Brewers hammer Derek Holland for 3 home runs in pummeling Pirates

It was a hit-or-miss night for Derek Holland, kind of like his season.

The Pittsburgh Pirates left-hander got off to a fast start by getting the Milwaukee Brewers swinging in recording a career-high seven strikeouts through the first three innings, including three looking.

What spelled trouble, however, was when the Brewers made contact.

Jedd Gyorko, Ryan Braun and Jacob Nottingham hit home runs as the Brewers beat the Pirates, 9-1, on Friday night at Miller Park. Holland allowed as many runs (eight) as he had strikeouts, and Gyorko hit a second solo homer off reliever Nick Mears in the seventh.

“We just didn’t finish at-bats,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said. “He did a good job getting to two strikes then left balls in the middle of the plate, then they hit ‘em hard and obviously hit some of them out of the ballpark.”

The Pirates had no such luck against Brewers starter Corbin Burnes, who struck out 10 in six scoreless innings, allowing three hits and one walk. Burnes became the sixth pitcher to record double-digit strikeouts against the Pirates this season, joining Milwaukee’s Brandon Woodruff (10), Tyler Chatwood of the Chicago Cubs (11), Cincinnati’s Sonny Gray (10), Cleveland’s Shane Bieber (11) and Lucas Giolito (13) of the Chicago White Sox.

“The velocity really maintained, and I thought the cutter was better than last time – and I thought last time the cutter was pretty good,” Shelton said. “But (Friday night), it was really good. He executed it to both sides of the plate. He was able to run it in off the left-handers, and the fastball velocity just maintained and he was able to locate it.”

The Pirates scored their run on JT Riddle’s 417-foot homer to right off reliever David Phelps in the seventh inning. It was quite the difference from Holland’s previous start, a 12-5 victory over the Brewers on Aug. 22 at PNC Park. He also pitched two scoreless innings in relief in a 6-3 loss to the Cleveland Indians on Aug. 18. Before that, however, Holland was rocked for nine runs, including four home runs against the first five batters he faced, in an 11-5 loss to the Detroit Tigers on Aug. 8.

The loss snapped a two-game win streak for the Pirates (9-20), who swept a doubleheader at St. Louis on Thursday. This was the first of a four-game series in Milwaukee that concludes an eight-game road trip.

After striking out the first two batters on six pitches, Holland surrendered a 399-foot home run to left field by Gyorko on the seventh pitch as the Brewers took a 1-0 lead in the first inning.

Holland struck out three of the four batters in the second but hit Nottingham with a pitch to start the third, then gave up a double to Luis Urias. After striking out the next two batters, Holland served up a three-run, 394-foot shot to left by Braun for a 4-0 lead. It was Braun’s 800th career extra-base hit, his 75th against the Pirates.

Holland encountered more trouble in the fourth inning, when he walked Ben Gamel with two outs. Nottingham scorched a 1-1 sinker for a 436-foot shot with an exit velocity of 107.3 mph to make it 6-0.

The Brewers stretched their lead to 8-0 on a two-run double by Mark Mathias that scored Keston Hiura and Avisail Garcia, who both walked. Seven of their eight runs came with two outs and two strikes.

“It’s something that’s going to bother me,” Holland said. “We were right there. This is what we’ve been working for. We’ve been practicing this the whole time, putting guys away. Today was just one of those days where you got there and all of a sudden you couldn’t finish it. You weren’t getting the results that you wanted.

“Execution just wasn’t quite where it needed to be, but at the same time, what’s frustrating about it is you have such good stuff today and you’re attacking, you’re getting strikeouts, and all of a sudden you run into something like that and you can’t get that out. Once you got two outs, it’s like, we didn’t get the third out. That’s what’s frustrating the most is I hurt our guys by giving up these runs with two outs, not giving our team a chance to win by any means.”

The 10 homers Holland has allowed this season are tied for the most in the majors. It’s not a new problem. He surrendered 20 last season, including 17 with the San Francisco Giants before being traded to the Chicago Cubs.

After signing with the Pirates as a nonroster invitee to spring training, Holland won a spot in a starting rotation that has been plagued by injuries. But with right-handers Joe Musgrove and Mitch Keller soon to return from the injured list, Holland could be a candidate to be traded by Monday’s MLB deadline.

“My focus is here. I can’t worry about could I be traded or anything like that because then I’m definitely not going to be pitching the way I should be pitching,” Holland said. “I want to try to be the best that I can be to try and help these guys and do my job. Unfortunately, today was not the case. It was a big letdown.”