The Cardinals started a three games series against the National League East’s Atlanta Braves on Friday night. St. Louis entered the game 6.0 games ahead in first place, with a 61-34 record, while Atlanta entered the game 45-50, and 6.5 back of the first place Washington Nationals.
And, St. Louis kept their dominance at home going, with a 4-2 victory.
For the evening, the pitching match-up featured Tim Cooney (0-0, 3.33) for St. Louis, going up against Manny Banuelos (1-1, 1.08) for Atlanta.
During the top of the second inning, former Cardinal catcher A.J Pierzynski stepped up to the plate, and got a nice ovation from the Busch Stadium crowd. Pierzynski hit a single, but did not score in the inning.
But in the bottom of the second, the Cardinals scored first, as one of their best young players kept his hot streak going. After a walk issued to Yadier Molina, center fielder Randal Grichuk hit another two-run home run, his 11th home run of the season, to give the Cardinals an early 2-0 lead.
They added to that 2-0 lead the following inning. After consecutive groundouts by Cooney and Kolten Wong, third baseman Matt Carpenter doubled. Matt Holliday was then issued a walk. During the following at-bat, Jhonny Peralta hit a sharp single, that scored Carpenter, making it a 3-0 Cardinals lead.
That 3-0 lead became 4-0 when Mark Reynolds singled home Grichuk after he had singled himself in the previous at-bat.
Atlanta finally got on the board in the top of the sixth. Andrelton Simmons led off the inning with a single out to center field. Banuelos then hit a sacrifice bunt, advancing Simmons to second. Cameron Maybin doubled to score Simmons, to make it a 4-1 game. But Atlanta scored once again when, with Nick Markakis at the plate, Cooney threw a wild pitch that allowed Maybin to come home, and cut the Cardinals lead to two runs.
However, that was all Atlanta scored during the remainder of the night. Cooney exited the game before the top of the eighth, throwing a career high seven innings. His final line of the evening: 7.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 5 K.
Seth Maness and Kevin Siegrist, the latter of whom made his 50th MLB appearance of the season, kept the Braves in check the rest of the way, as the Cardinals defeated the Braves 4-2, with Cooney winning his first game. Banuelos drops to 1-2 on the year.
With the win, St. Louis heads into the weekend with a record of 62-34, while the Braves drop to 45-51.
(AP Photo/Tom Gannam)
