Braves, Cardinals Tied for NL Wild-Card Lead
By Editorial Staff
The Atlanta Braves September collapse continued last night, as the club dropped yet another game. After their 7-1 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies and St. Louis’s comeback win over the Astros, the Braves find themselves tied with the Cardinals for the National League wild-card lead.
Atlanta couldn’t have felt very confident entering Tuesday’s matchup with Philadelphia. Not only had the Braves dropped six of their last seven games to the Phillies, but they were sending Derek Lowe to the mound.
Lowe continued his abysmal September, allowing five runs on six hits over four innings of work. After last night’s loss, Lowe is now 0-5 this month with an ERA of 8.24.
The support was more than enough for Phillies starter Roy Oswalt, who logged six shutout innings. On the night, Atlanta’s offense only mustered a single run on four hits.
The Braves have now lost four straight and seven of their nine September series. Atlanta’s only scored 2.6 runs per game over their last ten, resulting in a 3-7 stretch.
St. Louis finds themselves on the other end of the spectrum, playing about as good as a team could be playing right now. With their 13-6 comeback victory over the Astros Tuesday night, the Cardinals have now won seven of their last ten and are 17-8 over the month of September.
After falling behind 5-0 over the first three frames, St. Louis’s bats came alive. The Cardinals evened things up by putting up a five spot in the 5th.
Houston again took the lead, but St. Louis finished the night scoring four, three and one runs in the 7th, 8th and 9th innings. Amazingly enough, Albert Pujols, Lance Berkman or Matt Holliday didn’t collect a single RBI last night for the Cardinals. Allen Craig, Holliday’s replacement, Skip Schumaker, and Nick Punto carried St. Louis’s offense, combining to drive in nine runs.
Both the Braves and the Cardinals will send their aces to the mound for Wednesday’s season finale. Chris Carpenter takes on the Astros while Tim Hudson tries to silence Philadelphia’s bats.
If the teams remain tied, a one game playoff will be held Thursday. The teams would play in St. Louis Thursday night to determine who moves on to the NLDS.
For more on the Braves and Cardinals, be sure to check out Tomahawk Take and Redbird Rants.