Starling Marte's 3-run homer caps Pirates' late rally over Nationals

Even with two surgically-replaced hips, the quick first step Clint Hurdle took off the postgame podium at PNC Park was perhaps topped only by the jump Starling Marte got on the fly ball into the gap he caught to end the game minutes prior.

Hurdle was walking with defiant purpose after his Pittsburgh Pirates produced what he called “one of the best team victories we’ve had all year.”

Having seemingly sunk to new depths the night before, the slumping Pirates overcame the loss of one of their highest-profile players in addition to an eighth-inning deficit for a 4-1 victory against the Washington Nationals on Tuesday.

A reporter appeared to have touched a nerve within Hurdle by pointing out that the Pirates could very well have quit after Chris Archer — the team’s second highest-paid active player — left the game after experiencing shoulder discomfort throwing warmup pitches in the second inning. This, a night after a 13-0 loss and on the heels of a three-game losing streak in which they’d been outscored 22-1 and had lost 28 of 35 games since the All-Star break.

But even against Nationals ace Stephen Strasburg, the Pirates (52-73) didn’t quit Tuesday — and Hurdle perhaps took offense to someone even suggesting they could have even considered it.

“The vibe (in the Pirates’ dugout) doesn’t match the record,” Hurdle said. “The effort and the energy don’t match the record. We know that. You don’t win games on vibe and you don’t win games on effort; you win games with results. We got the right results tonight; however, that team has got no quit in them. They’re going to fight, they’re going to play.

“There’s a code of honor you get to the point of the season we are right now. They still represent the name on the front of the jersey. They still represent ‘Pittsburgh’ and they represent the name on the back. And that’s what we’re doing.”

With that, Hurdle ended his own postgame news conference, tersely grabbing his papers and briskly walking down the long hallway toward the Pirates’ clubhouse.

And despite all the losing, Hurdle’s right, the Pirates do not have the look of a team that’s given up on the season. Tuesday was the third time in seven games they had a comeback victory, the second time in five days they did so in their final at-bat while overcoming a deficit.

“Right now, (with) all we’ve been through and all that stuff, I think we are kind of getting together as a team,” said closer Felipe Vazquez, who got the final four outs for the win.

Marte capped it by making a fine running and leaping catch at the wall on a ball struck by Howie Kendrick. That wasn’t his biggest contribution to the win, though: his three-run tiebreaking homer the half-inning prior was.

Marte crushed a 1-2 four-seam fastball from former teammate Daniel Hudson, hitting it with an exit velocity of 103.8 mph to score Melky Cabrera and Adam Frazier for his career-high 22nd home run, one that gave the Pirates their first in-game lead in six days.

“I tried to put my best swing,” Marte said, “and then I just got it.”

The Pirates entered that eighth inning having scored one run over their previous 34 innings. Marte’s shot to right-center was their first extra-base hit of the game and only their second extra-base hit over the previous 27 innings.

Moments before Marte’s blast, the Pirates tied it on a Bryan Reynolds sacrifice fly; they’d loaded the bases with nobody out by modest means — opposite-field single, walk and bunt single.

Still, that was much more than the Pirates had managed over seven innings against Strasburg, who allowed four hits and one walk.

But he was mostly matched by the combined eight innings from Clay Holmes, Michael Feliz, Richard Rodriguez and Vazquez.

“We kind of knew what we were up against,” said Holmes, who allowed one hit in 3 2/3 innings, “and we took it one out at a time — and Marte came up with the big home run there to put us up. It was a great win.”

Chris Adamski is a TribLive reporter who has covered primarily the Pittsburgh Steelers since 2014 following two seasons on the Penn State football beat. A Western Pennsylvania native, he joined the Trib in 2012 after spending a decade covering Pittsburgh sports for other outlets. He can be reached at cadamski@triblive.com.