When Trever Miller relieved Jason Motte with two outs in the 11th inning Friday night at Atlanta and collected a save, albeit a shaky one, the 37-year-old became the fourth different pitcher to record a save in the St. Louis Cardinals’ last four victories.
Miller followed Fernando Salas, who closed out Thursday’s win in Houston and Eduardo Sanchez, who earned his first MLB save on Wednesday night. In the game immediately prior to Mitchell Boggs’ blown save against the Astros on Tuesday, Boggs closed out the Cincinnati Reds on Sunday night.
Sunday marked both Boggs’ third consecutive save and the first game of the unusual four-man, four-save streak.
As is usually the case, researcher Tom Orf was able to satisfy my curiosity about the uniqueness of the feat.
The Cardinals had a similar stretch in 2005, also in April on almost the same exact dates. That one was led off by incumbent closer Jason Isringhausen and followed by Randy Flores, Julian Tavarez and Al Reyes. Just as in 2011, one loss occurred in the interim.
Since at least 1972, the Cardinals have had no other periods of four saves by four different pitchers in five or fewer games.
St. Louis Cardinals, four different relievers with saves in four consecutive wins over four or five games
| 2005 | Opp | W/L | Score | WP | LP | Save |
| Sunday, Apr 24 | HOU | W | 8-5 | Morris | Backe | Isringhausen |
| Tuesday, Apr 26 | MIL | W | 5-3 | Suppan | Davis | Flores |
| Wednesday, Apr 27 | MIL | W | 6-3 | Carpenter | Santos | Tavarez |
| Thursday, Apr 28 | MIL | L | 3-4 | Capuano | Marquis | Turnbow |
| Friday, Apr 29 | @ATL | W | 6-5 | Mulder | Hudson | Reyes |
Will Motte, Ryan Franklin or Miguel Batista be given a chance to extend the streak to five on Saturday or Sunday?
Addendum
When expanding the scope to four or more consecutive Cardinals wins/saves by different pitchers over any number of games, four more examples back to 1960 were found. (Obviously, losses were interspersed.) They follow.
| Win# | Game# | Date | Opp | W/L | Score | Save |
| 2 | 2 | 4/10/1990 | MON | W | 4-2 | Terry |
| 3 | 4 | 4/13/1990 | @PHI | W | 11-0 | Tewksbury |
| 4 | 7 | 4/16/1990 | @PIT | W | 6-4 | Horton |
| 5 | 9 | 4/18/1990 | @PIT | W | 3-0 | Dayley |
| 3 | 3 | 4/13/1968 | @CHC | W | 8-5 | Willis |
| 4 | 5 | 4/15/1968 | @ATL | W | 4-3 | Hughes |
| 5 | 6 | 4/16/2008 | @ATL | W | 6-2 | Hoerner |
| 6 | 9 | 4/19/1968 | CHC | W | 9-2 | Gilson |
| 52 | 88 | 7/17/1967 | NYM | W | 6-4 | Briles |
| 53 | 90 | 7/19/2007 | @CIN | W | 3-2 | Lamabe |
| 54 | 91 | 7/20/1967 | @CIN | W | 7-3 | Hoerner |
| 55 | 94 | 7/23/1967 | ATL | W | 3-2 | Willis |
| 53 | 101 | 7/30/1964 | @CHC | W | 5-2 | Craig |
| 54 | 104 | 8/2/1964 | CIN | W | 5-4 | Taylor |
| 55 | 106 | 8/5/1964 | CHC | W | 4-2 | Humphreys |
| 56 | 107 | 8/6/1964 | CHC | W | 5-3 | Schultz |
There have not been saves by five different pitchers in five consecutive Cardinals wins any time since at least 1960. With Salas “repeating” on Saturday, saving the Cardinals win over Atlanta, it will not happen this time, either.
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TLR seems to be using Boggs, Salas, and Sanchez as closers. Sanchez pitched 2 innings Friday, so got today off. Maybe TLR thinks Boggs is a big lad who can handle more appearances. If we had not rallied, Batista and Salas could have enjoyed a day of rest, while Franklin could have taken care of the bottom of the 8th.
Its great to go into Atlanta and take the first two. Strong teams are competitive on the road. The Cards need to just keep rolling, like Sherman marched through Georgia, showing little mercy.
In 4 minor league seasons, Boggs never missed a start.
Looks like TLR is trying to split up Boggs and Sanchez so he always has one of them available.
