CINCINNATI _ Homers help erase mistakes. They create breathing room, widen margin for error. Thus far this season the Pirates haven't had that luxury. Friday night, the perfect combination of team and ballpark afforded it to them.
The Cincinnati Reds' pitching staff has improved in the second half of the season _ although there really was nowhere to go but up _ but still is among the worst in baseball. Entering Friday's game, they had allowed 234 home runs, only seven shy of the major league record set by the 1996 Detroit Tigers. The cramped quarters at Great American Ball Park exacerbate matters.
Punctuated by a five-homer outburst Thursday in Philadelphia, another good locale for the long ball, the Pirates had homered in three consecutive games entering Friday. Two-run home runs, from Gregory Polanco and Jung Ho Kang, papered over two lost leads and a defensive mistake to help the Pirates beat the Reds, 9-7, in 10 innings.
The Pirates (72-74) pulled even with power. They won with small ball.
Kang worked a leadoff walk against Tony Cingrani in the 10th. He reached base for the fifth time in the game: Two walks, two hit-by-pitches and the homer.
Sean Rodriguez hit an infield single. Francisco Cervelli dropped a bunt that he beat out, loading the bases. Jordy Mercer and David Freese contributed RBI singles.
Polanco hit .287 with a .362 on-base percentage and a .500 slugging percentage prior to the All-Star break. The second half has been less kind: .227/.273/.449, with 12 walks and 38 strikeouts before Friday's game.
"They're not throwing him the same pitches," manager Clint Hurdle said before the game. "... You're not going to keep getting pitches you splatter."
Pitches to hit while ahead in the count, up and out over the plate, and down and in became scarcer. Somehow, Robert Stephenson gave him one. The Reds starter fell behind 2-1, then left a changeup over the middle that Polanco lined out to right field. His 22nd homer gave the Pirates a 3-0, first-inning lead.
Ryan Vogelsong would give that back, as he would a 4-3 lead in the fifth. Trailing 6-4 in the seventh, Kang got ahead of Blake Wood, 2-0, with Polanco on first. Wood worked backward, throwing a 91-mph slider. Kang drove it off the batter's eye in center field. His 19th homer of the season tied the game at 6.
Before Friday's game, the Pirates ranked 12th in the NL with 138 home runs, better than only San Francisco, Miami and Atlanta.
In the first five starts after joining the rotation in early August, Vogelsong had a 2.48 ERA and 23 strikeouts in 29 innings. In his past four, he has a 10.19 ERA (20 earned runs and 26 hits in 172/3 innings) with nine walks and nine strikeouts.
