Pozo's walkoff in extras gives Cards fifth straight win

By MATT PIKE

It took extra innings to do it, but the St. Louis Cardinals extended their winning streak to five games, beating the Cincinnati Reds 6-5 in 11 innings at Busch Stadium thanks to a clutch hit from Yohel Pozo. 

The Cardinals opened the scoring in the first inning on a two run home run by Alec Burleson, scoring Masyn Winn.  The Reds battled back though, first scoring a run in the third inning when Gavin Lux grounded into a double play, bringing home Matt McLain, before taking the lead in the seventh inning, Lux bringing in another run with a groundout, driving in Connor Joe, before Elly De La Cruz hit a two run home run to break a 2-2 tie, scoring McLain. 

Cincinnati extended their lead in the eighth inning with a sacrifice fly, Will Benson driving in Spencer Steer.  But in the bottom half of the inning, St. Louis started to battle back, scoring two runs on back to back RBI singles, the first by Winn scoring Victor Scott II and Burleson driving in Brendan Donovan to cut the lead to one.   Then in the ninth, Nolan Arenado led the inning off with a game tying home run, his 10th of the season, forcing extra innings. 

Neither team scored in the 10th, the Cardinals stranding the winning run at third base.  But in the 11th, St. Louis came through in the clutch thanks to Pozo, who came on to play catcher replacing Jose Barrero who had pinch ran in the 10th for Pedro Pagés.  With Jordan Walker at second, pinch running for Willson Contreras, Pozo singled with two outs to drive in Walker for the walk off win. 

Phil Maton earned the win in relief, earning his first win of the season moving to 1-2, pitching just the 11th inning and striking out three batters while walking one.  At the plate, Burleson was 2-for-5 with the home run and three RBI’s.  Scott II was also 2-for-4 with a run scored. 

St. Louis wraps up their series with Cincinnati tomorrow.  Miles Mikolas (4-4, 4.35 ERA) takes the mound for the Cardinals against Andrew Abbott (6-1, 1.84 ERA) for the Reds.  First pitch is at 1:15, and will be joined near the start of the game at 1:05 on KY 102 (102.5 FM). 

You can follow Matt on X @KfeqMatt.