the gap to 5-4, chasing reliever Amir Garrett.
--Field Level Media