On Friday night, the St. Louis Cardinals took on the Milwaukee Brewers in game one of a three game divisional series in Milwaukee. The Cardinals wound up winning the game 6-0, and in the process, reached the 70-wins mark 16 days earlier than they reached the same feat in 2014.
And during Saturday night’s game, St. Louis defeated Milwaukee 3-0, as they continued to pitch strong on the mound.
The pitching match-up for the evening was Jaime Garcia (3-4, 1.98 ERA) for the Cardinals, and Wily Peralta (2-6, 4.55 ERA) for the Brewers.
In the top of the first inning, Matt Carpenter kicked off the game by hitting his 16th home run of the season to give the Cardinals the 1-0 lead. Carpenter has been improving a lot in the past few weeks, since being placed at the lead-off spot.
St. Louis added another run in the top of the second inning. After a double by Mark Reynolds that went deep into center field, Stephen Piscotty hit a single, scoring Reynolds and making it a 2-0 Cardinals lead.
Garcia throughout the early goings of the game had issues with allowing the lead-off hitter to reach first, but he wasn’t wavered and kept his composure, getting out of jams with the help of the Cardinals’ defense. He continued to look sharp as the evening progressed, only throwing nine pitches in the bottom of the sixth inning.
In what was one of his best pitching performances of his career, Garcia’s final line of the night: 7 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 4 BB, 5 Ks. Kevin Siegrist picked up right where Garcia left off, and threw a scoreless eighth inning. And in the bottom of the ninth inning, Trevor Rosenthal came into the game, an pitched a 1-2-3 bottom of the ninth, as the Cardinals won 3-0.
Garcia improved to 4-4 with the win, and Peralta dropped to 2-7 with the loss. After Saturday night’s win, Garcia is now 8-3 with a 1.64 ERA in his last 13 road starts. The Cardinals are now 71-39, while the Brewers are 47-65.
John Lackey will get the start in the series finale on Sunday, looking to get his 10th win.
(Photo by Mike McGinnis/Getty Images)
