Talkin Baseball with Mary on Monday, August 24

SMOLTZ IS TOUGH
AND HE'S A CARDINAL!
photo from: www.blog.ajc.com

John Smoltz is in th house.  Hemade his Cardinal pitcher debut on Sunday, August 23.  Smoltz showed all of us that he's still got it!

He threw five scoreless innings and set a club record for seven straight strikeouts in a game.  He was awesome. He threw nine total Ks in the game. Everyone thinks we should try him again as a starter (duh!). Smoltz will start the game on Friday against the Washington Nationals.  Sunday we got most of our runs playing good old hit 'n run baseball (aka Whitey Ball). The Padres scored after the bullpen took over in the fifth.  Our Cardinals beat the Padres 5-2 and we won the series 3 games to 1. Is that cool or what?  

Albert Pujols, who has been struggling at the plate, belted his 40th home run in the game. Wow! This home run made his fifth consecutive year to hit 40 home runs. Albert, Mark McGwire, Johnny Mize, Rogers Horsnby and Jim Edmonds are the only players to have hit 40 home runs in a season for the Cardinals. Albert is now the 20th player in Major League Baseball history to hit forty home runs in five consecutive years. He's something!

Smoltz pitched five scoreless innings and then our bullpen took over.  The bullpen was a little nerve wracking at times, but Franklin was able to get his 32nd win. Yea! Want more? We're still 8.0 games ahead of the Cubbies in the Central Division. Cool. The Cardinals are also sitting 17 games over .500.

We have the day off Monday and then open a three-game series on Tuesday against the Houston Astros (it's the beginning of a nine-game home stand). Adam Wainwright (14-7) will pitch for our Birds and Rodriguez (12-7) will have the ball for the Astros.


WHAT FENCE WILL
IT GO OVER?
photo from: www.ww2,bc.edu.com