Pirates Clean Up With a Giant Sweep

It was bullpen against bullpen, and San Francisco has one of the best in baseball. Sunday, the Giants were second-best--and, because of the Pittsburgh Pirates, they’re in second place.

Jermaine Allensworth’s high-hop single broke a tie in a four-run eighth inning of the Pirates’ 9-6 victory, which allowed Pittsburgh to sweep San Francisco and dropped the Giants into second place for the first time in 106 days.

San Francisco’s fourth loss in five games and the Dodgers’ 5-1 victory in Philadelphia pushed the Giants out of the National League West lead they had held since May 10. The Giants have been in first place all but 23 days this season.

“It doesn’t matter until September,” Barry Bonds said. “You just try to stay close until then. September is where you make the difference.”

The three-game sweep matches the Giants’ longest losing streak of the season. The Pirates, who stayed three games back of Houston in the NL Central, have won six of seven and nine of 12.

“There’s no pressure on us--remember, this is a team that was supposed to lose 100 games,” said Al Martin, who had a two-run single in the eighth. “I don’t think we know we swept [the Giants]. We just go out and play every game like it’s the only one that exists.”

The Giants trailed, 3-0, before scoring solo runs in six consecutive innings against four pitchers, with Jose Vizcaino’s two-out RBI single off reliever Jason Christiansen (2-0) tying it in the eighth.

But Joe Randa greeted reliever Doug Henry (4-5) with his second double of the game and the fourth by the bottom three hitters in the order to start the Pirate eighth. Starting pitcher Jon Lieber had earlier put the Pirates up 3-0 with a two-run double in the second off Mark Gardner.

“[The Giants] have as good a bullpen as I’ve seen in quite a while, but the [eighth inning] proved how important it is to add on runs,” Pirate Manager Gene Lamont said. “Allensworth showed that when you put the ball in play and you avoid striking out, good things can happen.”

Both teams used five relief pitchers.