| Judith A. Culp. 7th July, 2005 - 9:05 pm
 After splitting a four game series with the lowly Colorado Rockies, many Cardinal fans were worried about a West Coast road trip. This writer had hoped for a sweep, instead, the Cards came out and lost the first game of that series 7-0.
That was not the statement Cardinal Nation was looking for. However, July 1 saw Chris Carpenter win his 12th and the Cards shut out the Rockies, 6-0. Inexplicably, they lost the next game 3-1. Jason Marquis pitched a decent game, but could not get the run support from the Redbirds that night. The final game of that series was an exciting comeback victory for the Cardinals, winning 5-4. Surprisingly, the victory was not off of the big named batters, but from Abraham Nunez who singled Yadier Molina home in the bottom of the ninth.
The Cardinals began a road trip to Arizona on the Fourth of July that saw Matt Morris dominate the Diamondbacks with a 10-3 win. That pushes Matty Mo to a surprising 10-1 record. The second game of the series was a 7-1 pounding that improved Jeff Suppan’s record to 8-7. Last night was an extension of Chris Carpenter’s amazing season; he is now 13-4. The Redbirds won 2-1 on a suicide squeeze by David Eckstein.
The Cardinals enter tonight’s game with a season record of 54-30. All of the pre-season questions about how the team would perform without Edgar Renteria have been definitively answered. They also have a closer in Jason Isringhausen who boasts 23 saves. Albert Pujols is cruising into the All-Star break with a .343 batting average, 22 homeruns, 69 RBI and 8 stolen bases. All of this and he is suffering from plantar fasciitis. And while Pujols is not the starting first baseman in the All-Star game, St. Louis knows who the true All-Star has been for the past five years. The Cardinals show no signs of slowing down through the break and are preparing for the second half push. They are currently 12 ½ games in front of Houston in the NL Central. |
