While the Pittsburgh Pirates were losing for the 14th time in 20 games this month, there were brief moments of encouragement Saturday.

• Michael Perez hit a home run to stop an 0-for-26 streak. It only raised his batting average to .096, but it was something.

• Relief pitcher Chris Stratton put together his eighth consecutive scoreless inning.

• Starting and losing pitcher Mitch Keller “felt really good with all my pitches.”

But none of it was nearly enough to prevent the Braves from dominating the Pirates (18-27) for the second day in a row, this time 6-1 before a crowd of 40,078 at Truist Park. The Braves (22-24) have outscored the Pirates, 26-2, the past two games and have hit 12 home runs in the first three games of the series (three Saturday), giving them a MLB-high 75 for the season.

“Yeah, the Braves are red hot,” manager Derek Shelton said.

And the Pirates are just the opposite, managing just seven singles to back up Perez’s home run. They have scored two or fewer runs in 13 of the 20 games in May.

“I think the big thing is we need to bunch together hits, and we have not,” Shelton said. “I think we’ve gotten away from our approach at times and been a little too aggressive, and when you do that, you put yourself into bad counts or weak contact.”

One of the singles quickly turned into the first out of the game when Adam Frazier, who is hitting .337, tried to stretch a single to short left field into a double. He was thrown out.

“I trust Fraz in that respect,” Shelton said. “They made a good play. On the other side of that, because we haven’t been scoring runs, sometimes we have to be a little aggressive and try to get ourselves some runners in scoring position. They made a good play. They made a good baseball play.”

In the bottom of the first inning, Ronald Acuna Jr. jumped on Keller’s first pitch — a fastball down the middle — and drove it into the left-field seats 404 feet away at 108.5 mph. It was his major league-leading 15th home run.

“Just trying to get ahead, strike one,” said Keller (2-6), whose ERA rose to 7.41. “Acuna is a good hitter, and he’s shown in the past that he takes the first pitch for homers. Hats off to him.”

Ozzie Albies homered twice, once against Keller and once off reliever Sam Howard. Overall, Keller allowed eight hits, one short of his season high, and five runs in five innings.

“I though (Keller) executed some pitches,” Shelton said. “But you have to execute a lot of pitches to this group, and we left balls in the middle (of the plate) and they got hit out of the ballpark.”

“I think it just comes down to two or three pitches that I missed, locations,” Keller said, “and they took advantage of it.”

The good news is Stratton is among six Pirates relievers whose ERAs are 3.52 or lower.

“He continues to execute pitches to both sides of the plate and up and down,” Shelton said. “His breaking ball has been really good.”

Stratton said he has been less predictable in recent outings.

“Leaning too much on just fastball, curveball. Now, with the ability to throw the slider and changeup, even to righties, (it) opened the door for me,” he said. “Going after people, not messing around, trying to get outs.

“I’m throwing the curveball for strikes, and the changeup’s been able to play off the slider, as well. If you come out of the bullpen and you’re throwing four pitches for strikes, it just has to be challenging as a hitter to be able to sit on anything. It’s tough to keep them all sharp, but at the end of the day, if one’s not there, you still have three more to work with.”

Perez was encouraged by the home run.

“We weren’t able to walk out with the victory,” he said through interpreter Mike Gonzalez, “but anytime you’re struggling or not struggling and you’re able to hit the ball out of the ballpark, it feels good.”

Perez flied out and struck out twice in his final three at-bats, including a strikeout to end seventh inning when the Pirates had two runners on base and were trailing 5-1.

Perez was filling in for Jacob Stallings, who missed two games this week with a left knee contusion but played Thursday and Friday.

“He’s still a little banged up,” Shelton said, “and then (Friday) night catching didn’t help him. I mean, he’s fine. He’ll catch (Sunday) and then we have the off-day (Monday).”

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