Diamondbacks Overcome Cardinals’ Two-Mac Attack

Luis Gonzalez drove in three runs as the Arizona Diamondbacks overcame a pair of two-run homers and five runs batted in by Mark McGwire to beat the Cardinals, 9-5, Friday night at St. Louis.

McGwire hit his 24th and 25th home runs of the season for his 56th career multihomer game, moving ahead of Jimmie Foxx for fourth on the career list.

Brian Anderson (2-1) gave up both homers to McGwire but held the rest of the Cardinals to five hits and struck out a career-high eight in 6 2/3 innings.

Joe McEwing doubled in the seventh to extend his hitting streak to 23 games, a Cardinal rookie record. It’s the longest active streak in the majors and the longest by an NL rookie since Jerome Walton hit in 30 in a row in 1989 for the Chicago Cubs.

McGwire, while declining to talk about his homers, said of McEwing:

“Chicks can start digging singles instead of long balls.”

The Diamondbacks, who had scored only one run in their previous two games, didn’t need a lot of big hits to score against St. Louis. They scored four runs on groundouts and another on a sacrifice fly.

Meanwhile, McGwire’s homer in the first landed in the bullpen beyond the left-field wall, a drive estimated at 392 feet. He topped that with a 432-footer in the fifth, a ball that bounced off a window just below the upper deck in left.

McGwire added a run-scoring infield single in the ninth for his first five-RBI game of the season.

McGwire had 10 multihomer games in his record 70-homer season last year, including a three-homer game against Arizona on April 14.

He still remains well off his record pace. At this point last season, McGwire had 37 homers.

Houston 7, Cincinnati 5--The Reds’ 10-game winning streak ended as Carl Everett had four hits, including an inside-the-park homer and a two-run double, at Cincinnati.

Jeff Bagwell hit his 26th homer as the Astros, stung by Cincinnati’s four-game sweep at the Astrodome last weekend, pulled back into a first-place tie with the Reds in the Central.

The Astros blew a pair of two-run leads before rallying for their second victory in eight games against the Reds. Everett’s two-out, two-run double off Stan Belinda (0-1) in the eighth broke a 5-5 tie.

Atlanta 16, New York 0--Greg Maddux gave up two hits in six shutout innings and Chipper Jones hit a pair of two-run homers at New York.

Eddie Perez and Gerald Williams hit three-run homers and Ryan Klesko added a solo shot for the Braves, who handed the Mets to their worst shutout loss ever.

The Braves matched their biggest shutout win this century. They beat Brooklyn, 16-0, on May 7, 1918, and defeated Pittsburgh by the same score on Sept. 12, 1952.

In his last four starts, Maddux (8-5) has given up two earned runs in 27 2/3 innings, lowering his earned-run average from 4.64 to 3.66.

Philadelphia 14, Chicago 1--Scott Rolen hit an inside-the-park homer and added a 421-foot blast and drove in four runs and rookie Randy Wolf improved to 4-0 and struck out a career-high 10 at Philadelphia.

The Cubs were routed a day after losing, 19-12, to the Milwaukee Brewers at Wrigley Field.

Rolen, who was four for five Thursday night in Pittsburgh, hit the Phillies’ third inside-the-park homer of the season, off the wall in center, in the first inning. He hit a two-run shot, his 17th, in the seventh to make it 9-1.

Wolf gave up one run and six hits in eight innings to recover from a terrible outing last Sunday against the Cubs.

The left-hander walked none and retired the last 13 batters. He also had an infield single.

Milwaukee 5, Pittsburgh 2--Geoff Jenkins drove in three runs and Jeromy Burnitz hit his 23rd home run for the Brewers at Pittsburgh.

The Brewers won for the seventh time in the last eight road games. They have won nine of 12 overall.

Montreal at Florida--The game started 12 minutes late, then was postponed because of rain in the top of the first inning after a wait of 66 minutes. It will be made up when the Expos visit Miami from Sept. 21-23.