Sonny Gray struck out 10 batters and allowed just three hits in six scoreless innings as the St. Louis Cardinals routed the visiting Detroit Tigers 11-4 Monday night.
Gray (5-1) rebounded from his worst outing of the season: seven runs allowed in 3 2/3 innings against the Philadelphia Phillies on Wednesday. He walked just one in his 90-pitch outing vs. Detroit.
Ivan Herrera, Jordan Walker and Pedro Pages drove in two runs each for the Cardinals, who won for the 13th time in 15 games. Lars Nootbaar and Brendan Donovan (3-for-5) each had an RBI and two runs.
Dillon Dingler finished with two hits for the Tigers had won five of their previous six games.
The Tigers opened with left-hander Sean Guenther (0-1) before turning to Keider Montero for bulk innings.
That strategy failed as the Cardinals took a 1-0 lead in the first inning. Nootbaar hit a leadoff double and moved to third on Masyn Winn’s single.
After Winn was thrown out trying to steal, Donovan hit an RBI single. Montero relieved Guenther and retired the next two batters to end the inning.
The Cardinals increased their lead to 2-0 in the fourth. Herrera hit a leadoff single, extending his hitting streak to nine games.
Herrera took third on Alec Burleson’s one-out single and scored on Montero’s wild pitch. With two outs, Riley Greene prevented further damage by making a diving catch on Victor Scott II’s liner into center field.
St. Louis increased the gap to 5-0 in the fifth inning. Nootbaar, Winn and Donovan hit singles to load the bases. Willson Contreras hit an RBI groundout, Herrera hit an RBI fielder’s-choice grounder with no out recorded, and Nolan Arenado grounded into a run-scoring forceout.
The Cardinals pushed their lead to 11-0 in the seventh inning, which was interrupted by a 34-minute rain delay. Donovan’s double and Contreras’ single set the table.
Herrera hit an RBI single, Walker smacked a two-run double with one out, and Pages launched a two-run homer. After Scott doubled and took third on an error, Tigers catcher Tomas Nido replaced John Brebbia on the mound and allowed Nootbaar’s sacrifice fly.
Detroit got on the board in the eighth on Akil Baddoo’s RBI double, In the ninth, Andy Ibanez hit an RBI double, Trey Sweeney added a sacrifice fly, and Dingler contributed an RBI grounder.
