Redbirds Week in Review: 4/23/12 – 4/29/12

Let’s take a look at what happened during a big rivalry week in the Central division for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Monday, April 23, 2012 – Cubs 3 Cardinals 2

It’s never fun to lose to your rival. It’s even less fun to have your closer blow the lead in the ninth to lose to your rival. This is exactly what happened to St. Louis. The Cubs got out to an early lead on a 1^st inning sac fly by Alfonso Soriano. The Cardinals took the lead back in the 4^th on a rally started by Skip Schumaker and Matt Holliday. Carlos Beltran drove in Schumaker with a groundout that also advanced Holliday and then Yadier Molina drove in the second run with a sacrifice fly. Then the ninth inning came. It started out innocently enough. Jason Motte struck out Soriano. He then walked Bryan LaHair and Geovany Soto. Motte got Steve Clevenger to ground out. Joe Mather then came up and got the winning single for the Cubs.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012 – Cubs 3 Cardinals 2

It’s never fun to lose to your rival. It’s even less fun to lose on a walkoff two nights in a row to your rival. Let’s relive shall we? Adam Wainwright pitched his best game to that point in the season only giving up a first inning run on a David DeJesus lead off double and a sac fly by Starlin Castro. Matt Holliday responded finally in the 8^th with a two run homer. Marc Rzepczynski then pitched a scoreless 8^th and in the ninth gave up a home run to Bryan LaHair to blow the save. Fernando Salas came in in the 9^th and got out of the inning. In the bottom of the 10^th Tony Camapna got single and stole second much to the chagrin of Mike Matheny, so much so that he got ejected. Salas struck out Starlin Castro then walked LaHair intentionally. That was a bad idea. Alfonso Soriano got the game winning hit off Tyler Greene‘s glove to win the game.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012 – Cardinals 5 Cubs 1 

I’m glad Mike Matheny listned to me and kept Lance Lynn as a starter. Maybe he didn’t but I like to think he did. Lynn shut down the Cubs giving up a run over 8 innings while striking out 7 to move to 4-0 on the season. The big bats of Carlos Beltran and David Freese drove in the runs to break the 1-1 tie in the 6^th with a double by Beltran and Freese’s fourth home run. Freese drove in a tack on run in the eighth with a double of his own.

Friday, April 27, 2o12 – Cardinals 13 Brewers 1 

Jake Westbrook continued his great start moving to 3-1. He gave up sone run over seven strong innings. The story was the Cardinal bats especially the eight run third. Jon Jay singled and Matt Holliday walked. Carlos Beltran and David Freese drove them in with singles. Yadier Molina walked and Matt Carpenter drove in Beltran and Freese with a double. Yovani Gallardo was done after that. Mike McClendon came in and was greeted rudely by Skip Schumaker who drove in Molina with a single. Jake Westbrook bunted Schumaker to second. Furcal walked. Jay got his second hit of the inning and drove in Carpenter and Schumaker. Holliday singled in Furcal for the last run of the inning. Beltran lined into a double play to end the inning. Jay and Holliday got RBI hits again in the 5^th and Molina got an RBI double to conclude the scoring.

Saturday, April 28, 2012 – Cardinals 7 Brewers 3

Yadier Molina received his gold glove than preceded to have a party at the expense of Brewers pitching. Kyle Lohse got the win and got the opening rally started with a walk. Rafael Furcal reached on an error. Jon Hay singled in Lohse and Matt Holliday grounded out to score Furcal. The Cardinals and Brewers traded home runs as Aramis Ramirez homered then David Freese and then Alex Gonzalez did. George Kottaras walked to tie the game in the sixth. Molina responded in the bottom of the sixth with a two run home run. Skip Schumaker iced the game with a two run double.

Sunday, April 29, 2012 – Brewers 3 Cardinals 2

Rafael Furcal staked the Cards to 1-0 lead in the second with an RBI single. The Brewers scored their three runs in the sixth with an RBI single by Aramis Ramirez and a two run double by Jonathan Lucroy. Daniel Descalso drove in a run on a force in the bottom of the eighth to cut it to 3-2. The Cardinals baserunning did them in especially in the ninth when Tyler Greene was caught trying to steal home on a double steal to end the game.

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