The Milwaukee Brewers continued their homestand with a doubleheader against the St. Louis Cardinals.
There will be five games in three days between the teams due to canceled games. Many St. Louis players and coaches tested positive for COVID-19 earlier in the season, which is a result of multiple double-headers for St. Louis against several teams.
Brewers 2, Cardinals 1
In addition to being no-hit on Sunday against the Chicago Cubs and Alec Mills, it took the Brewers another eight innings to record a run. Counting Saturday’s game, the Brewers went 22 innings straight without scoring a run.
Both starting pitchers had great games. Kwang-Hyun Kim went seven innings and gave up only three hits over 87 pitches. Josh Lindblom impressed as he returned to the mound as a starting pitcher. The Brewers’ righty pitched five strong innings and gave up three hits. He could have gone longer, but with Devin Williams and Josh Hader ready to go, Counsell wasn’t going to take any chances.
The game went into extra innings, and lead to the Cardinals scoring a run with Freddy Peralta on the mound.
But the Brewers were tired of not scoring. Avisail Garcia started off the inning by drawing a walk. With Tyrone Taylor at second (new MLB postseason rule) and Garcia at first, Christian Yelich had a heartbreaking strike out at the plate. It hurts my heart.
Ryan Braun was clutch again, hitting a double into deep center. Taylor scored and Garcia was held up at third.
After Jace Peterson walked, Keston Hiura hit the game-winning sacrifice fly to left to bring in Garcia.
Milwaukee breaks out of their hitless and scoreless slumps to win a crucial game.
Cardinals 3, Brewers 2
Both starters were great again for the second game. Daniel Ponce de Leon had three scoreless innings before giving up a single to Daniel Vogelbach and a two-run blast from Jedd Gyorko. But he couldn’t compete with Corbin Burnes.
Burnes was on fire and throwing fire again. He pitched four and 2/3 innings of the seven and ended with five hits and 10 strike outs and the chance for the win.
Would he get it though?
He would not. The Brewers offense didn’t do much. The Cardinals had a lead-off double from Paul Goldschmidt in the seventh, followed by an RBI single by Brad Miller to tie the game at two after getting a run in the fifth inning.
The Brewers had their chance again in the bottom of the seventh inning. Vogelbach got his second hit of the night, and Eric Sogard came in to pinch-run. After a wild pitch landed Sogard at second, Luis Urias walked. They reached second and third base, but no runs would score.
Onto the eighth! The Brewers had runners on first and second after Garcia was hit by a pitch and eventually had bases loaded with two outs. But three strikeouts in the inning cost the Brewers the game.
The Cardinals scored in the top of the ninth and the Brewers weren’t able to respond.
The Brewers lose another game with way too many strike outs (16) and way too many left on base.
Milwaukee splits the first double-header with St. Louis.
Double-Header Take Aways
Ryan Braun Forever. He is keeping the Milwaukee Brewers within reach of the playoffs. He scored Milwaukee’s only run on Friday, only two on Saturday and the first run of Monday’s win.
Corbin Burnes. His season and month have been great so far. What a comeback story. Keep it up, Corbin.
String Some Wins Together. The Brewers need to start winning. Keep Craigtember going. Importantly, they can still top the Cardinals and Reds for a playoff spot. After everything that has happened so far, it would be bittersweet and glorious to see a third straight playoff appearance.
The Brewers are now 21-25 with 14 games left to play.
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