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PrintMILWAUKEE -- The Pirates made Milwaukee mighty nervous -- the city and its baseball team -- but Prince Fielder's monster, two-run home run in the bottom of the ninth inning lifted the Brewers to a stirring 7-5 victory tonight before a delirious crowd of 36,612 at Miller Park and allowed all concerned here to exhale for another day.
The New York Mets, the team the Brewers are chasing for the National League wild card, beat the Chicago Cubs, 6-2, at Shea Stadium, but the Brewers remained a game behind. Had it been two, with five games remaining, that might have been too much.
The Pirates this month already quashed the St. Louis Cardinals' playoff hopes with that three-game sweep two weekends ago, then pretty much did the same to the Houston Astros just by taking just one of three this past weekend.
But not this time, against an opponent that now has taken 12 of 13 meetings.
T.J. Beam took the mound for the ninth and quickly retired his first two batters, but Ryan Braun's roller up the middle was muffed by Freddy Sanchez, though ruled a single. Beam then fell behind Fielder, 2-0, and placed on a platter a meaty curveball that was launched deep beyond right-center field for his 34th home run, the second walkoff of his career.
Jeff Karstens, who lost all six starts after those first two terrific showings, rediscovered some of that form in time for his season finale: He was charged with two unearned runs on five hits over six-plus innings, with six strikeouts and one walk.
But that walk came to lead off the seventh, to Craig Counsell, and the Pirates blinked with a 3-2 lead: Manager John Russell replaced Karstens with rookie Jesse Chavez, and that would prove to be an enormously unproductive decision.
Counsell took second on a sacrifice, then third on pinch-hitter Mike Lamb's single. Next was Mike Cameron, who quickly fell behind, 0-2, including one ugly swing at a ball outside and in the dirt. Chavez wasted one, then came at Cameron with a hanging slider that Cameron rifled into the left-field corner for a two-run double that put Milwaukee ahead, 4-3.
There was one more critical hanging slider to come, though.
Just as the buzz began to settle in the top of the eighth, Doug Mientkiewicz drew a four-pitch walk off fresh reliever Guillermo Mota. Steve Pearce then destroyed a one-strike slider, sending it high and well past the bullpens beyond left-center.
It was his second home run, and the Pirates were back ahead.
But Pearce gave it right back.
With John Grabow pitching in the bottom half, a man at second and two outs, Pearce got a poor break on Jason Kendall's slicer into the right corner, where it landed for an RBI double and a 5-5 tie.
Milwaukee was handed two unearned runs in the first inning.
Cameron's looping liner into left clanked off Nyjer Morgan's glove for an error. After an out, Ryan Braun's drive to deep left-center drew a diving attempt by McLouth, but he did not come close, and it caromed off the angled fence back toward right field.
McLouth had to bounce back up and reverse course about 40 feet to collect the ball, then missed both cutoff men with an off-balance, hurried, sidearm fling, allowing Braun to come all the way around and to put the Brewers up, 2-0.
It was ruled a triple and error, perhaps because Milwaukee third base coach Garth Iorg put up a stop sign for Braun before the throw.
McLouth, who fielded his first 363 chances cleanly, was one of two center fielders in Major League Baseball with 100-plus starts to be error-free, along with the Los Angeles Angels' brilliant Torii Hunter. Because of that, McLouth is widely considered a Gold Glove candidate, and this error probably will not affect that, as most voting is believed to be complete.
Morgan atoned in the Pirates' next at-bat, with a two-out, bases-loaded poke into center that tied the score. Freddy Sanchez's follow-up single brought a 3-2 lead.
Zach Duke draws CC Sabathia tonight.
