L.A. stops Cards’ streak
DODGERS 7, CARDINALS 2
ST. LOUIS — Adrian Gonzalez hit his eighth home run, red-hot Justin Turner got two more RBIs and the Los Angeles Dodgers beat St. Louis 7-2 on Saturday night to end the Cardinals’ five-game winning streak.
Turner’s two-run double capped a four-run third. He has 14 RBIs since the All-Star break.
Gonzalez’s 429-foot solo hit to center sparked a three-run sixth.
Kenta Maeda (9-7) rebounded from a poor outing against Arizona on July 17, giving up two runs in 5⅔ innings. Only one of the Cardinals’ first 15 batters hit the ball out of the infield against the Japanese right-hander.
Maeda helped himself with an RBI bunt single to start the third-inning rally.
Andrew Toles went 3 for 4 and scored once for the Dodgers. He has reached safely in nine of 10 games since being called up from the minors.
Mike Leake (7-8) allowed seven runs — six earned — in six innings. He was victimized by a mental error on Maeda’s single when second baseman Greg Garcia failed to cover first on the bunt attempt.
“I wasn’t hitting my spots as well tonight,” Leake said. “They were ready for mistakes. I think they had a pretty good approach tonight and they were jumping on me early. I just wasn’t placing the ball exactly where I wanted it.”
Matt Adams homered for the second consecutive game. His blast to left in the fourth extended the Cardinals’ streak of home runs to 14 straight games.
Aledmys Diaz reached safely for the 26th straight game with a first-inning single. Diaz’s streak is the second-longest by a Cardinals rookie since Albert Pujols had streaks of 30 and 48 games in 2001.
The loss dropped St. Louis’ home record to 2529.
In today’s 7:08 p.m. game, Cardinals righthander and former Redbird Mike Mayers will make his major league debut in prime time after going 3-3 with a 2.94 ERA in nine starts at Memphis. St. Louis will become the last team in the majors to use a starter outside of the starting five who opened the season.
The Dodgers will counter with left-hander Scott Kazmir (8-3, 4.30 ERA).