Milwaukee's Christian Yelich tied a major league record by homering for the fourth straight game to open the season, then smacked a two-run walk-off double in the ninth inning as the Brewers defeated the visiting St. Louis Cardinals 5-4 on Sunday.
Ben Gamel doubled leading off the ninth and Lorenzo Cain followed with an infield single before Yelich doubled to left-center field on a 2-0 pitch from Jordan Hicks (0-1).
Yelich hit a solo home run off St. Louis starter Michael Wacha in the first inning to become the sixth player to go deep in his team's first four games, joining Willie Mays (San Francisco Giants, 1971), Mark McGwire (Cardinals, 1998), Nelson Cruz (Texas Rangers, 2011), Chris Davis (Baltimore Orioles, 2013) and Trevor Story (Colorado Rockies, 2016).
Jacob Barnes (1-0) pitched one inning for the win as Milwaukee took three out of four in the series.
Paul Goldschmidt continued his torrid start for St. Louis, hitting his fourth homer with his new team.
Paul DeJong hit a two-run homer and Matt Carpenter added a solo shot for the Cardinals.
Wacha pitched six innings and allowed a run on four hits and four walks. He had seven strikeouts.
Milwaukee's Corbin Burnes allowed four runs on six hits over five innings in his first career start after appearing in 30 games out of the bullpen in 2018. He struck out 12 and walked one.
After Yelich's homer made it 1-0 in the first, the Brewers got two men on with one out in the third but Wacha struck out Ryan Braun and Travis Shaw.
The Cardinals took a 2-1 lead in the fourth when Marcell Ozuna opened with an infield single and DeJong homered to left on the first pitch.
Carpenter and Goldschmidt hit back-to-back home runs in the fifth to make it 4-1.
Braun and Shaw hit two-out RBI singles in the seventh off Andrew Miller to pull the Brewers within 4-3.
--Field Level Media
St. Louis | Milwaukee | |
Michael Wacha | Player | Corbin Burnes |
No Decision | W/L | No Decision |
6.0 | IP | 5.0 |
7 | Strikeouts | 12 |
4 | Hits | 6 |
1.50 | ERA | 7.20 |
St. Louis | Milwaukee | |
Matt Carpenter | Player | Christian Yelich |
2 | Hits | 2 |
1 | RBI | 3 |
1 | HR | 1 |
6 | TB | 6 |
.667 | Avg | 1.000 |