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Looper, Ankiel carry Cardinals past Reds

Jun 12, 2008 - 2:50 AM CINCINNATI (Ticker) -- The St. Louis Cardinals did not miss their All-Star slugger that much.

Braden Looper tossed his first career shutout and Rick Ankiel and Jason LaRue both homered during a five-run first inning as the shorthanded Cardinals coasted to a 10-0 victory over the Cincinnati Reds on Wednesday night.

The Cardinals placed first baseman Albert Pujols on the 15-day disabled list prior to Wednesday's game with a strained left calf suffered in the seventh inning of Tuesday's opener.

Plagued by a bad calf, the 28-year-old Pujols is batting .347 with 16 homers and 42 RBI this season. He is on the DL for just the second time in his eight-year career.

With Pujols being out for a while, the Cardinals knew they would need help from the entire club, and that's what happened in this one.

Looper (8-5) gave up just three hits, striking out four with no walks en route to his fourth victory away from Busch Stadium this season. The righthander also improved to 2-0 against the Reds this season.

"(Looper) was very aggressive coming after them," Cardinals manager Tony La Russa said. "He got the leadoff hitter every inning. And the one chance that they had he made a good pitch to get out of it."

"The number one important thing was he was getting ahead of guys," said catcher Jason LaRue, who went 2-for-4. "When you do that you keep the count in your favor and can pick and choose the pitches you want to throw, and that's what he did."

The 33-year-old Looper was provided with some early offense when Ankiel belted a three-run home run and LaRue followed two batters later with a two-run blast off Reds starter Johnny Cueto (5-6) for a 5-0 lead.

"To his credit, it's not easy to pitch with a lead in this ballpark, against that team, but (Looper) kept making good pitches," La Russa said.

St. Louis pushed its lead to 6-0 when Ryan Ludwick's RBI double plated Skip Schumaker. Ludwick could have drove in two runs on the hit, but Aaron Miles was thrown out at home by left fielder Adam Dunn.

However, Ludwick added another RBI to his total with a solo blast to left against reliever Danny Herrera in the seventh inning.

The 22-year-old Cueto surrendered six runs and five hits in five frames. The hard-throwing righthander walked an eye-opening eight batters with two strikeouts.