Kolten Wong Jolts Cardinals to Win

Kolten Wong came into Thursday night’s game batting just .205 in his last ten games, but added to his .239 season’s average in a big way. The Cardinals jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first inning against Red Sox hurler Brandon Workman thanks to a Jhonny Peralta double scoring Wong and Matt Carpenter, and an Oscar Taveras single that scored Peralta. With Adam Wainwright on the mound, the lead seemed enough, and ultimately would be.

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Wainwright needed 120+ pitches to make it through seven innings, but gave up just two runs on seven hits and two walks. Wainwright retired eleven batters in a row before allowing a Daniel Nava single and settled in nicely after surrendering two runs in the third. Wainwright, who recently joined Twitter as @UncleCharlie50, lived up to his name in the seventh inning with a knee buckling curve ball for a called third strike against Boston outfielder Yoenis Cespedes. The win put Wainwright’s record at 14-6 on the season and kept the Redbirds just one game back from the Milwaukee Brewers, who also won on Thursday.

The offense struggled until the fifth innings when Kolten Wong hit a solo homer off of Brandon Workman (1-5). Wong wasn’t done their, adding another solo blast, and possibly the longest homer of the season to right field, in the seventh off of reliever Craig Breslow. Wong became the first Cardinals second baseman with a multi-homerun game since Tyler Greene did so in 2012 against Houston. Despite missing time this season and sustaining an unimpressive .239 batting average has hit 9 homeruns this season, with eight of the nine coming since July 6.

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With a three-run lead, the Cardinals sent out Kevin Siegrist to work a scoreless eighth and Pat Neshek to close it out in the ninth. The save was the second of the season for Neshek, who continues to have an unbelievable season with an ERA under one. The win gave the Cardinals their second series victory in a row after suffering a disappointing loss to the Padres where they dropped two of three. St. Louis continues interleague play Friday when they begin a three game set with the AL East leading Baltimore Orioles (65-49).