ATLANTA _ The Braves are going to miss Freddie Freeman for the next two or three months, but at least they got a big dude with serious power to pick up some of the slack while Freeman is out.
Matt "Big City" Adams gave the Braves and their fans a glimpse of what he can do with a mammoth two-run homer Monday night in his second game with the Braves, as he and Brandon Phillips powered Atlanta to a 5-2 win against the Pirates in a rainy series opener at SunTrust Park.
Ender Inciarte had a career-high five hits for the Braves, who've won eight of 11 games including three of five since Freeman fractured his left wrist.
Mike Foltynewicz (3-4) gave up eight hits and two walks in five innings but limited the Pirates to two runs (one earned), while Pirates ace Gerrit Cole gave up five runs and a season-high 10 hits in a season-low 4 2/3 innings, including two-out home runs by Phillips in the third inning and Adams in the fifth.
Two days after beating the Nationals and reigning Cy Young Award winner Max Scherzer, the Braves won for the first time in Cole's six career starts against them. Inciarte had three hits against Cole and finished with five singles in five plate appearances, raising his average from .258 to .279.
Cole had a 1.96 ERA in his past seven starts before Friday, allowing two earned runs or fewer in each. He'd given up two homers in his past five starts.
Phillips put the Braves ahead 2-1 with a long bases-empty homer in the second inning, the 200th of his career to make him the 48th player in major league history with at least 200 homers and 200 stolen bases. The 35-year-old second baseman has three homers and eight steals in 38 games in his first season with the Braves.
But the biggest swing of the night came from newcomer Adams, whose two-run homer in the fifth pushed the lead to 5-1 and showed why the Braves pursued him immediately after learning how bad Freeman was injured.
Inciarte and Phillips hit back-to-back singles to start the fifth inning before Nick Markakis hit a sharp grounder to third base that was ruled an error, bringing in a run for a 3-1 lead. After Matt Kemp grounded into a double play, Adams turned a Cole hanger into a two-run banger.
It was a Freeman-esque drive off Cole, who hung a 1-and-2 breaking ball that Adams squared up, pulling it to the standing area in front of Chop House above the right-field seats.
The Braves got Adams in a Saturday trade from the Cardinals, and the homer was his second of the season and second at SunTrust Park. He homered off Julio Teheran on May 6 in the last game that Adams started for the Cardinals, who used him as a pinch-hitter and backup outfielder since Matt Carpenter was moved to first base this season.
Adams is a large man, hence his nickname "Big City," and with one swing the left-handed hitter showed power that enabled him to hit 15 or more home runs for the Cardinals in each of the three seasons in which he got at least 300 plate appearances, including 16 homers in 297 at-bats in 2016.
The Pirates took a 1-0 lead in the third inning on a throwing error by Braves shortstop Dansby Swanson, who didn't have to wait long to get some redemption.
Swanson led off the bottom of the third with a double off the base of the center-field wall, then scored the tying run on Inciarte's one-out single. Inciarte was out trying to stretch the single to a double and Phillips followed with his third homer of the season.
Pirates third baseman David Freese and manager Clint Hurdle were thrown out of the game by home-plate umpire Phil Cuzzi in the fourth inning, Freese for arguing after a called third strike went against him and Hurdle for coming out to defend his player and getting into an animated discussion with Cuzzi.
