• Preview
• Recap
• Bleachers
• Game Tracker

Cards top Orioles, end losing streak at 3

Jun 29, 2011 - 5:01 AM Baltimore, MD (Sports Network) - Matt Holliday and Colby Rasmus belted solo home runs to lead the St. Louis Cardinals to a 6-2 victory over the Baltimore Orioles in the opener of a three-game interleague series at Camden Yards.

Nick Punto added a pair of hits, including an RBI single, while David Freese also had a pair of hits for the Cardinals, who snapped a three-game losing streak.

Kyle Lohse (8-4) worked five innings to pick up the win, yielding four hits while fanning two and walking one. He didn't pitch after a 27-minute rain delay.

"I felt strong, I wished that rain wouldn't have come in," Lohse said. "I felt I could have gotten quite a bit deeper than just five. You can't do anything about the weather, so the rest of the guys came in and did a good job."

J.J. Hardy smacked a solo home run and Nick Markakis chipped in with a pair of hits for the Orioles, who have lost four of their last six games and six of 10.

Zach Britton (6-6) worked 5 2/3 innings in defeat for Baltimore, giving up four runs on seven hits.

"It was more of a case of us not doing anything offensively," Orioles manager Buck Showalter said of his starter's performance. "It's a process for him, he's doing some things real well and there's some things he'll do better at as he goes forward."

Fernando Salas went 1 2/3 innings in relief to seal the win for St. Louis.

St. Louis opened the scoring with a three-run second and was in control from there. Freese hit a one-out infield single and Rasmus walked to put runners on first and second. Freese advanced to third on a line out by Yadier Molina and scored on a single to center by Mark Hamilton. Punto and Ryan Theriot followed with back-to-back RBI singles to give the Cardinals their 3-0 lead.

The Cardinals pushed their lead to four runs in the sixth on Rasmus' one-out homer to right, his seventh of the season.

They extended their lead again in the seventh. Punto belted a ball to center that soared over the head of Adam Jones, allowing him to slide into third with a leadoff triple. He scored on a sacrifice fly by Jon Jay to give St. Louis a comfortable 5-0 lead. Holliday then greeted Orioles reliever Jason Berken by blasting a fastball into the seats in left-center for his 10th home run of the year and a 6-0 lead.

The Orioles finally got on the board in the eighth, plating a pair of runs off Cardinals reliever Ryan Franklin. Hardy smashed a ball deep to center for his 11th home run of the year. Markakis followed with a sharp single to left and was chased home on an RBI double by Jones to cut the lead to 6-2.

The game was delayed by rain with two outs in the top of the sixth inning.

Game Notes

Baltimore is 22-20 at home and 11-16 in series openers this season...Orioles first baseman Derrek Lee went 1-for-4 and is only one hit shy of 1,900 for his career...Markakis extended his season-high hitting streak to 17 games...It marked the first ever regular season appearance in Baltimore for the Cardinals.