Milwaukee Brewers (80-75) at Pittsburgh Pirates (83-71), 1:35 p.m. (ET)
(SportsNetwork.com) - Despite suffering a 1-0 loss last night, the Pittsburgh Pirates have a chance to essentially put away the Milwaukee Brewers in the wild card race Sunday when the teams meet in the finale of a three-game series at PNC Park.
The Pirates enter the day with a 3 1/2-game lead on the Brewers for the second wild card slot, and with road games remaining against Atlanta and Cincinnati after today, the Bucs could just about seal Milwaukee's fate. The Brewers have six games left after today, three at Cincinnati and three at home against the Chicago Cubs.
Vance Worley has won his last two decisions going into today's start for Pittsburgh. The right-hander is 0-3 with a 5.48 ERA in four career starts versus the Brewers.
Wily Peralta, who is 1-3 over his last five starts, toes the rubber for the Brewers. The righty is coming off a no-decision at St. Louis Tuesday. He was blasted for eight runs -- seven earned -- in a loss to the Pirates on Aug. 23. Peralta is 2-1 with a 4.32 ERA in four career starts against the Pirates, all coming at Miller Park.
Last night, Logan Schafer hit a sacrifice fly in the ninth inning to give the Brewers a 1-0 win. The victory came almost two hours after Brewers starter Matt Garza was ejected for hitting Pirates star Andrew McCutchen twice, giving an already tense game an extra spark.
Garza was ejected immediately by home plate umpire Marty Foster after hitting McCutchen on the arm in the fifth inning. The right-hander, who also beaned the Pirates center fielder in the third, punched his glove, apparently upset that the fastball trailed too far inside.
It came after both benches were warned when Pirates starter Edinson Volquez threw inside to Brewers star Ryan Braun leading off the fourth.
"If people think I hit McCutchen on purpose with a 1-2 count in a game like this, then you're just an idiot," Garza said. "That goes for the Pirates TV crew that kept insinuating that's what we were doing."
For his part, McCutchen said he knew why Garza didn't throw the ball directly over the plate to him.
"They know better than to throw me a fastball on the plate in, so if they're going to throw it in there, they're going to throw it in off the plate," McCutchen said. "My assumption is that's what he was trying to do both times, throw it in off the plate. He's not going to try and hit the plate because if he does he knows what can happen."
After the Pirates wasted several scoring opportunities, the Brewers got a key double from Lyle Overbay, who chopped a ball over first baseman Gaby Sanchez's head to move Elian Herrera from first to third.
Herrera scored on Schafer's fly ball to left field off Mark Melancon (3-5) and Francisco Rodriguez pitched a 1-2-3 bottom of the ninth for his 43rd save.
The Pirates had a five-game winning streak snapped and fell 3 1/2 games behind first-place St. Louis with eight games left.
The Pirates have tied a PNC Park record with 50 home wins this season. A victory this afternoon would give the Bucs 51 wins at home for the first time since going 53-28 in 1992 at Three Rivers Stadium.
Milwaukee holds a 12-6 lead in the season series with the final meeting today.