Andrew McCutchen hits walk-off homer in 14th to lift Pirates over Cardinals

The crack of Andrew McCutchen's bat woke up the Pittsburgh Pirates enough to put them to bed happy.

It took more than five hours and 15 combined pitchers for the Pirates to outlast the St. Louis Cardinals 6-5 in 14 innings on McCutchen's walk-off, two-run homer to seal the deal.

(Courtesy: MLB.com)

For McCutchen, this wasn't about extending his 17-game hitting streak, nor was it about the fact that he was hitless in six plate appearances. It was about the roaring boos from the home crowd as Vance Worley gave up the go-ahead run in the top half of the inning.

This was home, but it didn't feel like it.

After leading off the 14th with a walk, Cardinals third baseman Matt Carpenter stole second, and scurried on to third after Chris Stewart's throw skipped into center field.

Then came the boos.

Two batters later, Jhonny Peralta roped a go-ahead single to left, giving the Cardinals a 5-4 lead, and hope that the winningest team in baseball would scratch out yet another victory.

Overall, this was a battle between two of the winningest active pitchers in the majors, as Cardinals starter John Lackey bettered his counterpart, All-Star A.J. Burnett.

Lackey gave up one run, a Burnett homer, his first in almost ten years, on five hits with two walks in 6 2/3 innings. Burnett, meanwhile, gave up three runs and six hits over 6 1/3 innings.

The win brings Pittsburgh within 3 1/2 games of the division-leading Cardinals, who are 5-5 in their last ten. The Pirates, on the other hand, are a major-league best 8-2 in their last ten, thanks in part to winning games they have no business winning.