The St. Louis Cardinals left Arizona feeling a little bit better about themselves
Max Pacioretty Jersey , thanks to a late-inning surge by the offense and another strong outing from Miles Mikolas.
The Cardinals scored seven times in the seventh and eighth innings to beat Arizona 8-4 on Wednesday night. After coming to town on a four-game losing
streak and off a three-game sweep at the hands of Atlanta, St. Louis took two of
three from the first-place Diamondbacks.
Yadier Molina’s three-run homer on the first pitch from reliever Fernando Salas highlighted a five-run Cardinals seventh inning after Arizona had nursed a
2-1 lead through six in front of a sellout crowd of 44,072.
”Had some big hits today,” St. Louis manager Mike Matheny said. ”It allows those big five-run innings to happen. Wear the pitcher down, wear the defense
down. Then you have Yadi come in and do something special on the back end.”
Tommy Pham drove in three Cardinals runs with a double and two singles. Matt Carpenter doubled twice and singled with one RBI.
”Carp kind of set the tone. He got on base a lot,” Pham said. ”I think we had good at-bats. Even when the results weren’t there, we made guys throw pitches.
That’s key. If a guy is taking four or five plus pitches to get outs, that means
you are grinding as a hitter. When you put that together as a team, it wears out
pitching staffs.”
The Diamondbacks dropped to 1-5 on their homestand and lead the surging Los Angeles Dodgers by just a half-game in the NL West.
Mikolas (9-3) gave up two runs and seven hits, walked four and struck out three.
Arizona reliever Yoshihisa Hirano (2-1) had his franchise-record streak of 26 games without allowing a run end when Yairo Munoz homered to lead off the
seventh. Hirano gave up four runs, one earned, on three hits in two-thirds of an
inning for his first loss since coming to the major leagues from Japan this
season.
”Yoshi’s human
Shayne Gostisbehere Jersey ,” Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said. ”That’s what it means, right? And he’s absolutely spoiled us. He’s been a
slam-dunk reliever and he made a really tough game look easy for a long
time.”
After Munoz’s homer, shortstop Ketel Marte booted pinch-hitter Tyler O’Neill’s grounder for an error. With one out and O’Neill on second, Pham
singled to center to put the Cardinals up 3-2. Center fielder Jarrod Dyson left
the game with discomfort in his right groin area, Lovullo said.
Salas relieved Hirano and gave up the big hit to Molina, who homered twice in the series.
”It was like two totally different games,” Lovullo said. ”The first six innings were exactly the way you’d like to see guys go out and execute and do
their job, and then the final three innings unfortunately we couldn’t execute in
a lot of key areas.”
HARD-LUCK LEFTY
Arizona starter Patrick Corbin allowed one run and six hits in six innings, his third straight strong outing without a decision. He’s given up two runs in
19 innings during those three starts.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Cardinals: Paul DeJong (broken left hand) homered and doubled and played shortstop all nine innings Tuesday night in his fourth rehab game for Triple-A
Memphis. Matheny said DeJong would not be activated Thursday in San Francisco
but could be at some time during the four-game series.
Diamondbacks: Right-handed reliever Randall Delgado (left oblique strain) was scheduled to make another rehab appearance for Triple-A Reno and is expected to
be activated Thursday, the end of his rehab assignment. … OF Steven Souza Jr.
(strained right pectoral) had Wednesday off in his rehab assignment with Reno
after homering twice for the Aces on Tuesday night. Souza has three homers in
his last two rehab games.
UP NEXT
Cardinals: Head to San Francisco for four games against the Giants. RHP Luke Weaver (4-7, 5.16 ERA) starts for St. Louis in Thursday night’s opener. Johnny
Cueto (3-0, 0.84) comes off the disabled list to pitch for the Giants.
Diamondbacks: RHP Shelby Miller (0-2
Reilly Smith Jersey , 11.42), following two rough starts in his return from Tommy John surgery, takes the mound Thursday night in the opener of a
four-game home series against San Diego. LHP Eric Lauer (3-5, 5.08) goes for the
Padres.
—
The Jacksonville Jaguars will go down in history as the NFL’s top rushing team in 2017.
They haven’t looked like it lately.
The Jaguars failed run the ball with much consistency during the second half of the season, including a wild-card victory against Buffalo. Jacksonville found
few holes against the Bills until quarterback Blake Bortles started scrambling
in the second half. Still, the lack of a reliable ground attack is a major
concern for the third-seeded Jaguars (11-6) heading into Sunday’s playoff game
at No. 2 seed Pittsburgh (13-3).
”It starts with us up front,” rookie left tackle Cam Robinson said.
Coach Doug Marrone agreed, saying ”if they’re not doing their job up front, it’s going to be very difficult.”
”We have to figure it out and get it done in a quick fashion,” Marrone added.
Little, if anything, changed down the stretch while Jacksonville continued to struggle.
The Jaguars averaged 3.58 yards a carry over the final seven weeks of the regular season
http://www.officialredwings.com/authentic-adidas-dylan-larkin-jersey , ranking 30th in the NFL. They ran for 155 yards in a 10-3 victory against the
Bills, but more than half of those came from Bortles. His 88 yards rushing were
the most by a Jaguars player in nearly a month.
Rookie Leonard Fournette hasn’t looked the same since spraining his right ankle against the Los Angeles Rams in mid-October. He ran for 181 and 130 yards
in consecutive weeks against the Steelers and the Rams, respectively, and broke
off long touchdown runs in both games.
He’s topped the century mark twice – both barely – since.
Bortles has picked up the slack at times, but he’s not a guy the Jaguars rely on week in and week out to carry the offense.
They are built to run the ball and play stout defense.
”It’s who we are,” Bortles said. ”We want to be able to run the football and do it different ways, so we have to figure it out, whether it’s a
during-the-week practice thing or execution thing on Sundays. … It’s a big part
of our offense and who we are and who we want to be, so it’s important that we
figure it out.”
There doesn’t seem to be an easy fix since the problem appears to stem from several factors:
-Fournette is facing more stacked lines of scrimmage than any running back in the league. Of his 268 carries in 2017, 31 percent of them (82) came against
eight- and nine-man boxes, according to ESPN Stats & Info. That’s nine more
than second-place
-Fournette is missing holes and assignments. He’s running with authority, but not waiting for holes or looking for cutback lanes.
-Opponents are loading up against the run because they have little respect for Bortles and a banged-up receiving corps that features two rookies. Allen
Robinson (knee) was lost for the season on Jacksonville’s third offensive
play
Filip Forsberg Jersey , and Allen Hurns (ankle) and Marqise Lee (ankle) have been slowed lately. Although newcomers Keelan Cole and Dede Westbrook have
been better than expected, they looked like rookies in recent weeks.
-Jacksonville’s offensive line has been average at best, and every starter has missed games with injuries. Brandon Linder, one of the league’s highest-paid
centers, has been solid. But guards A.J. Cann and Patrick Omameh have struggled
at times in a rushing attack that averaged 1.9 yards before contract (also 30th
in the league) over the final seven weeks of the regular season.
”Right now, we have to do a better job,” Marrone said. ”Your performance on Sunday, that’s going to be who you are for that week until you change it or you
sustain what you’re doing well.”
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