PITTSBURGH — Josh Bell homered from both sides of the plate in his Diamondbacks debut, Ketel Marte also hit two home runs and Arizona beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 9-8 on Friday night after blowing a five-run lead.
Acquired Tuesday from the Miami Marlins for cash considerations, Bell had the last of Arizona’s three straight homers in the first inning, then tied it at 7 with two outs in the seventh.
On the second, he hammered Aroldis Chapman‘s 102.9 mph sinker 370 feet to right — the fastest pitch hit for a homer since ball tracking began in 2008.
“Everything he throws seems like it’s 120,” Bell said. “Happy to put the barrel on it. … He tried to get me to swing and miss at the sinker, which is what I’ve been doing virtually my entire career against him. But happy to get the barrel there.”
Bell joined Felipe Lopez (2009) as the only players in Diamondbacks history with a multi-HR game in their debuts with the team. He became the first player to hit a home run on the first pitch of his first at bat with Arizona since Didi Gregorius did it against the Yankees on April 18, 2013
Geraldo Perdomo, after fouling a ball off the inside of his right knee, drove a sweeper from Colin Holderman (3-3) to the gap in right-center for a go-ahead double in the eighth.
“Never, never. We’re never going to give up,” Perdomo said after Arizona’s fourth straight victory and eighth in nine games.
Marte then hit his second homer of the game and 26th of the season in the ninth off an 0-1 cutter from Dennis Santana.
Justin Martínez (5-2) struck out the side with one walk in the eighth for the victory.
“They’re fighters,” Arizona manager Torey Lovullo said. “They had every reason to feel sorry for themselves. They didn’t. They had every reason to shut down and they didn’t. They believed they were going to win this game even when things were looking very, very desperate.”
Oneil Cruz led off the ninth for Pittsburgh with a single, his fifth hit, and scored on Rowdy Tellez‘s one-out RBI single. Ryan Thompson then got Joey Bart and Ke’Bryan Hayes to ground out for his second save.
Cruz’s RBI single in the sixth put Pittsburgh — down 5-0 in the first — ahead 7-6. Andrew McCutchen scored on the slow dribbler, initially called out on a throw by second baseman Marte before it was overturned on a challenge.
“It just feels good to have a 5-for-5 game,” said Cruz, who was 0 for 4 with three strikeouts and three errors against Houston on Wednesday. “But the most important thing is you learn from your mistakes. And today, I was able to bounce back.”
McCutchen and Bryan Reynolds hit RBI singles ahead of Cruz in a four-run sixth.
The Diamondbacks scored on their first four at-bats against Luis Ortiz, who allowed six runs on six hits in 5 1/3 innings.
Leadoff batter Corbin Carroll tripled down the right-field line before going home when a relay from Cruz got past Hayes at third.
Marte followed with first homer. Joc Pederson then sent a slider from Ortiz 430 feet to right, over the wall and into the Allegheny River, and Bell made it three straight homers with one to right-center on the first pitch he saw as a Diamondback. Lourdes Gurriel Jr. later scored on a groundout from Alek Thomas.
It marked the eighth time the Diamondbacks have hit back-to-back-to-back home runs in franchise history. All three home runs were over 400 feet.
“Challenging first inning and was in the middle of the plate the whole inning,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said about Ortiz. “To come back and give us five-plus (innings) was huge for us with where we’re at.”
Bart hit an RBI single in the fourth before McCutchen and Reynolds had consecutive two-out doubles the fifth. Cruz cut it to 5-3 on a single off Brandon Pfaadt, who gave up three runs and seven hits in five innings.
Thomas had an RBI single for Arizona in the sixth.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.