St. Louis Cardinals avoid snake bite, sweep Diamondbacks

After weeks of bad play, the St. Louis Cardinals showed signs of getting it together with their three game sweep of the Arizona Diamondbacks.

The St. Louis Cardinals were able to avoid getting snake bitten with a sweep of the Arizona Diamondbacks. The Cardinals won Monday 7-1, Tuesday 3-2 and Wednesday 7-4.

Let’s discuss the good, the bad and the ugly of it all.

The Good

The hitters looked hitterish. Finally!  It was great to see the guys put together some hits, some really big hits, and score runs.

Monday’s scoring kicked off with a triple from Dylan Carlson in the third scoring Edmundo Sosa. In the seventh, Carlson singled to score Sosa. Paul Goldschmidt singled to score Carlson. Yadier Molina doubled to score Goldschmidt and Tyler O’Neill. Paul DeJong capped off the scoring with a two-run homer to left center:

The blast went 402-feet with an exit velocity of 106.7 mph.

Tuesday night featured a line drive homer off the left field foul pole by Nolan Arenado to score Tommy Edman. Take a look at the blast here.

Tommy Edman added a run after singling to right field to score Sosa.

Kwang Hyun Kim knocked a double to help himself on Wednesday to score Molina and Sosa. It’s great to see how excited he is to help himself and his team out!

In the third inning of Wednesday’s game, O’Neill hit a single to score Goldschmidt. Molina singled to score O’Neill. In the fourth, Goldschmidt singled to score Sosa. In the fifth, Edman singled to score O’Neill. And in the seventh, Edman grounded a force out and scored O’Neill.

Monday also gave us a pretty good start from Wade LeBlanc. He pitched 4.1 innings, giving up four hits including a homer to Josh Rojas. He did strikeout two. Good to see him deliver some innings and give his team a chance to win.

Carlos Martinez did an excellent job Tuesday going six innings for the Cardinals. He gave up four hits, two walks and one earned run. He struck out six. Nice to see him keep his composure, trust Molina and his teammates and get his fourth win of the season.

On Wednesday, Kim pitched five innings giving up three hits, three walks and one earned run. He also struck out five. Still couldn’t make it to the seventh inning stretch, but I hope we will see him do it soon.

Alex Reyes pitched two innings Tuesday giving up one hit, but striking out three. He was pumped between innings for certain. He got his 20th save of the season Wednesday pitching one inning, giving up one hit and striking out one.

The Bad

The Diamondbacks are 22-60 on the season now, but manager Torey Lovullo could at least try to create some opportunities. There were several times in the series the D-backs could have made things interesting but were held back by poor managerial decision. It doesn’t matter what the record is, that’s bad baseball.

The Ugly

The walks were still an issue for the pitching staff.

On Tuesday, Andrew Miller walked the bases loaded to bring in the Diamondbacks second run of the night. Cardinals television voice Dan McLaughlin noted during the broadcast this was the Cardinals 19th bases loaded walk of the season.

I’ll be happy to see the Cardinals break their habit of giving up walks at key moments of the game.

The Cardinals hit the road for a four game series with the Colorado Rockies. The team was decked out in sports coats for the trip. Looking very nice, indeed! It will be interesting to see what happens as Harrison Bader is expected to return to the team for Thursday’s game.