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Nady leads Pirates past Astros

Apr 4, 2007 - 7:42 AM HOUSTON (Ticker) -- Xavier Nady and the Pittsburgh Pirates are making the National league stand up and take notice.

Nady homered for the second straight game and delivered a go-ahead RBI single in the eighth inning to lead the Pirates to a 3-2 victory over the Houston Astros.

Rallying for the second time in as many nights, Jack Wilson started the decisive rally with a bunt single off Dan Wheeler (0-1). Wilson moved to second on a walk to Jason Bay and scored on a base hit to left by Ronny Paulino. Nady followed with a base hit to center, easily plating Bay with the lead run.

"It's just one of those things," Nady said. "It's still early. I'm just trying to have quality at-bats. The first one, I got a good pitch. That's all I can ask for. The second one, (Dan Wheeler) caught me a little inside, more than I anticipated. But it worked. It's good to see this team fight like this. We have it in us. Hopefully, we'll keep it up."

In Monday's opener, the Pirates belted homers in each of the last three innings, including a game-winning shot by Bay in the 10th, in a 4-2 victory.

Pittsburgh got 11 strikeouts in six strong innings by starter Ian Snell.

"These are two very good games for us," Pittsburgh manager Jim Tracy said. "Snell was tremendous. It was a fairly dominant performance.

"We did some things tonight that took us a while to figure out last year. Our discipline at the plate has really improved. We're eons ahead of where we were a year ago. We really worked the count, fought off good pitches, made good decisions."

Snell yielded two runs, four hits and a walk.

"Last year, I probably would have had a little bit of jitters, but I have a year of experience now, and our team is a little stronger," snell said. "Everything was working tonight, and they were swinging at a lot of pitches, too. They were swinging at bad pitches, and that helped me a lot.

"There are a lot of things you can say about this team. We're not going to give up. We're going to play with a lot of heart. If we keep this up, we're going to go a long way. We're a pack of brothers out there."

Jonah Bayliss (1-0) got one out in the seventh for the win. Matt Capps pitched a scoreless eighth and Salomon Torres a perfect ninth for his second save.

Houston starter Jason Jennings allowed a run and five hits in six innings with a walk and seven strikeouts.

"Obviously, the one mistake I made was there to Nady in the second inning," Jennings said. "But overall, I felt I threw the ball well. I was working ahead of the guys most of the time.

"(Tonight) was a good thing. Hopefully, I can go out and do the same thing next time. I was excited to pitch in my home state for a new team. I'm going to try to show these guys why they brought me over here." Pittsburgh jumped to an early lead when Nady drilled his second homer in as many games in the second inning. Jason Lane tied it with his first blast in the fifth.

In the next frame, pinch hitter Orlando Palmeiro led off with a single, advanced to second on a groundout and scored on Carlos Lee's two-out single up the middle.