The Pirates got the result they needed Sunday, and they got a pair of storylines that made the afternoon feel bigger than a simple 8-7 win over the Cubs.
At PNC Park, in front of 32,921 for the finale of Yinzerpalooza weekend, Ryan O’Hearn and Shawn Ross each delivered a home run worth talking about. O’Hearn launched a grand slam on his 33rd birthday.
Ross, making his first MLB start, blasted a two-run shot. Inside the clubhouse, the debate was half-serious and all fun: which one was better?
“Oooh, first major league start,” said Shawn Ross, unsurprisingly picking his own feat.
The Pirates needed the win after dropping the first two games of their biggest homestand in a decade, and they got it with a mix of power, timely hitting and enough pitching to survive a tight finish. Esmerlyn Valdez drove in what became the winning run with a fifth-inning single, Braxton Ashcraft battled through his outing, Mason Montgomery handled the save, and Pittsburgh hit three homers to get back on track.
O’Hearn’s blast was the loudest swing of the day. In the third inning, he turned on an elevated four-seamer and sent it to center for his 17th homer of the season, pushing the Pirates to a 7-1 lead.
The home run fit the player. O’Hearn has been one of the steadier presences in the clubhouse, even while the bat had cooled.
Before Sunday, he was hitting .178 with only one extra-base hit since his three-homer, 10-RBI eruption on July 7. That slump included an at-bat at Yankee Stadium that should have gone for a hit, a play that clearly bothered him.
Still, the approach never changed.
“It's baseball,” O’Hearn said. “If you have 600 plate appearances, you're gonna have some tough stretches. So, just not paying attention to outside noise or anything like that, staying locked in on the process and not getting too emotional about it.
“Just trusting, believing in myself, and knowing I'm not too far off. It's what good hitters do.”
That kind of attitude has made him valuable to the Pirates, and it matters even more now. Sunday’s win moved Pittsburgh to 54-52, and the club is 12-10 in this stretch against teams .500 or better.
After one of its roughest losses of the season Saturday, the Pirates needed a response, and O’Hearn helped provide it. Bryan Reynolds did too, with a pair of doubles, and Brandon Lowe added three hits, including a double.
“He’s a pro,” Kelly said of O’Hearn. “He’s a leader in our clubhouse the way he gets after it every day. You wouldn’t know whether he’s going through it, if he’s swinging the bat well or he’s not.
“Are there frustrations at times? There are for every player that plays this game because it’s a hard game to play.
Especially from a hitting standpoint. You wouldn’t know with him.
He works hard every single day. I can honestly say that for everybody in there.”
The day also belonged to Ross, whose path to this moment has been anything but direct. O’Hearn has had his own winding road, bouncing from starter to bench piece, getting DFA’d a couple times, then resurfacing to become an All-Star last season after stops in Kansas City, Baltimore and San Diego.
Ross’s climb has been different but just as unlikely. He played college ball at NAIA Faulkner University in Montgomery, Ala., then was with the independent Grand Junction Rockies in the Pioneer League when the Pirates signed him in December 2022.
By 2024, he had hit 23 homers at High-A Greensboro to lead the South Atlantic League.
So when Ross drilled Jameson Taillon’s cutter 438 feet at 110.6 mph in the second inning, Kelly had reason to get emotional.
“I think I teared up when he hit it,” Kelly said. “It was unbelievable for him to have that moment. It was a huge hit in the game.”
It was huge in every sense. Ross smiled as he rounded the bases while teammates reacted in disbelief.
“I didn't know he had juice like that,” O’Hearn said. “That was impressive.”
Ross, hearing that later, just grinned.
“I have sneaky pop,” he said. “It felt good.”
Ross is from Santurce, Puerto Rico, and his phone was buzzing after the game. He said he was looking forward to getting back on the field and spending more time with his parents, who have seen him play there only once before.
“Puerto Rico is really known to be a great support system,” Ross said. “Everybody is texting me and congratulating me. It’s just amazing, and I’m proud of myself because of that.”
He had every reason to be. Ross hit .174 in the Minors last year and was at .163 this season when he was called up after Rafael Flores Jr. went on the seven-day concussion list.
The Pirates haven’t exactly been rolling offensively since the break. Valdez entered Sunday one for his last 12 with seven strikeouts, and the lineup as a whole has been limited to 29 runs in eight games, which ranks 23rd. But the larger point Sunday was simple: the Pirates needed a win, and they got one with contributions from the veterans and the young players alike.
That’s the formula now. The road is narrowing, the games matter more, and Pittsburgh needs both the steady hands and the surprise moments.
“We’ve been good at [bouncing back] all year,” O’Hearn said. “That’s kind of been our thing. [Sunday] was no different, trying to save a series.
“I think that’s pretty consistent with good teams. When things go down, you find a way to get out of it, bounce back and get that positive momentum swing.”
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