By MATT PIKE
The St. Louis Cardinals extended their win streak to four games in a row, coming off a sweep of the Chicago White Sox on the road and opening up a home series with the Cincinnati Reds with a 6-1 win.
The Cardinals scored one lone run in the third inning on a sacrifice fly by Alec Burleson, driving in Brendan Donovan, before the Redbirds blew the lead open in the seventh inning with a five run frame against former Royals reliever Scott Barlow, who replaced former Royals starting pitcher Brady Singer on the mound for the Reds.
After getting Jordan Walker to pop out to open the seventh, Barlow walked Pedro Pagés and hit Victor Scott II with a pitch before leaving with an injury and being replaced by Taylor Rogers. Rogers walked Donovan before giving up a run on an RBI single to Masyn Winn. With the bases still loaded following the single, Rogers struck out Burleson, but then walked Nolan Gorman for another run and was replaced by Tony Santillan.
Santillan nearly got out of the inning, but a throwing error by third baseman Gavin Lux allowed Thomas Saggese to reach first safely, bringing home Donovan and Winn, and gave up and RBI single to Lars Nootbaar for the final run, scoring Gorman. Jose Trevino doubled in the eighth inning on a line drive to bring home Santiago Espinal for the lone run by Cincinnati after Espinal pinch hit for Will Benson and singled off reliever John King to open the inning.
Andre Pallante earned the win for the Cardinals, improving to 5-3 on the season, pitching six shutout innings and giving up just two hits, striking out four and walking one. At the plate, Winn was 2-for-5 with a double and an RBI while Nootbaar was 2-for-4 driving in a run.
St. Louis and Cincinnati continue their series tomorrow. Sonny Gray (7-2, 3.84 ERA) takes the mound for the Cardinals against Brent Suter (1-0, 2.91 ERA) for the Reds. First pitch is at 1:15pm, pregame will be joined around 1:05 on KY 102 (102.5 FM).
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