The St. Louis Cardinals entered the 4th of July looking to end their four-game losing streak, which is their longest losing streak of the season thus far. They fell to the Padres on Friday night 2-1 despite a stellar performance by starter Michael Wacha.
During the course of the four game losing streak, the first place Cardinals have been 1-34 with RISP (runners in scoring position). That is equal to an average of 0.29. Also, during the losing streak, the ERA of the starters for St. Louis has been 2.06.
On Saturday, the starters for both teams were Carlos Martinez (9-3, 2.80) for the Cardinals, and Odrisamer Despaigne (3-6, 4.94) for the Padres.
After three scoreless innings by both teams, the Padres once again struck first on the board. During the top of the fourth inning, Yangervis Solarte led off with a solo home run (his fourth home run of the season) to give the Padres a 1-0 lead.
But Martinez was able to get out of the inning allowing only the home run.
St. Louis, meanwhile, continued to struggle at the plate as they had during the entire losing streak, going down in order 1-2-3 during the bottom half of the fourth inning.
However, in the bottom of the sixth inning, the Cardinals finally were able to get on the board and tie the game up. It started with a double by Tommy Pham, who earlier in the game had made two key running catches in the outfield. Following the double, Matt Carpenter stepped up to the plate, and hit a single that scored Pham to tie the game at 1-1.
Jedd Gyroko led off the top of the seventh for the Padres with Martinez still on the mound for the Cardinals, and singled to left field. Alexi Amarista then hit a sacrifice, moving Gyroko to second base with one out. Gyroko then advanced to third on a ground out by Brett Wallace. Melvin Upton, Jr. followed with a walk, putting runners on the corners with two outs.
Randy Choate was then brought in for Martinez to get the final out, Yonder Alonso.
And that’s exactly what Choate did.
The final line of the afternoon for Martinez: 6.2 IP, 8 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 5 Ks.
With the game still tied heading into the bottom of the eighth, the Cardinals finally were able to garner themselves a lead. Pham reached base on a fielding error by the Padres, and a ground out by Carpenter advanced Pham to third base. A sacrifice fly to right field by Jhonny Peralta scored Pham, giving the Cardinals a 2-1 lead.
As it turned out, those two runs were all they needed. Trevor Rosenthal entered to pitch the ninth inning, shutting down the Padres, and helping end the Cardinals four game losing streak.
St. Louis improved to 52-28, and 30-11 at home, while the Padres drop to 39-44 overall. Rosenthal gets his 24th save of the year, and Maness improves to 3-0 on the season. Brandon Maurer falls to 5-1.
Over the past five games, the ERA of the Cardinals starters (including Saturday’s victory) has been 1.93. While the run support has been lacking lately, every team goes through a slump that they climb out of, and the Cardinals seem to be no different.
(Photo by Jeff Curry/Getty Images)
2 comments
Stellar pitching usually doesn’t count for much for teams who typically score less than three runs,
Cardinals are 1st in the league with a +89 run differential. I’d say stellar pitching is counting for a lot. Last night was their 8th win this year when scoring 1 or 2 runs too.
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