With Wednesday night’s game against the Nationals being rained out, the Cards faced the prospects of a good old fashioned day-night double header. St. Louis took care of business in Game 1 behind another stellar effort from Todd Wellemeyer, who recorded his 7th win of the year by shutting out Washington through 6 innings. The offense was paced by Troy Glaus, who was just warming up in hitting his 3rd home run in 5 days, and Albert Pujols, who hit his first career pinch-hit home run. Rookie Joe Mather added his first career extra-base hit, an RBI double.
Unfortunately, the Cards were unable to keep it going in the nightcap and lost 10-9 in 10 innings. Rookie Mike Parisi struggled for the second straight outing, giving up 8 runs in just 4 innings of work. The Cards actually fought their way back from that hole in the 6th inning, however, as Troy Glaus continued his hot streak with his 6th home run of the year and rookie pitcher Mark Worrell, who came into the game in relief of Parisi, blasted a homer in his first career at-bat. Rookie Joe Mather hit his first big league homer in the 10th and looked to be the hero as the Cards took a 9-8 lead, but new closer Ryan Franklin blew his 3rd save of the year when he gave up a walk-off, 2-run homer to Elijah Dukes in the bottom half of the inning.
The Cards will take anothe rseries win, however, and head backto Minute Maid Park to face the Astros. Braden Looper (7-4, 5.03 ERA) will face Houston righty Brian Moehler (2-2, 4.54 ERA) tonight at 7:05pm (Central time).
