The last time Lance Lynn stepped on the mound, it did not go well at all, as he only went 2/3 of an inning, while allowing seven runs in a 10-5 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates. On Tuesday night, he would get a chance to redeem himself in front of the hometown crowd at Busch Stadium.
And he did just that.
However, while he had a much better start than last week, the Cardinals were edged out by the Giants in a 2-0 loss.
After a half-hour weather delay, the game was underway, with the starting pitchers being Lynn (9-7, 2.95), and Ryan Vogelsong (8-8, 4.15).
While Lynn started off the game by throwing a 1-2-3 inning, Vogelsong’s first inning of work was a much harder affair. Matt Carpenter led off, and despite not getting on base, already raised the pitch count of Vogelsong to 10. By the end of the first inning, he had thrown 30 pitches.
However, fortunately for the Giants, it was still a scoreless first inning.
Lynn was able to get out of a walk issued to Brandon Crawford, by getting Louis Tomlinson to ground into a one-out double play to end the second inning. Both veteran pitchers kept the amount of hits low, and the scoring at zero throughout the first half of the game.
But that changed in the sixth inning.
Gregory Polanco led off the top of the inning with a single, which was followed by a single from Matt Duffy, putting two on and no one out. Later, with one out, Buster Posey walked, loading the bases for Crawford, who would ground out, but score Polanco in the process to make it 1-0 Giants.
Despite allowing the one run, Lynn continued to have an impressive night, pitching well into the seventh inning. With two outs in the seventh inning, Giants pitcher Madison Bumgarner entered the game as a pinch-hitter. Bumgarner, one of the best hitting pitchers in baseball, singled to left field, putting one on with two outs. As for Lynn, he would not make it out of the inning, as Randy Choate entered the game for the Cardinals to get the final out.
With two outs and the bases loaded, Choate faced off against Brandon Belt. And the score became 2-0 following Belt getting hit by a pitch, scoring Bumgarner. Seth Maness came into the game afterwards to take Choate’s place. Maness was able to get Posey to strike out, ending the inning, as the Giants stranded three runners.
In the eighth inning, Tyler Lyons entered to pitch in place of Maness for the Cardinals, throwing a scoreless inning. And in the ninth inning, Steve Cishek did the same , as the game headed to the bottom of the ninth, with the Giants leading 2-0.
Carpenter walked to lead off the bottom of the ninth, bringing up Stephen Piscotty with Santiago Casilla on the mound for the Giants. Casilla was able to strike out Piscotty for the first out of the inning. Next up to the plate was Jhonny Peralta, who also struck out. Brandon Moss then came up to bat with two outs, and Carpenter on first.
But Moss would be the final out of the game, as the Cardinals lost 2-0 to the Giants.
With the win, Vogelsong improved to 9-8, while Lynn dropped to 9-8. Casilla earned his 29th save of the year.
Tomorrow night, Jaime Garcia gets the start for St. Louis.
(Photo by Michael Thomas/Getty Images)
