Mitch Keller gets 5th straight win as Pirates rout Blue Jays

With every outing, Pittsburgh Pirates starter Mitch Keller looks more and more removed from a rough April, during which his ERA ballooned to 4.98.

Keller’s fortunes improved mightily in May, when he won all four of his decisions and posted an ERA of 1.30.

Saturday in Toronto, Keller took the hill vs. the Blue Jays and got June started on a positive note, tossing six innings of one-run baseball in helping the Pirates to an 8-1 victory.

It was Keller’s (7-3, 3.42 ERA) fifth straight win and quality start. He struck out eight, walked one and allowed five hits, throwing 106 pitches.

“That was a gritty performance by him,” manager Derek Shelton said on the SportsNet Pittsburgh postgame show. “I thought the first three or four innings, he really struggled with his command.

“ … We’ve talked about the things we’ve seen out of him the last three or four years. Two years ago, that start gets away from him. Today, it doesn’t.”

Ke’Bryan Hayes and Bryan Reynolds hit two-run homers for the Pirates, with Connor Joe (2 for 4) and Andrew McCutchen (1 for 4, three runs) collecting RBIs.

When Keller began his afternoon in the bottom of the first, he already had a 3-0 lead, with the Pirates getting to Blue Jays starter Yusei Kikuchi quickly.

Edward Olivares drove in the game’s first run with a sacrifice fly, followed by Hayes’ homer.

After a stalemate of three innings, the Pirates went up 5-0 in the fifth.

Jared Triolo, who went 3 for 4, was awarded a double thanks to a poor defensive play at third by the Blue Jays’ Isiah Kiner-Falefa.

Michael A. Taylor bunted Triolo to third, and McCutchen drove him in with a single past the glove of shortstop Bo Bichette, putting the Pirates (27-31) up 4-0.

McCutchen got to second base thanks to a Reynolds single and came around to score on an RBI single by Joe.

In the sixth, the Pirates took a 6-0 lead thanks to another defensive slip-up, this time by Bichette, who made an errant throw to home plate on a Triolo grounder, allowing Hayes to score.

Hayes and Nick Gonzales led off with singles, with Yasmani Grandal moving them up via a sacrifice bunt.

“When the offense puts up the run support that they put up, it makes my job a lot easier. Just go try to fill it up, get weak contact and let the defense work out there,” Keller said.

That prompted Kikuchi’s removal from the game after 5 1/3 innings, but reliever Ryan Burr, thanks to Bichette, wasn’t able to strand his inherited runners.

Kikuchi took the loss, allowing five earned runs on nine hits.

Keller’s efficiency wasn’t elite, as he was at 80 pitches by the fourth inning and 92 by the sixth.

But Keller battled through extended Blue Jays at-bats — featuring plenty of foul tips — and toughed out a Bichette liner to his ankle before finishing the sixth inning.

He did let up a run in the frame, however, when Daniel Vogelbach singled home Vladimir Guerrero Jr. But that was the only blemish on Keller’s day.

“Mitch looked great again,” Triolo said. “Held them to one run. Just another really good job out of him. One hundred-and-something pitches, that’s awesome to see.”

After he left, Luis Ortiz came on and was sharp for the remainder of the game, striking out three in as many innings, with one hit allowed.

Ortiz’s effort qualified him for his first MLB save.

With his team up comfortably in the top of the ninth, Reynolds made it 8-1 with a 440-foot moonshot to deep center field off of Brendon Little for his eighth homer of the year, scoring Triolo, who had singled.