Brewers fall to Cardinals 9-5 on Goldschmidt’s 3 home run day

WP: John Gant (1-0)
LP: Taylor Williams (0-1)

HR: Paul Goldschmidt 3 (1,2,3), Ryan Braun (1), Christian Yelich (2)

Box Score

Please welcome your newest Brewer killer to the NL Central: Paul Goldschmidt. In his second game with the Cardinals, he hit three home runs off the Brewers pitching staff as the Brewers lost to the Cardinals tonight, 9-5.

The damage started right away in the first inning, when the Cardinals took an early 2-0 lead two batters in after Goldschmidt’s first home run of the day. Other noted Brewer killer Yadier Molina also contributed in the first inning, hitting an RBI double to stake the Cardinals to an early 3-0 lead.

The Brewers did manage to rally from that deficit early. In the bottom of the third, Lorenzo Cain singled and Christian Yelich walked to set up Ryan Braun, who hit a three-run home run to tie the game at 3-3. The two teams then traded runs in the fourth, with Paul DeJong driving in a run with an RBI single, and Yasmani Grandal driving in Jesus Aguilar with a sacrifice fly. That tied the game at 4-4 after 4 innings.

Paul Goldschmidt then came up with his second home run of the day in the sixth, a solo shot to put the Cardinals up 5-4. It continued downhill from there, as Kolten Wong and Matt Carpenter singled to set up Goldschmidt again, who homered for the third time of the day to increase the Cardinals lead to 8-4. Yadier Molina scored on a wild pitch in the eighth to account for the Cardinals ninth run, and Christian Yelich homered for the second time in two days to account for the final 9-5 score.

Freddy Peralta struggled in his first start of the season. He allowed a total of four runs, three of those coming in the first inning. He also allowed six hits and three walk, and just struck out three. Peralta did pitch into the fourth, but he was taken out of the game after allowing two hits to start off the fourth. Matt Albers came in to finish off the fourth, allowed a walk and a hit (which allowed one of Peralta’s runners to score), but did strike out two in his inning of work. Alex Claudio made his Brewers debut in the fifth, and worked around a walk for a clean inning. Taylor Williams took the sixth, allowed a home run and another hit, but nothing else. Jacob Barnes had the seventh inning, and he allowed three runs on three hits. Chase Anderson took the last two innings, and he also allowed a run, this one coming on two hits, two walks, and a wild pitch (with three strikeouts).

On offense, the top three (Cain, Yelich, Braun) accounted for six of the Brewers eight hits and four of the Brewers five runs. Jesus Aguilar and Mike Moustakas each also addded a hit, and Yasmani Grandal drove in his first run with a sacrifice fly.

One injury note from the game. In the fifth, Lorenzo Cain was caught stealing, and he was in pain as he returned to the dugout. He did stay in the game, and everything was looking good after the game.

The Brewers are right back to action tomorrow evening. Dakota Hudson makes his first start in the majors after spending last year in the Cardinals bullpen, and Brandon Woodruff makes his first start of the season for the Brewers. First pitch is at 6:10 pm.