Michael Chavis homers twice but Pirates come up short against Diamondbacks

Pittsburgh Pirates manager Derek Shelton wasn’t shy about expressing his disgust for praising opposing starting pitchers, placing some of the blame on his own batters.

Whether it was Tommy Henry’s pitching or the Pirates’ hitting, the Arizona Diamondbacks took advantage.

Henry limited the Pirates to four hits over seven innings and the Diamondbacks held off a late rally as Michael Chavis homered twice to hold on for a 6-4 win Tuesday night at Chase Field in Phoenix.

“We didn’t get anything going off the starter,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said on the AT&T SportsNet postgame show, blaming their tendency to hit balls right at Diamondbacks shortstop Geraldo Perdomo (seven assists and two putouts). “The balls that we did hit hard, it seemed like we hit hard on the ground right at Perdomo. I don’t know how many assists he had but it seemed like he may have set a league record because everything we hit hard we hit right at him.”

The 25-year-old left-hander fared far better in his second major league start than he did in his first, when Henry gave up four runs on four hits, three walks and one hit batter in a 7-4 loss at Cleveland on Aug. 3.

Behind the bat of Chavis, who had the fourth two-homer game of his career, the Pirates cut a five-run deficit to two in the eighth inning.

It was the second consecutive loss and fourth in five games for the Pirates (44-66), who slipped a half-game behind the Chicago Cubs and Cincinnati Reds (both 44-65) and into last place in the NL Central.

The Diamondbacks took a 1-0 lead in the first inning against Pirates starter Zach Thompson when Josh Roajs got a leadoff double down the left field line, advanced to third on a fielder’s choice by Ketel Marte and scored on Christian Walker’s single to right.

Thompson experienced discomfort in his hip while issuing a full-count walk to Seth Beer. After a visit from trainer Rafael Freitas, Thompson remained in the game and got Carson Kelly to fly out to left.

“It wasn’t too bad,” Thompson said. “I just landed kind of awkwardly and pinched something, so it wasn’t that big of a deal to get over it.”

Thompson got a break when Geraldo Perdomo hit a deep fly to right that sailed over the outstretched glove of Ben Gamel, bounced off the warning track and over the fence for a ground-rule double. That left runners on second and third but Thompson struck out Rojas and got Alek Thomas to fly out to left to escape without any damage.

The Diamondbacks increased their lead to 2-0 when Walker doubled in the third and scored when Jake McCarthy beat out a grounder to second. Thompson allowed two runs on five hits and three walks in 4 2/3 innings.

Chavis cut the deficit to 2-1 when he crushed a two-out, 2-2 slider in the sixth for a 416-foot shot and his 11th home run.

But Arizona added four more runs against righty reliever Duane Underwood Jr. in the seventh, when it had five hits and batted around the order. Marte hit a two-run single and McCarthy did the same with the bases loaded to stretch the Diamondbacks’ lead to 6-1.

The Pirates answered with a three-run eighth, as Ke’Bryan Hayes got a two-out single and scored on Gamel’s double to right past a diving Daulton Varsho. Chavis followed by driving Chris Devenski’s slider 424 feet to left-center for his 12th home run, a two-run shot that cut it to 6-4.

They had no luck against former Pirates closer Mark Melancon, who pitched a scoreless ninth inning to earn his 16th save.