Aaron Civale logged six scoreless innings as the Milwaukee Brewers downed the host Pittsburgh Pirates 5-2 on Thursday afternoon in the rubber match of a three-game series.
Civale (8-9) yielded three hits while walking one and striking out five. He is 6-1 with a 2.57 ERA over his past nine starts.
Joey Ortiz went 3-for-3 with an RBI and a run and Brice Turang finished with two RBIs for Milwaukee (91-68), which is one victory away from matching its win total from a season ago.
Devin Williams worked around a double in the ninth to notch his 14th save of the year.
Bryan De La Cruz clubbed a two-run homer as Pittsburgh (74-85) fell for the ninth time in its past 13 games.
Mitch Keller (11-12) got the start for the Pirates and lasted five innings. He gave up three runs on six hits, walking two and fanning six.
Sal Frelick doubled to open the fifth, advanced to third on a sacrifice bunt from Ortiz and scored on a double by Eric Haase to put the Brewers up 2-0. Turang followed with an RBI single.
Run-scoring doubles by Blake Perkins and Ortiz made it 5-0 an inning later.
Nick Mears took over on the mound for Civale at the start of the home seventh. Making his first appearance since Aug. 22, Mears issued a leadoff walk to Nick Gonzales before De La Cruz sent a high fastball over the wall in right for his 21st home run of the season.
Milwaukee opened the scoring in the third when Ortiz scored on Turang’s groundout.
It was a brutal day on the basepaths for Pittsburgh center fielder Oneil Cruz, who was picked off first to end the third inning before another blunder in the eighth.
Cruz was at first with one out when Andrew McCutchen grounded out to short. He moved up to second on the play and overran the bag, seemingly under the impression that the frame was over. Brewers first baseman Rhys Hoskins noticed that Cruz was in no man’s land and fired to second to nab him, completing an inning-ending double play.