NL Recaps – Starling Marte, Burnett Star In Pirates Win Over Astros

Pittsburgh Pirates NewsHOUSTON – Maybe the Pittsburgh Pirates don’t need to trade for bat after all. Starling Marte homered on the very first pitch he saw in the major leagues and later added another hit in his debut to help the Pirates to defeat the Astros 5-3.  

Marte was called up yesterday from AAA and got the start in left field and hit leadoff for the Pirates. Clint Barmes and Garrett Jones also homered for the Pirates.

A.J Burnett turned in another solid performance allowing two runs in 7+ innings of work. Burnett struck out five and allowed four hits, on 103 pitches.

Joel Hanrahan came on the ninth to nail down his 30th save of the season. The Pirates improved their record to 56-42, but clearly, the night belonged to the rookie Starling Marte

Other National League Scores

Los Angeles 4 – St. Louis 7 Matt Holliday hit his 17th home run to back the pitching of Jake Westbrook.

New York – Arizona

Washington 8 – Milwaukee 2 – Edwin Jackson scattered eight hits over seven shutout innings, struck out four and walked one. Jackson is now 6-6 with a 3.52 ERA and 90/35 K/BB ratio over 120 1/3 innings.