The Nooner #6: Weekend Highlights
The St. Louis Cardinals boast a three-game winning streak heading into their game against the American League Champion Tampa Bay Rays today in Jupiter, Florida. The gem of the weekend was Saturday’s game against the Washington Nationals. The Cardinals won the game 9-2, but the biggest story was Chris Carpenter pitching two innings of no-hit ball, followed by Ryan Franklin pitching three innings and allowing no runs on one hit while striking out five. Sunday, the Cardinals and Florida Marlins played a wild game in stormy weather that ended with St. Louis on top 14-10. Joel Piniero allowed one unearned run on two hits in his two innings of work. The team bashed out 19 hits, and six different Cardinals had at least one RBI. But the real star of the game was outfielder Brian Barton, who went 3-5 with a double, two home runs, and six RBI. For more details and full box scores, check out the St. Louis Cardinals’ home page.
TEASER: Saturday night I attended what will surely become another benchmark for the approach of Opening Day year in and year out. Check back later tonight for details!
Posted on March 2, 2009, in Baseball Dailies, Nooners and tagged american league, barton, cardinals, carpenter, franklin, jupiter, marlins, nationals, piniero, rays. Bookmark the permalink. 9 Comments.
(:> Bird Brained 
Can’t wait to find out what you attended!
Julia
http://werbiefitz.mlblogs.com/
It’s good to see Chris Carpenter back in action and mostly healthy, although I hated what he did to my Pirates. How’s he look anyways? Is he the #1 guy again?
Julie – All in good time!
eatsleep – A 100% Chris Carpenter is the ace of this (and almost any other) pitching staff. He pitched well, but from what I heard on the radio he was throwing mostly off-speed stuff. The good thing is his location was reported as really on. But I’m not convinced we’ll see a 100% Chris Carpenter this season, which makes Adam Wainwright the ace. Either way you look at it, Carpenter is on the downside of his career and Wainwright is on the upside…make of that what you will. But these two guys healthy and pitching gives the Cards one of the best 1-2 punches in MLB.
Chris
I hope that Carpenter can stay healthy for a whole year, remember 05?
http://thewrightway.mlblogs.com/
Good to hear that Chris Carpenter is looking good again. Where does he fit into the pitching staff?
-Elizabeth
http://redsoxgirl46.mlblogs.com
gomets & redsoxgirl – It all depends on his health and stamina. If he is the Carp of 2005-2006, he’s the ace. If he’s effective but only able to go 6 innings most nights, well then he’s probably the best fifth starter in baseball. Luckily the Cards’ system is loaded with pitchers and outfielders to trade, so if Carp does have issues the team has plenty of potential options. But it’s hard to envision them as a better team without Chris Carpenter in the rotation.
Chris
Congrats on breaking the top 20. Keep it up. We could use some good Redbird folk around the ‘sphere which is dominated by Boston and New York fans.
–Jeff
http://redstatebluestate.mlblogs.com/
I am happy Chris Carpenter is looking better this year. He is awesome. And I love Brian Barton. 🙂
Melissa
http://clemsongirlbaseball.mlblogs.com
Hey brotha, tell your Cardinals thanks for the beating they gave my Mets this afternoon. I hate watching stuff like that!
– Donnie
http://donnieanks.mlblogs.com/