ST. LOUIS—All season Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez has been forthcoming about his team's limitations.
The Braves can be competitive when they get quality outings from their starting pitchers and the bullpen holds. Keep the game close and the Braves can scratch out enough runs to win close games.
That formula was their best chance in their weekend series against the Cardinals, who own the best record in baseball.
“We pitch well, we’ll be all right,” Gonzalez said before the series opener on Friday. “We’ve proven that.”
It’s not an easy plan against the Cardinals, especially when the Braves couldn’t get the most important part right. Rookie left-hander Manny Banuelos put the Braves in an early hole and the Cardinals went on to a 4-2 victory at Busch Stadium.
The Braves (45-51) suffered their ninth loss in their last 12 games. The Cardinals (62-34) are leading the NL Central and pointed towards a pennant.
“This is a good club,” Gonzalez said of the Cardinals. “They’ve got a lot of good players at a lot of different positions. Their pitching depth is good. They are fundamentally sound.”
The Braves are a different team than the squads that featured outfielder Jason Heyward, who now is with the Cardinals. They don’t strike out as often but neither do they have enough pop to overcome big deficits.
That was true before the Braves traded away Juan Uribe and Kelly Johnson, two of their better power hitters. Quality pitching is even more important for the Braves now that small ball is pretty much all they have most games.
Banuelos couldn’t deliver. The rookie left-hander was in a 4-0 hole after four innings and lasted just five.
The trouble often began for Banuelos when he was close to getting out of innings. The Cardinals scored all of their runs with two outs while building a 3-0 lead.
In the second inning Banuelos got Jhonny Peralta to pop out and struck out Heyward to bring up Yadier Molina. Banuelos walked Molina and then Randal Grichuk smashed his first pitch about 420 feet to left field for a 2-0 Cardinals lead.
Banuelos retired the first two batters he faced in the third inning before Matt Carpenter laced a double. Banuelos issued another two-out walk, this time to Matt Holliday, before Peralta poked a single through the middle for a 3-0 advantage.
That was all the offense the Cardinals needed because the Braves couldn’t do much against Cardinals rookie left-hander Tim Cooney. He pitched seven efficient innings while allowing five hits and two earned runs and striking out five batters.
Cameron Maybin knocked a one-out RBI double in the sixth inning, went to third on Pedro Ciriaco’s ground out and scored on Cooney’s wild pitch. Maybin’s double was the only extra-base hit by the Braves and was one of just two times they advanced a runner past first base against Cooney.
Heyward chased Banuelos with a single to lead off the sixth inning. Braves relief pitcher David Aardsma got Mark Reynolds to ground into a double play to end the inning, Andrew McKirahan retired three straight Cardinals in the seventh to strand two base runners and Ross Detwiler induced a bases-loaded double play to end the eighth.
But the Braves couldn’t add any more runs. Nick Markakis hit a one-out single in the ninth and A.J. Pierzynski walked with two outs before Cardinals left-hander Kevin Siegrist struck out Jonny Gomes to end the game.
