ST. LOUIS (AP) – Paul Goldschmidt hit a tiebreaking single in the eighth inning and Marcell Ozuna followed with a two-run homer, and the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 6-2 on Friday night.
Goldschmidt’s single went under the glove of Pirates shortstop Kevin Newman, scoring Dexter Fowler to break a 2-all tie. Five pitches later, Ozuna drove a 99 mph fastball from Richard Rodriguez (3-5) into the left-field bullpen for his second homer in two games. The Cardinals tacked on an extra run when Paul DeJong reached on an error by Jose Osuna and scored on Matt Carpenter’s sacrifice fly.
The rally made a winner out of Carlos Martinez (3-2), who pitched the final 1 1/3 innings as the Cardinals snapped a five-game losing streak.
Cardinals starter Dakota Hudson threw a season-low 49 pitches through four innings. He gave up two runs on six hits and didn’t walk or strikeout anyone.
Tyler Webb, John Brebbia and Andrew Miller pitched 3 2/3 innings of scoreless relief to bridge the game to Martinez.
The Pirates lost their sixth straight and are 4-22 since the All-Star break.
Josh Bell doubled and scored on sacrifice flies by Osuna in the second and Colin Moran in the fourth for the Pirates’ two runs.
The first three Cardinals batters of the game singled to load the bases, but Pirates starter Chris Archer escaped the jam with only one run allowed by getting Ozuna to ground into a double play and striking out DeJong.
St. Louis tied the game at 2 in the fourth when Matt Wieters legged out an infield hit to score Carpenter.
Archer gave up two runs on seven hits in six innings. His nine strikeouts were one shy of his season-best.
