The Cardinals’ Favorite Cheese

Colby Jack.

Colby Rasmuswas the no-doubter Hero last night.  Two home runs, an early one to give the Cards a comfortable lead and a late one to break a tie in the ninth inning, plus a triple (and a run scored on a wild pitch) in the middle to boot.  These were the kind of games we thought we’d see out of Rasmus this year and it’s going to be even more difficult for National League pitchers to navigate the Cardinal lineup if he is growing into this type of player.

Chris Carpenter didn’t look quite vintage Carp, but he was pretty close.  I was a little surprised to learn that he’d never put up back-to-back double-digit strikeout games before.  Then again, while Carp can get the K, he uses his defense a lot as well.

Carpenter apparently was battling in more than just the traditional baseball sense.  He really took exception to being hit by a pitch from Edwin Jackson, especially, as he noted, that he’s not exactly a Silver Slugger up there at the plate.  I don’t think he was thinking that he had been hit intentionally, I think it was the frustration of a master craftsman with a talented but unthinking worker in the same field.  Carp knows that he’d never hit someone in that instance because he’s pitching them so differently.  Jackson should have been, but wasn’t thinking the way a top notch pitcher would have been.

Mike commented on the post here before the series started that Arizona’s bullpen was worse than St. Louis’s.  We saw that some in Game 1, but it definitely came to fruition last night.  I was thinking that was likely the reason we saw Dan Haren and Jackson go so long, so the Diamondbacks wouldn’t have to get into that bullpen.  Giving up five runs in the ninth of a tie game, well, Cardinal fans can empathize with that and are just glad that, for once, our team was on the giving end of one of those debacles.

Not that the Cardinal pen was much better in this series, including last night.  I’ve always thought that Trever Millerwas one of the more consistent guys down in the bullpen.  He’s not necessarily going to face a lot of batters, but the ones he does face he usually retires.  Not last night.  Miller was hit hard and then threw a wild pitch to let the tying run in.  You know it’s a rough night when they remove you for Jason Motte.

Motte looked solid, though he ran up a lot of full counts.  He just blew his fastball past Justin Upton and did throw some offspeed stuff for strikes.  If he can continue this growth pattern, there might be fewer Tums purchases in the St. Louis area this season.

Off day today, so we’ll look at Jaime Garcia vs. Tim Lincecum tomorrow!