Rowdy Tellez hits 3-run homer to rally Brewers past Pirates

Steven Brault felt like he was back where he belonged: pitching for the Pittsburgh Pirates and at Milwaukee’s American Family Field.

After being sidelined since spring training, the Pirates left-hander hoped to help solidify the starting rotation when he made his first appearance of the season against the Brewers.

“It felt like being back home,” said Brault, who pitched at Milwaukee for the 11th time in his six-year MLB career. “I say that for, one, because I love pitching in the big leagues and, two, I feel like I’ve pitched in Milwaukee every other start in my career. I’ve done this a lot here. So it was really nice to be back. But, just in general, to be back against the best hitters in the world. This is a good lineup. So it was a good little test for the first start back.”

It was a test Brault passed but the bullpen failed.

Kyle Keller allowed two runners, and Chasen Shreve served up a three-run homer to pinch-hitter Rowdy Tellez in the seventh inning as the Brewers rallied for a 4-2 win Wednesday afternoon.

The Pirates had a 2-1 lead before things unraveled in the seventh, when Keller (0-1) retired the first two batters but blew an 0-2 count as Luis Urias drew an eight-pitch walk. Manny Pina followed by bouncing one off the glove of third baseman Ke’Bryan Hayes for a single, putting runners on first and second with two outs.

That’s when Pirates manager Derek Shelton turned to the lefty Shreve to face Tellez. Left-handed hitters were slugging .176 against Shreve, who hadn’t allowed a homer to a lefty all season. Shreve left a 90-mph four-seamer over the middle of the plate, and Tellez turned on it for a 423-foot blast to right.

“We got two outs, and kind of like the first night here, we just had trouble getting that third out and had trouble putting away hitters,” Pirates catcher Jacob Stallings said. “We got ahead on Urias, and then Pena hits a ball off the edge of Ke’Bryan’s glove and just barely out of the reach of Kevin (Newman). Just one of those things, but we just struggled to finish the inning, and obviously, that’s really important.”

After losing two in the three-game series to the Brewers (65-44), the Pirates (41-67) will travel to Cincinnati for a four-game series against the second-place Reds starting Thursday.

The Pirates reinstated Brault, who suffered a left lat strain in spring training, to the major-league roster after he made three rehabilitation starts at Triple-A Indianapolis. They optioned right-hander Max Kranick and transferred Chase De Jong from the 10-day injured list to the 60-day IL to make room on the 40-man roster.

It was Brault’s first major-league start since facing the Chicago Cubs last Sept. 22. He allowed one run on three hits and one walk with two strikeouts on 75 pitches in four innings.

“A lot of it was getting over that initial adrenaline rush of being back in the big leagues again. It’s been, gosh, five months or whatever that I’ve been out,” Brault said. “So, kind of settling in after that, just more consistent with the release point and everything and throwing it down the middle less. That definitely helps not giving up so many hard hit balls.”

The Pirates got off to a fast start by getting three hits in the first inning against Brewers starter Freddy Peralta, who hadn’t allowed more than five in a game this season. Hoy Park hit a leadoff single but was picked off at second in a strike-’em-out, throw-’em-out play. Bryan Reynolds and Ben Gamel followed with back-to-back singles but were stranded when John Nogowski grounded out to third.

“We got to two outs,” Shelton said, “and we didn’t get the two-out hit.”

Brault got out of a jam in the first inning, when Willy Adames drew a walk, reached second on an infield single by Eduardo Escobar and advanced to third on Avisail Garcia’s lineout to center. Brault got Tyrone Taylor to ground out to third to escape unscathed.

After a 1-2-3 second inning, Brault gave up a one-out double to Kolten Wong, who scored on Escobar’s single to right to give the Brewers a 1-0 lead in the third. Brault tossed a clean fourth, and Cody Ponce pitched two perfect innings as the Brewers didn’t reach base again until the seventh.

“I think he really settled in the last two or three innings and threw like he did at the end of last year and really did a good job of keeping them off-balance,” Stallings said. “I didn’t think he had his best stuff but … was able to get outs.”

The Pirates answered in the fourth, when Reynolds drew a leadoff walk and scored on a double to the left-center wall by Stallings to tie the score.

Newman hit a leadoff double in the fifth and reached third on a sacrifice bunt by Brault but was left stranded. Reynolds tripled to right in the sixth and scored on Nogowski’s sacrifice fly to center for a 2-1 lead. The Pirates got a sixth hit off Peralta on Wilmer Difo’s single.

Brent Suter (10-5) replaced Peralta in the seventh, only to give up a double to Park, intentionally walk Reynolds and throw a wild pitch that allowed the runners to advance to second and third. But he got Gamel for a called third strike on a full-count fastball to escape.

Devin Williams pitched the ninth for the Brewers to earn his first career save. After giving up a leadoff walk to Newman, Williams froze Hayes — who is 0 for his last 17 — on a changeup for a called third strike and got Park to pop out to third before facing pinch-hitter Gregory Polanco.

Polanco, who broke up a no-hitter and robbed the Brewers of a home run Tuesday night, worked a 3-0 count before going to a full count and striking out on a 98 mph fastball.

Afterward, Shelton was focused on blown lead. After trading relievers Austin Davis, Clay Holmes and Richard Rodriguez in separate deals last week, the bullpen is in flux and young pitchers are trying new roles.

“We’ve talked about opportunity, and it’s not only opportunity with guys coming to the big leagues. It’s opportunistic in terms of the role you pitch in,” Shelton said. “And one of the things that we have to find out about people is what roles they can pitch in, and because we have taken some people out of our bullpen, guys are going to get opportunities in different roles than they had.”