Rafael Flores Jr. and Brandon Lowe each homered to propel the Pittsburgh Pirates to an 8-4 victory over the visiting Boston Red Sox on Friday night.
Flores, who had two three-run home runs during Thursday’s 13-1 triumph over Miami, hit a solo home run in the second, and Lowe smashed a Jovani Moran changeup for a three-run home run in the fifth.
Flores collected three hits in the victory. Pittsburgh also received two hits and three runs from Bryan Reynolds.
Bubba Chandler (6-8) limited Boston to two runs on four hits in five innings to earn the win. He walked two and struck out five.
Nick Sogard had two hits and two RBIs for Boston, which lost for the sixth time in its last seven games.
After Flores opened the scoring with his fourth home run of the season, Pittsburgh took a four-run lead by scoring three times in the fourth. It was 3-0 after an Esmerlyn Valdez double drove in Reynolds and Ronny Simon, and Flores followed with an RBI single to stretch the lead to 4-0.
Boston starting pitcher Jake Bennett (7-6) was pulled after four innings. He allowed four runs on five hits, walked one and struck out six.
Boston trimmed its deficit to 4-2 in the fifth. Andruw Monasterio hit an RBI single to make get the Red Sox on the board, and Nick Sogard drove in Jarren Duran with a sacrifice fly to center field for Boston’s second run.
Lowe’s home run extended Pittsburgh’s lead to 7-2.
Sogard drove in Duran a second time with an RBI single that trimmed Pittsburgh’s lead to 7-3 in the seventh, but the Pirates got the run back in the bottom of the inning when third baseman Caleb Durbin made a wild throw to first that allowed Reynolds to score.
Masataka Yoshida’s single in the ninth with two outs drove in Eli White to make it 8-4. At that point, the Pirates replaced Kirby Yates with Mason Montgomery, who struck out Adley Rutschman with two aboard to secure the save.
