News
Cards fall despite Carpenter's brilliance
Righty loses perfect game in seventh; McClellan takes loss
By Matthew Leach / MLB.com
05/25/09 6:31 PM ET
MILWAUKEE -- The Cardinals took two recent trends to an unfortunate extreme on Monday.Even within a run of brilliant starting pitching, Chris Carpenter's performance against the Brewers stood out. Unfortunately for Carpenter, even within a stretch of offensive malaise, his teammates' showing stood out as well. Carpenter's eight dominating innings were wasted in a 1-0 loss to Milwaukee in a Memorial Day matinee.
Carpenter took a perfect game into the seventh. The Cardinals took a shutout into the 10th. Even at game's end, they had yet to allow an earned run. But two missed defensive opportunities set up Bill Hall for a game-ending 10th-inning single, and Kyle McClellan took the defeat on a day when Carpenter deserved to win.
"What usually happens is that you get a break, and there's the difference," said manager Tony La Russa.
In fact, the Brewers got two.
Casey McGehee led off the 10th with a grounder to third baseman Brian Barden, who couldn't corral the ball. McGehee reached on Barden's error, giving Milwaukee only its second leadoff baserunner of the game. Ryan Braun followed with a groundball up the middle that could have been a double play, but McClellan deflected it and St. Louis got only one out.
After an intentional walk to Prince Fielder, Mike Cameron reached on a force play. Hall smacked a 2-1 slider into the gap in right-center field, ending the game.
"With the last hitter, one out away from getting out of it, you don't put any extra pressure on yourself," McClellan said. "The average is on your side. You've just got to make pitches. I think he hit a good pitch. If I could go back and do it again, I'd probably throw the same pitch in the same spot."
While Barden put the loss on his own shoulders because of his error, and McClellan took responsibility for not getting the outs in the 10th, Monday's game was in fact lost on the other side of the ball entirely. An offense that has seemed to be swinging foam rubber bats for the second half of May continued to struggle.
Milwaukee starter Yovani Gallardo was all but impregnable. He didn't allow a hit for five innings, with his bid at history broken up by a Brendan Ryan infield single to lead off the sixth. He finished with two hits and four walks over eight innings, striking out six. Gallardo fanned Albert Pujols with a runner on first to end the eighth on his 126th pitch of the afternoon.
"I didn't see one, two pitches to hit," Ryan said.
The Cardinals have scored 34 runs in their past 13 games. Monday marked their second 1-0 loss in 10 days, and they haven't scored more than five runs in a game since May 10. It's a tribute to some outstanding starting pitching that Monday's loss was only their second in seven games.
"There were a handful of at-bats where, if we had executed better, we might have broken through," La Russa said. "I just think that with the way we're pitching, if we have better at-bats, we can keep winning our share."
They should have won Monday. Carpenter certainly deserved to win.
He was simply dominant over eight innings, holding Milwaukee to two hits without issuing a walk. He struck out 10 and needed only 93 pitches to record 24 outs. Carpenter likely could have lasted longer, but he was on a restricted pitch count because it was only his second start after a stint on the disabled list due to a strained left oblique muscle.
The layoff, though, magnifies what Carpenter has accomplished. Upon returning from the DL, he has shown no rust whatsoever.
"You just can't do what he's doing, to be this sharp, but he's doing it," La Russa said.
Carpenter's perfect game was broken up when Craig Counsell poked a leadoff single up the middle. He had still faced the minimum through seven, because Counsell was thrown out trying to steal second base. It was the 10th career 10-strikeout game for Carpenter, and according to STATS Inc., Carpenter is the third pitcher since 1954 not to allow an earned run in his first four starts of a season, joining Fernando Valenzuela in 1985 and Zack Greinke this year.
"I felt like we had a pretty good plan of what we wanted to do," Carpenter said. "From the first pitch on, I executed pretty well and kept the ball down and off-balance and all that stuff. It definitely was one of my better ones."
Without support, though, it was for naught. The Cardinals now trail the first-place Brewers by one game in the National League Central and have gone 0-4 against them this year.
Matthew Leach is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
