Bucs can’t get to shaky Carpenter

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Chris Carpenter is almost always good for a victory against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Even on a night when a pitcher who hasn’t lost since June looked ready to be beaten.

Ryan Ludwick’s sacrifice fly in the eighth inning scored the go-ahead run and the St. Louis Cardinals withstood a shaky beginning by Carpenter to beat Pittsburgh 6-4 on Friday night, stretching the Pirates’ losing streak to six games.

Carpenter (11-3) fell behind 4-2 in the third — as many runs as he allowed in his previous four starts combined — but settled down to give up only two singles and no runs over the next five innings before Ryan Franklin finished. Carpenter is 6-0 in his last seven starts.

The key point for Carpenter came after play was stopped for about 10 minutes in the seventh inning when a man tumbled onto the field from a front-row box seat while reaching for a foul ball and cut his forehead. The Pirates had runners on first and third, but Carpenter came back after the delay to get Garrett Jones and Ryan Doumit on foul pop-ups. Both had homered against him in the first.

“I knew if I kept my team in the game in that seventh, we had a shot at putting some runs on the board and we were able to do it,” said Carpenter, who is 11-1 in 13 career starts against Pittsburgh. “We continue to go the whole game. I never felt we were out of the game.”

Matt Holliday hit a two-run home run and relied on his speed to score the lead run as the Cardinals won for the seventh time in 10 games. Albert Pujols, 9 for 13 in his last three games, and Mark DeRosa each had three hits, with DeRosa hitting his eighth homer in 16 games. Pinch-hitter Khalil Greene added a game-tying RBI double in the seventh.

With the score tied at 4, Holliday beat out a grounder to third in the eighth off Jose Ascanio (0-2), the former Cubs reliever who was called up from Triple-A earlier in the day. Holliday stole second and advanced to third as second baseman Delwyn Young misplayed the throw. Ludwick followed with his sacrifice fly on an 0-2 pitch and Colby Rasmus added another sacrifice fly in the ninth.

“He’s a complete player,” Cardinals manager Tony La Russa said of Holliday.