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James takes no-hitter into seventh; Thorman homers twice for Braves

May 13, 2007 - 3:49 AM PITTSBURGH (Ticker) -- Chuck James certainly did not let a previous bad performance affect him against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

James was perfect through five innings and left after seven shutout frames as the Atlanta Braves stomped the Pirates, 9-2, on Saturday.

Scott Thorman homered twice and Willie Harris had four hits as every position player had a hit for Atlanta, which has won five straight games.

"It seems like it's someone new every night and if we can keep that up, we'll keep piling up wins and having fun," said Jeff Francoeur, who had three hits. "It's fun when you're playing like this.

"It's good for (manager Bobby Cox) to know that he's got a lot of guys that he's got a lot of confidence in to come up to the plate and hit."

The 25-year-old James (4-3) was coming off the worst start of his season Monday, leaving after just 3 2/3 innings in a 4-2 loss to San Diego, but turned it around against the punchless Pirates.

The lefthander retired the first 15 batters before walking Jose Bautista to open the sixth. After issuing another walk to Jack Wilson, pinch hitter Jose Castillo grounded into a double play and Chris Duffy struck out to end that frame.

Jason Bay broke up the no-hit bid in the seventh with a one-out single to left-center. James allowed a two-out walk to Ryan Doumit before striking out Brad Eldred to end his night.

"He was popping strikes all night long," Cox said. "In, out, changeup, I mean he had it all going. The knack is getting ahead of the hitter and throwing strikes and he accomplished that very well."

James yielded just the one run and three walks and struck out three.

"Today was a good confidence booster," James said. "I just tried to go out there and pitch and if they were going to beat me, I was going to pound the strike zone and make them hit it."

Wilson snapped the shutout bid with a run-scoring double in the eighth off reliever Chad Paronto.

Thorman provided James all the runs he needed when he jerked his fourth homer of the season off Tony Armas (0-3) in the second inning for a 3-0 edge. He lined a fastball from Jonah Bayliss well over the right field fence in the ninth to complete his first multi-home run game.

"That's the sign of a good team that it's not always the same people doing it every night," Thorman said. "It seemed like every time we were up at the plate, there was somebody on base. That definitely puts the pressure on the other team."

Harris led off the third with a double, advanced to third on a base hit by Edgar Renteria and scored on an error by second baseman Freddy Sanchez for a 4-0 lead. Brian McCann singled up the middle to end the night for Armas.

Harris doubled in a run in the sixth and Francoeur singled in a run in the seventh. Harris, signed as a minor league free agent this past offseason and purchased from Class AAA Richmond on April 29, recorded his fifth multi-hit game in eight starts and raised his average to .467.

"I'm just going out trying to play my game," Harris said. "I know I'm not going to get four, three, two hits every day, I'm just trying to put together good at-bats. That's really all I concentrate on. And when I get a good pitch, try to make good contact."

Armas was tagged for five runs and seven hits in two-plus innings.

Pittsburgh has lost six of eight, scoring just 20 runs over that span.

"It's terrible," Bay said of the Pirates' lack of run production. "Everyone wants to know where the magic potion is. ... It all falls on the hitters and until we make a conscious effort to change what we're doing and doing it ourselves, it's not going to change. We've just got to take it upon ourselves to take it personal and go out there and turn it around."