Three Pittsburgh Homers Bury Cleveland, 7-1

Pittsburgh hit three home runs in a 7-1 demolition of Cleveland on Saturday, with Jacob Gonzalez, Esmerlyn Valdez, and Nick Gonzales each going deep. Gavin Williams struck out 11 and walked nobody, and still got tagged for five earned runs — that's the kind of afternoon that stings.

Pittsburgh wasted no time. In the second inning, Jacob Gonzalez launched a 428-foot shot to right, scoring Callihan and putting the Pirates up 2-0. Cleveland answered in the third when Travis Bazzana tripled to right to score Kwan, cutting the deficit to 2-1 and making it feel like a game. It wouldn't stay that way for long.

The sixth inning is where this one was decided. Esmerlyn Valdez crushed a two-run homer to right center — 373 feet — scoring Bryan Reynolds and pushing the lead to 4-1. That swing is where Cleveland's hopes effectively died: the home win probability dropped from 36% to 15% on that single swing of the bat. Before the inning was over, Nick Gonzales followed with his own shot to right center, 387 feet, making it 5-1. Two homers, back-to-back, in the same frame. The story of the night was Pittsburgh's power — three different hitters, three different pitchers' nightmares.

Jared Jones did his part on the mound, going 5.0 innings and punching out 9 while allowing just 1 earned run on 3 hits. Carmen Mlodzinski then locked it down with 3.0 scoreless innings — 2 hits, 0 walks, 2 strikeouts — and Isaac Mattson closed it out with a clean inning of his own. The Pittsburgh bullpen combined for 4.0 innings of shutout ball after Jones departed, which looks like a complete team effort from top to bottom. Cleveland's Gavin Williams was sharp in his own right — 11 strikeouts, zero walks in 6.0 innings — but the home run ball was his undoing, surrendering 5 earned runs on 7 hits. Reynolds was quietly excellent, going 2-for-4 with 2 runs scored without recording an RBI, while Brandon Lowe also went 2-for-4 and added a run in the eighth when Cleveland's reliever uncorked a wild pitch. Pittsburgh tacked on one more when O'Hearn hit a sacrifice fly to right, scoring Reynolds and capping the 7-1 final. This appears to be Pittsburgh operating at full throttle.