LOS ANGELES -- Overwhelmed both offensively and on the mound most of the day by Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani on Wednesday, the Cardinals battled to stay within striking distance and found a way to win the game late at Dodger Stadium.
Jordan Walker capped a three-hit day with a line drive into the left-center gap to plate Alec Burleson to knot the score in the eighth inning. Masyn Winn, who had reached earlier in the inning on his second hit of the day, then came around to score on a throwing error by Dodgers third baseman Alex Freeland, allowing the Cardinals to escape Los Angeles with a 5-3 win.
The stunning turn of events in the eighth inning allowed the Cardinals to capture the three-game series and win the season series, 4-2, over the defending World Series champions. They took two of three in St. Louis from June 6-8 and then combined Wednesday’s comeback with Monday’s 3-2 victory for another series victory.
Ohtani showed off his superstar skills in the early going, striking out eight Cardinals and allowing just two infield singles over four dominant innings of work. Of his eight strikeouts, four came on his slider, three on four-seam fastballs and another on his sweeper. Ohtani then registered the 1,000th hit of his career by smashing a Statcast-projected 440-foot shot for a two-run homer.
Trailing 3-1 in the top of the sixth, the Cards got within a run of the lead on a Lars Nootbaar RBI groundout. After St. Louis was just 2-for-11 with runners in scoring position, leaving six runners on base through the game’s first seven innings, Walker came through in the clutch with his smash into the left-center gap with two outs. Pedro Pagés, Alec Burleson, Brendan Donovan and Winn each had two-hit days to supplement Walker’s three-hit performance as the Cardinals pounded out 12 hits.
Camarillo, Calif., native JoJo Romero, who struck out Ohtani to end the seventh inning, recorded the win.