Sedona Red Recap: Ahmed’s power surge not enough as D-backs fall to Pirates

PHOENIX — The Arizona Diamondbacks rode a three-game winning streak into Saturday night’s meeting with the Pittsburgh Pirates, doing so thanks in large part to a 20-run outburst over that trio of contests.

The bats weren’t nearly as hot on Saturday though. Well, except for Nick Ahmed, that is.

Ahmed and Paul Goldschmidt each delivered home runs. In fact, Ahmed left the yard twice, but all three longballs were of the solo variety, and nobody else managed to score for the D-backs. Despite making a push in the ninth, they fell by a final of 4-3 in front of 31,673 fans at Chase Field.

Without their typical offensive output, Arizona needed some strong defensive play in the field. It didn’t happen though, as a pair of errors led to two runs for the Pirates.

Looking for his first win of May, Taijuan Walker surrendered four runs – three earned – over 6.0 innings. He struck out just three while allowing eight hits, and exited in the seventh with his club trailing 4-1.

Goldschmidt trimmed that deficit to 4-2 in the eighth, and Ahmed made things even more interesting by making it 4-3 in the ninth. Meanwhile, the bullpen came through for the Diamondbacks again. But still, it wasn’t enough.

With the loss, Arizona drops to 21-17 overall in 2017 and 15-7 at home.

THE GOOD

-Brandon Drury made a nice play on a sharply hit ball off the bat of Gregory Polanco in the first. With Andrew McCutchen on second, Drury was able to grab the ball in shallow right field and fire to first in time to end the inning and probably save a run.

-Ahmed got the scoring started in the second by putting his third home run of the season over the left field wall. His fourth went to right field, and came in the ninth inning.

-Once again, the D-backs’ bullpen got the job done, tossing three more scoreless innings. Arizona relievers now have a combined 1.41 ERA over the last dozen games.

-Goldschmidt launched his eighth homerun of the season in the eighth inning, depositing a Gift Ngoepe pitch into the right field seats.

-Drury has now reached base safely in 32 of his last 33 games at Chase Field.

THE BAD

-The Pirates took the lead in the fourth when Drury was handcuffed on a grounder that bounced up and caught him on the heel of the glove. Instead of ending the inning with a throw to first, he had to retrieve the ball while David Freese scored from third.

-Josh Harrison led off the top of the fifth with a double that actually landed him on third, courtesy of a throwing error by Gregor Blanco in center field. He immediately came around to score on a double by McCutchen, who was up next.

-Following a Jeff Mathis double in the second, 13 consecutive Arizona hitters were retired. Jake Lamb finally ended that slump with a walk in the sixth, but was promptly doubled off when Yasmany Tomas lined out to third just one batter later.

-The Diamondbacks squandered a shot at a rally in the seventh, when they put runners on first and third with just one out, but pinch-hitters Chris Owings and A.J. Pollock each popped out in foul territory to end the inning without a run.

STAT OF THE GAME

2: Number of homeruns by Ahmed tonight – his first career multi-homer game. To put that in perspective, he hit four over the wall all of last season.

HE SAID IT

“Just unfortunate that we came up a little short. I think we ran out of time. Had we played another inning or two, I felt like we would have caught up to them.” – Torey Lovullo

NOTED

-Prior to the game, the team announced that catcher Chris Iannetta had received stitches in his upper lip and suffered a couple of fractured teeth and a nose fracture after being hit in the face with a pitch during Friday night’s contest.

UP NEXT

These two clubs will meet again at Chase Field on Sunday. First pitch is set for 1:10 p.m., with pregame coverage beginning at 12:30 p.m. on 98.7 FM, Arizona’s Sports Station.

Robbie Ray (2-3) will take the mound for Arizona, looking to get back on track after a rough outing against Detroit on May 9. The big lefty surrendered five runs over just 5.0 innings in that one, but has been pretty effective in the majority of his starts this year.

Ray is currently tied for fourth in the NL with 57 strikeouts. He has struggled in four career starts against the Pirates though, going 0-2 with a 7.71 ERA.

Pittsburgh will counter with Ivan Nova (3-3), who is enjoying arguably the best season of his career. The 30-year old righty was dealt from the Yankees to the Pirates last season, and finished out the year by going 5-2 with a 3.06 ERA. And he’s performed even better in 2017, boasting a minuscule 2.23 ERA and 0.95 WHIP in seven starts.

Nova is 1-0 with a 3.60 ERA in his only career start against Arizona.

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