Rookie Dylan Carlson homered, doubled and drove in three runs to lead the St. Louis Cardinals (28-26) to a 4-2 win over the Milwaukee Brewers (27-29) at Busch Stadium in St. Louis on Thursday night.
The Cardinals trail the division leading Chicago Cubs by 2 1/2 games, while the Brewers may have put themselves in a situation to need to win out or at least capture three of their four remaining games to have a chance at the playoffs.
Their best chance was supposed to be Thursday night with Corbin Burnes (4-1) on the hill. He entered with a 4-0 record and 1.77 ERA. But Burnes didn’t have his good stuff and ended up leaving in the fourth inning with lower back discomfort, after allowing a home run for just the second time this season.
Three wins in the last four games would give the Brewers a 30-30 season and that may or may not be good enough to make the postseason. They’ve now dropped three of their last four games, with a doubleheader against the Cardinals on Friday.
Tyrone Taylor and Eric Sogard delivered the only two run scoring hits for the Brewers. Runs have been hard to come by most of the season. Thursday night, the Brewers had nine hits, but went just 2 for 9 with runners in scoring position.
St. Louis starter Kwang Hyun Kim (3-0) went five innings to pick up the win. He allowed one run on five hits, making just his seventh career start. Andrew Miller got the final two outs to record his fourth save.
Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina had two hits to reach 2,000 for his career. He’s just the 12th catcher in major league history to reach the 2,000 hit milestone. He’s the sixth player to collect 2,000 hits with the Cardinals.
St. Louis went just 1-for-16 with runners in scoring position, yet still won the game.