Jay got his first three hits for Arizona, including a three-run homer, and the Diamondbacks won their fifth game in a row with a sloppy 13-8 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates.
”I can’t stress enough how good this group is and how they’ve welcomed me and made me feel super comfortable,” he said. ”I’m super excited and looking forward to the summer.”
Jay, acquired Thursday in a trade with Kansas City, was hitless in 12 at-bats for the Diamondbacks before his leadoff single in Arizona’s six-run first inning. His opposite-field homer in the eighth broke the game open after the Pirates had rallied from an 8-0 deficit to trail 10-8.
”That was a pretty decisive blow in the game,” Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said.
Starling Marte hit a three-run homer, doubled and made a diving grab in center field for the Pirates.
Fernando Salas (4-4) gave up a run in 1 1/3 innings and got the win.
Nine of the runs in the game were unearned.
The Diamondbacks have scored 51 runs in the last five games. They’ve won 11 of 14 and lead the NL West by three games over the surging Los Angeles Dodgers.
”It’s hard to believe,” Lovullo said. ”You go through a May the way we did, I don’t know how many runs we scored the entire month. It wasn’t a lot.”
The Pirates have lost six of eight and fell to 1-4 on a six-game trip that ends Wednesday afternoon with the series finale in the desert.
Arizona jumped on Trevor Williams (5-4) in the first with six runs www.panthersauthorizedshops.com/authentic-rashaan-gaulden-jersey , two on Ketel Marte’s seventh triple of the season. Five runs were unearned thanks to three Pirates errors, two on one play.
”We’ve got work to do,” manager Clint Hurdle said of his infield defense. ”We are not playing at the level we are capable of playing.”
The Diamondbacks added a pair of runs in the third, one on David Peralta’s RBI triple, to lead 8-0.
But the Pirates countered with an unearned barrage of their own in a six-run fourth.
A catcher’s interference call against John Ryan Murphy loaded the bases and Clay Buchholz hit Jordy Mercer with a pitch to bring in Pittsburgh’s first run. Buchholz walked pinch-hitter Sean Rodriguez to bring in another. Josh Harrison followed with a sacrifice fly before Marte homered just over the right-field fence to cut what once was an eight-run Arizona lead to 8-6.
Because of Murphy’s error, the last four of the six runs were unearned.
Josh Bell’s RBI double, his third hit of the night, trimmed Arizona’s advantage to 10-8 in the seventh.
”A couple tough bounces their way and it got out of hand in that first inning,” said Williams, who allowed eight runs – only three earned – in three innings. ”It was good for us to fight back and it is awesome that the team showed that fight. I am disappointed in myself that it was out of reach in that first inning and let the team down that way.”
TOUGH START
The first inning was an ugly one for Pittsburgh.
With runners at first and second and no outs, Bell fielded Jake Lamb’s grounder to first base and spiked a throw to second Taven Bryan Color Rush Jersey , with the ball bouncing into the outfield.
Marte’s two-out triple brought in two more runs, and Jarrod Dyson was intentionally walked to bring up Buchholz. Williams made a pickoff move to first, threw wildly and Marte scored. The speedy Dyson headed for third and second baseman Harrison threw the ball away, allowing the runner to score.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Pirates: Harrison was back in the lineup after being hit by a pitch in the shoulder Monday night. The Pirates had said after that game that Harrison would be day to day.
Diamondbacks: RHP Braden Shipley took a line drive to the ribs in the ninth but stayed in the game to get the final out. … LHP Robbie Ray (strained right oblique) is to make his first rehab start Thursday for Class A Visalia. … RHP Shelby Miller (Tommy John surgery) makes his fourth rehab start, for Class A Visalia, on Saturday.
UP NEXT
Arizona, going for its second consecutive three-game sweep, sends RHP Zack Greinke (5-4, 3.53 ERA) to the mound on Wednesday. The Pirates counter with RHP Jameson Taillon (3-5, 4.08). Greinke is 16-1 with a 2.53 ERA in his last 25 starts at Chase Field.
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An estimated 103.4 million people watched the Super Bowl on NBC, a 7 percent drop from last year that indicates that television’s biggest event may have peaked in popularity.
The Nielsen company said it’s the smallest Super Bowl audience on television since 2009 despite the underdog Philadelphia Eagles beating the New England Patriots in a thrilling game that was close from start to finish.
Last year’s Patriots-Falcons game reached 111.3 million viewers. The all-time Super Bowl record – and record for any television event in the United States – was the 114.4 million who watched the Patriots against the Seahawks in 2015.
The NFL’s viewership has been down this year Nyheim Hines Color Rush Jersey , with experts citing factors like increased injuries, some confusing rules changes and anger at players protesting police brutality by kneeling during the national anthem. Similarly, fewer people have cable than they did a few years ago, with streaming onto hand-held devices becoming more popular.
The dip was also telegraphed by a poll conducted last week by Seton Hall University, which found that 54 percent of Americans were preparing to watch the game. That’s down from the 68 percent that said the same thing two years ago, according to the poll, which wasn’t done in 2017. The poll has a margin of error of 3.8 percentage points.
Despite that prediction, the poll’s director said he thought the game’s quality would lift the numbers beyond what was actually seen.
”If you turned the game on at any time to say, `I wonder what’s going on,’ or a friend texted you to say you should watch this, you’re going to watch and get hooked www.buccaneersauthorizedshops.com/authentic-alex-cappa-jersey ,” said Rick Gentile, director of the poll, also sponsored by the Sharkey Institute.
NBC said that if you add in people who followed the game online, viewership increased to 106 million. And Nielsen said it has not yet counted the number of people who watched the game outside of homes – in a bar, for instance. Some perspective: despite the decrease, Sunday’s game ranked as the 10th most-watched television even in U.S. history.
Soothing any hurt for NBC was Kantar Media’s estimate that $414 million was spent on advertising for the Super Bowl telecast. That’s second only to the $419 million spent last year, a figure that Kantar said exceeded 2018 only because last year’s game went into overtime, meaning there was more time to sell ads.
The network was able to remind millions of people that the Winter Olympics, which will also be televised by NBC, begin on Thursday.
Justin Timberlake’s halftime show, despite tepid reviews M.J. Stewart Color Rush Jersey , drew an audience of 106.6 million people, Nielsen said.
NBC’s post-game telecast of ”This is Us” was a winning choice. Nielsen said 27 million people stayed for the drama, the most-watched post-game entertainment show in six years and sharply above the 17.6 million people who watched the premiere of ”24: Legacy” on Fox last year.
And extra kibble is being handed out over at Animal Planet. The cable network’s annual ”Puppy Bowl” of cute animals, shown opposite NBC’s pregame show, reached 3.05 million people. That was the show’s biggest audience in its 14 years of existence.
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