Carlos Beltran and Matt Adams homered in the eighth inning, and the St. Louis Cardinals snapped the Los Angeles Dodgers’ 15-game road winning streak with a 5-1 victory on Tuesday night.
Joe Kelly pitched into the sixth inning, outperforming Clayton Kershaw and helping St. Louis to its fourth victory in the last six games. Tony Cruz added an RBI single.
The Dodgers’ road winning streak was a franchise record. Their previous loss away from Chavez Ravine was a 4-2 decision at San Francisco on July 6.
Adrian Gonzalez hit a one-out RBI single off Kelly (3-3) in the sixth, but that was it for Los Angeles against the right-hander. He left with runners on first and second and the Cardinals nursing a 2-1 lead.
Andre Ethier singled against Randy Choate, loading the bases, but Seth Maness got A.J. Ellis to bounce into an inning-ending double play.
The Cardinals then grabbed control in the eighth. Beltran hit his team-high 20th homer off Brandon League for a 3-1 lead. Matt Holliday then walked before Adams connected for his third pinch-hit drive of the season.
Kershaw (10-7) allowed two runs and six hits in six innings for Los Angeles, which dropped to 15-3 since the All-Star break. The left-hander is 5-2 with a sparkling 1.62 ERA over his last eight starts.
Cruz helped the Cardinals take the lead in the sixth. He singled in Jon Jay, then moved to third on Pete Kozma’s double. He came home on Kelly’s bouncer to second, lifting St. Louis to a 2-0 lead.
Kelly was working on a scoreless streak of 20 innings before Los Angeles scored in the sixth. He allowed six hits while lowering his ERA to 2.98.
St. Louis recorded four double plays in the first six innings to help Kelly, who is 3-0 in five starts since joining the rotation on July 6. The Cardinals used six pitchers.
The Dodgers came up two wins short of tying the major league single-season mark of 17 straight road wins for the Detroit Tigers from April 3-May 24, 1984, and New York Giants from May 9-29, 1916. The two-season mark is 21 in a row by Detroit from Sept. 18, 1983 to May 24, 1984.
— Associated Press —