One night removed from suffering one of their worst defeats of the season (for multiple reasons), the St. Louis Cardinals still held a 5.5 game lead in the National League Central as they began a series against their longtime rivals… the Chicago Cubs.
And Monday afternoon’s game went even worse for St. Louis than Sunday night’s did.
From beginning to end, the Cubs offense was firing on all cylinders, as was a former Cardinal pitcher, blanking the Cardinals 9-0.
The starting pitchers for the afternoon were Lance Lynn (11-8, 2.80), going up against Dan Haren (8-9, 3.89).
Dexter Fowler led off the game with a solo home run off of Lynn to immediately give the Cubs a 1-0 lead. He later scored Starlin Castro and Addison Russell in the second inning to make it 3-0. What’s interesting is that, while the Cubs scored nine runs, almost all of them actually occurred in the top of the third inning.
It started when Anthony Rizzo doubled deep to center field, scoring Chris Coghlan to make it 4-0. For the veteran Lynn, a single by Miguel Montero not only added a run, but also sealed his fate, as he was taken out in favor of Seth Maness before even pitching a full three innings. Later in the inning, Russell hit a three run home run to suddenly turn it into an 8-0 game.
Meanwhile, the former Cardinal pitcher Haren was lights out, throwing seven scoreless innings, as Gerrit Cole was the night before. He struck out five batters, walked two, only allowed seven hits, and lowered his ERA to 3.73 on the season.
In the end, Lynn dropped to 11-9 on the season, while the Cardinals dropped to 87-50 on the year.
Due to Pittsburgh losing to the Reds, however, the Cardinals are still 5.5 games ahead in first place.
On Tuesday, Michael Wacha will get the start on the mound.
(Photo by Michael Thomas/Getty Images)
