Nolasco pitches 6 shutout innings again, drives in 2 runs as Marlins beat Pirates 6-0

Nolasco, Marlins shut down Pirates 6-0

PITTSBURGH — Ricky Nolasco pitched six shutout innings for the second consecutive start and the Florida Marlins snapped a four-game losing streak with a 6-0 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates on Tuesday night.

Nolasco (14-8) extended his road winning streak to seven games and won for the fifth time in six starts overall. He allowed five hits — all singles — and a walk with nine strikeouts. Nolasco also went 2 for 3 and drove in two runs.

Gaby Sanchez added two hits and two RBIs for Florida, which is struggling to stay on the periphery of the NL wild-card race.

Jose Tabata and Pedro Alvarez each had two hits for Pittsburgh, which has lost eight of nine and was shut out for the 13th time this season.

The second Pittsburgh batter of the game, Tabata, singled. But he was caught stealing, and Nolasco retired the next 15 Pirates before pinch-hitter Andy LaRoche’s two-out single in the sixth.

Andrew McCutchen then walked and Tabata hit an infield single to load the bases. But Nolasco struck out No. 3 hitter Neil Walker swinging.

The first two batters of the next inning singled, but Jose Veras induced Ryan Doumit to fly out on his first pitch and got Chris Snyder to ground into a double play.

Nolasco’s first run-scoring hit against Zach Duke (5-12) was a hard line drive well above second baseman Walker’s head that drove in Wes Helms, who had walked to lead off the fifth and advanced to second on a groundout.

That was the beginning of four consecutive singles, the last of which was Sanchez’s liner to right that scored Nolasco and Hanley Ramirez. Dan Uggla followed with a sacrifice fly.

Nolasco drove in another run the following inning with a two-out double to the same vicinity as his first hit.

Despite spending nearly a month on the disabled list, Duke moved into a tie for the second-most losses in the majors. He allowed five runs on nine hits and two walks in falling to 0-4 lifetime against the Marlins.

NOTES: Florida improved to 22-12 when facing a left-handed starter. … The Pirates have scored one or zero runs in 24 of their 119 games this season, or more than 20 percent of the time. … The Marlins had lost their previous five games at PNC Park. … Marlins rookie OF Logan Morrison went 2 for 5 with a run and an RBI.