Oneil Cruz hit a walk-off single into the right field corner in the bottom of the 10th inning to give the Pittsburgh Pirates a 5-4 win against the visiting St. Louis Cardinals on Wednesday night.
Reliever Andrew Kittredge (1-4) started the 10th with a 4-3 lead for the Cardinals, but he walked Andrew McCutchen with one out before being replaced by JoJo Romero.
Bryan Reynolds tied the game with a run-scoring single against Romero ahead of Cruz’s heroics.
Rowdy Tellez had three hits, including a solo home run, and scored twice for the Pirates, who had lost three of their past four.
Pirates rookie right-hander Jared Jones allowed one run and four hits over five innings. He struck out five and walked two on 78 pitches.
Willson Contreras hit a game-tying two-run homer in the eighth and Masyn Winn had three hits and an RBI for his third straight multi-hit game for the Cardinals, who had won three of their past four.
St. Louis starter Miles Mikolas allowed two runs and five hits in six innings. He struck out four and did not walk a batter.
Kyle Nicolas and Carmen Mlodzinski each threw a scoreless inning of relief for Pittsburgh before Colin Holderman started the eighth with a 3-1 lead.
Holderman got the first out of the frame before Alec Burleson singled and Contreras lined the first pitch he saw over the fence in center to tie it 3-3.
Dylan Carlson was the automatic runner on second base for the Cardinals to start the 10th against veteran left-hander Aroldis Chapman (1-3).
Winn hit a slow-roller to the right side and Chapman did not cover first, putting runners on the corners with no outs. Burleson followed with a sacrifice fly to give St. Louis a 4-3 lead.
The teams traded runs in their respective halves of the fifth, with Winn hitting an RBI single in the top of the inning and Ke’Bryan Hayes bringing home a run with a groundout in the bottom of the frame.
Joey Bart then made it 2-1 Pittsburgh later in the fifth with a sacrifice fly, and Tellez smacked his homer in the seventh.
–Field Level Media