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RECAP
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BOX SCORE
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GAME LOG
ATLANTA (AP) -- In between the thunderstorm and the flood of
errors, Jim Edmonds managed to stand out.
Edmonds homered twice to back six strong innings by St. Louis
starter Pat Hentgen, giving the Cardinals a rain-delayed, 12-5
victory over the Atlanta Braves on Thursday night in a meeting of
division leaders.
|  | | Jim Edmonds, right, is congratulated by Cardinals third base coach Jose Oquendo after a two-run homer off Braves starter Andy Ashby in the first inning. Edmonds connected for two dingers to give him 36 on the season. |
"Our offense is starting to turn it around a little bit," said
Edmonds, doing a pretty good impression of the injured Mark
McGwire. "I'm starting to feel better every day. I happened to get
two good pitches to hit."
The first pitch was held up 2 hours, 23 minutes by a spectacular
thunderstorm. Fans huddling under the stands gasped as streaks of
lightning exploded all around Turner Field, causing the power to
flicker and briefly knocking out two banks of lights.
Things got ugly at the end. The Braves made three of their four
errors in the eighth -- including two on one play -- as the Cardinals
pushed across four runs. Atlanta came back with four unearned runs
in the ninth, benefitting from a couple of St. Louis errors.
Edmonds, who hit his career-high 34th homer on Wednesday, wasted
no time pushing his total even higher against Andy Ashby. After
Fernando Vina led off with a double, extending his career-high
hitting streak to 16 games, Edmonds hit a two-run drive into the
left-center seats.
Edmonds flipped his bat away after connecting with the 2-0
fastball, while Ashby didn't even bother to watch.
The Cardinals put the game away with a three-run sixth and
Edmonds hit another homer, his 36th, to lead off the seventh.
"It just got out of hand," Braves manager Bobby Cox said.
"You're going to have games like that. We don't have too many like
that around here."
St. Louis maintained its 8½-game lead over Cincinnati in the NL
Central, while the Braves' margin in the East dropped to two games
over the idle New York Mets.
"It's important to keep our distance from Cincinnati," Edmonds said.
Javy Lopez hit his 21st homer in the third. That was the only
major mistake by Hentgen (13-9), who surrendered seven hits before
getting the rest of the night off. He kept the ball in play,
striking out one and walking none.
"We came to play tonight," Hentgen said. "We fought through
the long rain delay."
In the eighth, Edgar Renteria led off with his 15th homer, tying
the St. Louis record for homers by a shortstop set by Solly Hemus
in 1952.
Renteria, who also had an RBI single in the fourth, homered
against Gabe Molina, who was making his Atlanta debut after being
called up from Triple-A Richmond on Monday.
Ray Lankford added a solo homer, his 19th, in the ninth.
Ashby (8-11) continued to struggle, surrendering 10 hits and
five earned runs in 5 1-3 innings for his fourth loss in five
starts. He won his first three starts for the Braves after being
acquired from Philadelphia at the All-Star break.
"It's been this way off and on all year," he said. "It's
frustrating for me. I wish it was one thing. I don't know what it
is. I'm not making pitches, that's the bottom line."
Ashby also was thrown out at the plate in the fifth, but
third-base umpire Mike Fichter ruled a fan touched the ball as it
skimmed along the wall in the left-field corner to give Rafael
Furcal a ground-rule double.
Instead of being out of the inning, Hentgen had to pitch to
Andruw Jones with runners at second and third. Jones flew out to
center for the third out.
Mike Matheny had a two-run single in the sixth, and things
really got ugly in St. Louis' four-run eighth. Renteria's homer was
the only hit of the inning, but the Cardinals took advantage of
three errors, a walk and a hit batter.
Game notes
The announced attendance was 41,166, but many fans left
before the game even started and most of the others hung around for
only a few innings. By the final pitch, there were only a few
thousand still watching. ... Lopez left the game with a bruised
right forearm and underwent precautionary X-rays. He is day to day.
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ALSO SEE
Baseball Scoreboard
St. Louis Clubhouse
Atlanta Clubhouse
Not in the Cards? Hurting McGwire's return not imminent
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