CINCINNATI — The infielders were drawn in, anticipating a play at home plate, when the baseball blasted off Billy Hamilton’s bat. Hamilton, the lightning-quick Cincinnati Reds leadoff hitter, connected with right-hander Jameson Taillon’s first-pitch fastball and sent it sailing into the Pirates bullpen at Great American Ball Park for a three-run home run.
Hamilton might have been forgiven if he had stood still and savored the shot. He did not. The most unexpected rocket in a 7-2 Reds win Wednesday was Hamilton’s first home run since June 28, and it ended the third-longest active homer-less streak in the majors at 319 at-bats.
Though this was Hamilton’s first home run in 60 games against the Pirates, he has been a nuisance — primarily on the base paths — for years. A .245 career hitter, Hamilton has batted .313 against the Pirates. He won Monday’s game with a walk-off, 10th-inning double.
“He continues to be more than a rock in our shoe,” manager Clint Hurdle said.
The Reds (13-14) hammered three home runs. The two off Taillon, who allowed a career-high six runs in five innings, were of the three-run variety. Eugenio Suarez reached down and yanked a low changeup into the left-field seats in the first, and Hamilton homered in the fourth.
“They say solo home runs don't beat you,” Taillon said, “but two- and three-run home runs do.”
Devin Mesoraco, the Reds catcher, added a solo shot off reliever Trevor Williams in the sixth. It was a night to snap streaks; Mesoraco hadn’t homered in 117 at-bats since Sept. 23, 2014.
For Taillon (2-1), it was one of the poorest results of his major league career. He invited traffic. He gave up eight hits, walked a batter and hit another. Taillon’s ERA rose from 2.08 to 3.31.
Taillon felt he had good stuff — “You only get a handful of nights here where you feel that good and crisp and clean,” he said — but overall was not sharp, especially in put-away situations with two strikes or two outs. The Suarez smash was with two outs. Hamilton’s home run was on an inside fastball that ran up in the zone. In the past, Taillon had seen the many dangers the speedy Hamilton represented; he had not before seen this sort of pop from Hamilton.
"Not surprising he was trying to jump on the first fastball he saw,” Taillon said. “It worked out.”
The Pirates (12-15) were punchless against Reds right-hander Rookie Davis, who entered the game with an 11.17 ERA this season. Unable to pitch past the fourth inning in three previous starts this season, Davis threw five scoreless innings Wednesday. He allowed four hits, walked three, hit one batter and managed to strand eight runners over his middle three innings.
“He really had to work for it,” Reds manager Bryan Price said. “Nothing has come easy for him. The Pirates don’t go away.”
The stranded runners might say more about the Pirates hitters than it does about Davis’ Houdini-like escapability. The Pirates loaded the bases in the second before Gift Ngoepe struck out and Taillon struck a grounder to shortstop. In the third, they had runners on second and third when Josh Bell popped out. The bases filled again in the fourth. John Jaso struck out swinging.
“Couldn’t pull the trigger at the right time,” Bell said.
“Those are innings where if they get out of hand you go, man, what could have been …’ ” Price added.
The Pirates were 0 for 7 with runners in scoring position, and they left 10 runners on base.
“The difference of the game is that number at the end of the box score: 10,” Hurdle said. “They hit a couple homers with men on base. We had three shots at doing something in those middle innings, and we weren’t able to do it. That put us in a bad spot.”
The Pirates managed just five hits. Their only offense was Andrew McCutchen’s two-run home run in the seventh, which ended the shutout bid but failed to jumpstart a full-scale comeback effort. The moonshot, measuring 432 feet, was McCutchen’s fifth home run this season.
The previous night, the Pirates fell behind on a three-run, first-inning homer but roared to life for a 12-3 win. On Wednesday, Bell remarked, “it was silence.” He corrected himself. Not complete silence. “Cutch got into that one,” Bell said. “So just ride that into [Thursday] and hopefully do the same thing.”
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