Talkin' Baseball with Mary on Wednesday, Sept. 22

MLB SITE BY-MARY CLAUSEN


ALBERT CELEBRATING IN HIS WAY.
WE HOPE WE GET TO SEE THIS BUNCHES!
photo from: www.asset.espn.com

Cardinals 11 - Astros 2

Our Cardinals' Magic Number is 2!  Do you think we will clinch the National League Central Division Wednesday night? We could - we need to get a win from our Redbirds and then a loss from our good friends, the Cubs. We'll see.

Tuesday night our bats were back big time. We were able to get 15 hits off of the rookie Astros pitcher. We were hitting the ball up and down the lineup and also had home runs from Yadier Molina and Colby Rasmus. MinuteMaid Park was rocking with Cardinals hits!

Our bats were backing up Joel Pineiro, but he didn't really need much help.  He was rocking Tuesday night.  Some people have been worried that he was possibly wearing down because he's experienced a little dip in his numbers recently, but he was back on top of it all again Tuesday.  He just had to pitch 87 to get 21 outs. The really cool thing is out of the 87, 63 were strikes.  He struck out four and walked two. His sinker was really working for him Tuesday because he had 12 ground outs and only five hits were in the air.  He said after the game, "I had a good sinker today.  I used my sinker a lot."  He was able to get all-important win 15. He's been working on that win for a while.

Manager, Tony LaRussa, was glad that his guys had happy bats Tuesday night.  He said after the game,  "We have got a good offense. A lot of talent up and down the lineup. I can tell partly because of the guys that you sit.  We have guys that have an argument to play and they are not in the lineup.  So that tells me we are deep and good."

Wednesday we have John Smoltz (3-6) pitching and the Astros are using Norris (5-3).  He's a righty with an ERA of 5.07. Be sure to watch and root on your Cardinals!