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Struggling Cardinals seek first August win

Aug 6, 2007 - 1:24 PM San Diego (60-50) at St. Louis (50-58) 7:05 pm EDT

ST. LOUIS (Ticker) -- Two teams heading in opposite directions square off Monday when the struggling St. Louis Cardinals host the San Diego Padres in the opener of a four-game series.

The Cardinals, who have yet to win in the month of August, are desperately hoping to avoid their sixth straight setback whereas the Padres are pursuing their fifth straight win.

St. Louis gives the ball to Braden Looper (8-9, 5.23 ERA), who is looking to rebound from a disastrous last outing. The righthander lasted just four innings in Wednesday's 15-1 loss at Pittsburgh, allowing seven runs.

Looper has a 2-3 record with a 1.97 ERA in 28 career games - including one start - against San Diego. The one start yielded Looper a win, as he tossed seven scoreless frames on May 12 at San Diego.

Opposing Looper will be David Wells (5-7, 5.18), who has fared very well in five career starts against the Cardinals, going 4-1 with a 2.08 ERA.

The lefthanded Wells did not factor in the decision of Wednesday's 9-5 loss at Arizona, surrendering five runs and seven hits over 5 1/3 innings to extend his winless streak to three.

San Diego completed a three-game series sweep of the San Francisco Giants with a 5-4 victory Sunday.

Marcus Giles plated the go-ahead run with a sacrifice fly while Mike Cameron added insurance with an RBI double in the eighth inning for the Padres, who trail the first-place Diamondbacks (63-50) by 1 1/2 games in the National League West Division.