Miller got the save last night but the ball was hit hard. I’d like to see TLR give Miller the chance to start and pitch a whole inning to see if he can get untracked. It can’t be easy to get your groove back when you’re only pitching to one batter at a time.
Motte is really the unsung hero of this bullpen. His last 9 appearances his line is:
8.1 IP 5H 2BB 11K 0R 0ER
I heard he wasn’t happy about being pulled last night.
Going to be a tough call for TLR/Mo When Tallet comes back. They may ask him to do a rehab stint just to buy time in making a decision.
Watching Perez in Cleveland probably makrs Mo refuse to take any calls about the four hard throwing righties. Too bad Franky can’t work up a pulse, we need to move somebody out.
I haven’t looked at splits, but maybe we don’t need a loogy.
Well the one we’ve got is falling flat on his face and we are still winning. Boggs and Motte both have had bad career numbers against lefties (coming in to this year) Sanchez and Salas also have been worse against lefties in the minors. Hopefully all are improving but McClellen was our late inning righty who could get out lefties as well as righties and he’s occupied in another job right now.
Probably need the Loogy at some point.
The reason there are LOOGIEs is because they are needed. Its good to have two. Tallet had an unbelievably awful 2010 for the Jays, but has been fine so far for Duncan.
Right now, Franklin is odd man out, if there gets to be a numbers crunch, when Tallet comes back. Boggs, Motte, Sanchez, Salas, and Batista are higher on the depth chart than Franklin as right relievers. And from Memphis, Dickson and Ottavino could move up to handle a long relief role, if needed.
I can’t see Franklin going anywhere. One of Tony’s best and sometimes annoying qualities is his loyalty to players who have come through for him. I think Tallet will have as long a rehab stint as possible. By then Batista may have run out of smoke and mirrors and be released. If not it’ll be interesting to see what happens. God forbid a 13 man staff!
May not be what I would do, but I agree that is probably what TLR will do…
Tony’s loyalty is a good quallity on a personal level, but a bad quality for the team because it makes him stubborn to the point of absurdity.
Lineup:
Punto 2B, Rasmus CF, Pujols 1B, Holliday LF, Berkman RF, Freese 3B, Molina C, Theriot SS, Garcia P
Good lineup………………… If BD could off Franklin with minimum losses…..he would already be gone…..Tony has very little leverage at this point. Reclaimed “powder” spends just as well as any.
Probably looking to swap him for somebody with a bad contract we can use.
Any word on punto?
Nevermind, they just said
tight hammy
Hope its ok
Seems like a lot of 3-2 counts. Hopefully we can wear Lowe out
This is one of those games where we had them by the throat and wouldn’t finish the kill…… we always loose them……….
This is one of those games that reinforces my belief that TLR is certifiable.
Freese’s left hand is broken. Cripes.
We were at our best when the whole starting middle infield was out of action. Brickhands Therriot strikes again.
Its hard to fault Albert for booting the hot grounder when he was playing in, except this is the bigs, and you know……
Its not hard to fault Franky, even without Brickhands. He’s throwing batting practice.
The injury to Freese is unhelpful. Freese has been getting on base and helping the offense. He is going to be out until at least July. Plus Punto has a sore hamstring it sounded like and Theriot has had an issue. We probably need reinforcements.
Room can be made on the 40 man roster. Reifer may be able to go on the 60 day DL. Blake King, Franciso Samuel, David Kopp, Bryan Anderson are candidates to be removed from the roster. The Cards could then add Freddie Bynum or Ramon Vasquez for middle infield depth behind Theriot and Punto, with Greene and Descalso R/L platooning at 3B.
The Cards could also bring up Matt Carpenter, since he has an OPS of 794 at Memphis, fine for a AAA rookie.
Also Allen Craig can be activated, since he too could serve at 3B. Hamilton can return to Memphis to make room for Craig.
That is all technically possible, but most likely is to simply DL Freese and activate Craig.
Yesterday morning on the radio Mo sounded like Tallet would definately be back in the pen but didn’t give any hints about how to make room. He mentioned the thin pen at Memphis due to the callups and also indicated Springfield’s pen is thin, and so said he may look for ‘outside help’ at the upper minor league level.
Mo had been in Springfield and two guys he talked up are Adams and the shortstop Jackson. He also talked like he liked Palm Beach’s pitching.
Brian, Did you get my article?
Yes, I replied to your email yesterday, but it bounced. I am preparing your article now and it should be posted within the next half-hour.
As you might imagine, like so many others, my routine was altered late last night and into this morning due to the world news.
It shouldn’t have bounced, that is weird.