cardinals beat mets, 5-4; halt sweep; draft tonight!

after weeks of frustrating performance, the cardinals cut short the mets' efforts at an ugly 4-game sweep.

kyle lohse did very well on the mound, allowing only two hits, no walks, and one run (on a solo homer) through six innings. the bullpen behind him managed to let the mets back in the game. marc rzepczynski allowed a 2-run homer in the seventh to tie the game. eduardo sanchez allowed a run to score on a sac fly in the eighth after putting two runners in scoring position. this prompted a move to jason motte for a four-out save. motte shut down the mets for the last out in the eighth and a perfect ninth.

the offense woke up a little after scoring only one run in three games against the mets, with allen craig taking command. in the top of the fourth, holliday hit a leadoff double. craig drove him in with an RBI single. craig walked to lead off in the seventh inning, scoring after a freese single and daniel descalso reached on an error (descalso also walked twice today). adron chambers singled, then freese scored on a ground out by rafael furcal. allen craig supplied the last two runs by following a matt holliday single with a home run.

the cardinals never led by more than two runs all night, so the game was tense and close the whole way through.

it's hard to have a happy flight when you leave a series with three losses to one win, especially when one loss was a no-hitter and another a CGSO. but today's outcome sure beats the alternative.

while i'm not going to blame the outcomes on terrible scheduling, i'd like to point out that, for maybe the third time this year, the cardinals have some pretty substantial travel followed by a game the next day. the cardinals have to travel from NYC to houston to face the astros. this travel schedule and continuing strings of games without an off-day must be taking a toll on the team. the team had 5 off-days in april, and 2 in may. they have 3 in june, and won't see the next one until a week from today. they have a 3-game series in houston, then three games at home, without even a day game on thursday to make the houston-st. louis travel a little easier. they have two mondays off in a row, including one with no travel next week.

stay tuned here and at futureredbirds.net for info on tonight's draft! the first round and compensatory round take place tonight, starting at 6pm CDT. MLB.com and the MLB network will broadcast the picking process live.