I’m not going to lie, when Angel Pagan hit his beginning-of-the-bottom-of-the-first triple today off of Wainwright, I started to become nervous. When the Giants went up 2-0 in the 3rd, I became more nervous. I should have had more faith.
To my delight, here came the run-of-the-mill 9-run top of the fourth for the Cards. My faith in their bats has been restored. They added 2 in the 8th and another 3 in the 9th to demolish (yep, I said demolish) the defending World Champs 14-3 on the day the Giants were given their World Series rings. Here’s the breakdown: Jay went 2-5 with a triple and 2 RBIs; Carpenter went 3-5 with a double and 3 RBIs; Craig was 1-3 with 2 RBIs; Beltran went 1-3 with 2 RBIs; Adams was 3-4 with a double and 2 RBIs; Wigginton 2-5 with 1 RBI; and Kozma 1-4 with 2 RBIs. And those numbers, my friends, equate to 14 runs for the Cards on this, a “high-sock Sunday”. Oh, and as a team, they also went 10-14 (that’s .714) with runners in scoring position. And, they did not even hit a single homerun! Beautiful!
How about our friend, Waino? He looked great today. Wainwright pitched 7 complete innings and struck out 6 while not walking a single batter. That 9-run 4th inning didn’t hurt him a bit. Looking much more comfortable on the mound today (and it helped that he didn’t have a ball ricochet off his arm while on the mound), he only allowed 2 earned runs by the Giants. This brings his ERA for two games to 3.46.
So where does that bring us? The Cardinals are headed home to Busch at 3-3, an even .500, coming back from the West. Yes, even taking 2 of 3 from the World Series champions. The West is a notoriously difficult division to play against, so I think they’re looking mighty fine. The boys begin their homestand against the Reds with opening day at Busch tomorrow. Then they continue their 6-game homestand against the Brewers on Thursday.
Here’s to keeping the bats hot, and the socks high!
Go Cards!
