Pittsburgh Pirates vs Atlanta Braves Match Player Stats On May 22, 2021

Atlanta's Ronald Acuna Jr. led off with a home run and Ozzie Albies went deep from both sides of the plate to send the Braves to a 6-1 win over the visiting Pittsburgh Pirates on Saturday.

Acuna set the tone when he connected on the first pitch from Pittsburgh starter Mitch Keller for his major league-leading 15th home run. It was his third leadoff homer of the season and 22nd of his career. Acuna has homered in three of the last four games.

Albies homered from the left side in the fifth inning, then from the right side in the seventh inning, giving him nine homers this season. It was the sixth multi-home run game of his career and the second time he's homered from both sides of the plate, the other coming July 11, 2018, against Toronto. It's only the 14th time a player has gone deep from each side in franchise history.

Atlanta starter Bryse Wilson (2-2) pitched 6 2/3 strong innings and allowed one run on five hits, two walks and four strikeouts. The right-hander has combined to allow just three runs in 12 2/3 innings in his last two starts.

Keller (2-6) suffered his third straight loss. He pitched five innings and allowed five runs on eight hits, one walk and six strikeouts.

Following Acuna's home run, the Braves added another run to take a 2-0 lead on Austin Riley's RBI single. Atlanta scored another run in the second on Freddie Freeman's run-scoring single.

The Pirates cut the lead to 3-1 in the third inning when Michael Perez hit a solo homer to right. The homer, his second, ended an 0-for-26 skid for the catcher.

Albies hit a two-run homer off Keller in the fifth and a solo shot off Sam Howard in the seventh.

Pittsburgh managed only seven hits, one of them by Adam Frazier, who went 1-for-4 to extend his hitting streak to eight games.

Three Braves had two hits apiece -- Freeman, Albies and Riley, who extended his hitting streak to seven games.

The Braves have outscored the Pirates 26-2 over the first two games of the series, which concludes Sunday.

--Field Level Media