Pirates waste Wil Crowe's strong start, get swept by Brewers for 7th straight loss

Wil Crowe was cruising through the Milwaukee Brewers lineup, retiring 15 consecutive batters in the first five innings when the Pittsburgh Pirates right-hander took the mound for the sixth.

Tim Lopes fouled off five pitches before drawing a 10-pitch walk, putting the tying run on base for the Brewers. That’s when Pirates manager Derek Shelton decided to replace Crowe with reliever David Bednar, a sign of confidence in the back end of the bullpen.

That move backfired when Luis Urias hit a tying triple and Avisail Garcia followed with a two-run homer to lead the Brewers to a 5-2 win on Sunday afternoon at American Family Field in Milwaukee.

The Brewers (38-27) remained in first place in the NL Central with a three-game sweep of the Pirates (23-41), who extended their losing streak to a season-high seven games.

“I mean, I was good to go. But everyone knows our bullpen is incredible. We’re trying to win a ballgame,” said Crowe, who threw 82 pitches in five innings, allowing two runs on two hits and one walk with eight strikeouts. “I knew that Bednar was going to get out of it. I had all the confidence in him, and so did Shelty. That’s why he brings him in in that situation, even though it didn’t go our way.”

Crowe got off to a slow start, as the Brewers took a 1-0 lead in the first inning when Urias hit a leadoff single and scored from first on Daniel Vogelbach’s double to the center-field wall. Shelton credited Crowe for making adjustments, speeding up his tempo and showing strong fastball command to balance his other pitches.

“His slider was really good, and the fastball was really jumping out of his hand … and he threw some really good changeups,” Pirates catcher Jacob Stallings said of Crowe, who was acquired from Washington in the Josh Bell trade. “I thought he looked good and maybe just overall command was better than the previous two (starts). He was really throwing the ball well and gave us a chance and got pretty deep into the game.”

The Pirates tied it in the second on Kevin Newman’s bases-loaded fielder’s choice that scored Colin Moran. In the sixth, Phillip Evans lined into a double play on a hit-and-run, costing the Pirates a run when Jacob Stallings followed by hitting the first pitch he saw for his fifth home run, a 392-foot shot off Houser for a 2-1 lead in the sixth.

“I wasn’t sitting breaking ball or anything,” Stallings said. “I just kind of reacted to it. Obviously, hit it well. And thank goodness (Brewers center fielder) Jackie Bradley didn’t do what Jackie Bradley does and rob me.”

Brent Suter (8-3) replaced Houser and walked Gregory Polanco, gave up a double to Ben Gamel (3 for 4) and intentionally walked Newman to load the bases with two outs. Shelton kept Crowe in to bat — he grounded into an inning-ending fielder’s choice — only to pull the pitcher after walking Flores to start the sixth. The Brewers took a 4-2 lead when Bednar (0-1) left a pair of pitches over the middle of the plate to Urias and Garcia.

“When you leave balls in the middle of the plate in the big leagues, they’re gonna get hit,” Shelton said. “Both of ‘em got it.”

The Brewers added another run in the seventh, when Shelton sent in lefty reliever Sam Howard in anticipation that Brewers star Christian Yelich would pinch hit for the pitcher despite a .200 batting average (5 for 25) against lefties. After Manny Pina doubled off Howard, Yelich lined a sacrifice fly to right field to score Pina for a 5-2 lead.

“We wanted that matchup,” Shelton said. “You have Christian Yelich on the bench. You have that weapon, you fire the weapon.”

The Brewers turned to their weapons in the bullpen, as Brad Boxberger, Devin Williams and Josh Hader combined to throw three scoreless innings, with Hader earning his 17th save by striking out Ke’Bryan Hayes and Bryan Reynolds to end the game with Adam Frazier on first.

Despite getting 10 hits against the Brewers, the Pirates went 1 for 7 with runners in scoring position and stranded 10 base runners. They finally got a strong start from Crowe, only for the hitters to come up short.

“We had opportunities and left people on base,” Shelton said. “We left too many guys on base.”