Cardinals Win a Testy Matchup With the Cubs

On a night when emotions raged and tempers flared, Scott Rolen delivered again for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Rolen connected for a tiebreaking home run in the eighth inning off fiery Carlos Zambrano and sent the Cardinals to a 5-4 win over the Cubs on Monday night at Chicago.

Zambrano’s outing ended one pitch after Rolen’s homer when he hit Jim Edmonds for a second time and was ejected.

“He’s an emotional guy,” Rolen said of Zambrano. “But I don’t believe what went on the field tonight outside of baseball deserves any words.”

The Cardinals homered three times and won for the 12th time in 14 games this month to increase their NL Central lead over the Cubs to nine games.

Zambrano (9-5) hit Edmonds with a pitch in the first to load the bases. Then the young Cub All-Star became angered when Edmonds homered in the fourth and hesitated before leaving the plate to admire the flight of the ball.

As Edmonds neared home plate, Zambrano began yelling in the direction of the Cardinal star.

“I just told him to run the bases and don’t try to be cocky,” Zambrano said.

Seconds later, Cub catcher Michael Barrett began jawing with someone in the Cardinal dugout and had to be restrained by umpire Joe Brinkman.

The benches emptied briefly, but order was restored quickly and no punches were thrown.

San Francisco 6, Arizona 1 -- Brett Tomko pitched into the eighth inning and the Giants made up for the absence of Barry Bonds with timely hitting at Phoenix.

Bonds sat out the game after having a root canal Monday morning, but the Giants won for the sixth time in eight games to stay 2 1/2 games behind the Dodgers.

San Diego 13, Colorado 6 -- Ismael Valdez pitched five-plus innings and hit a two-run double, Mark Loretta had four hits and three RBIs and the Padres set season highs for runs and hits at Denver.

Montreal 6, Pittsburgh 2 -- A four-run seventh inning by the Expos helped bring an end to the Pirates’ 10-game home winning streak.

Atlanta 4, Philadelphia 2 -- Mike Hampton pitched seven strong innings and John Smoltz did the rest as the Braves took sole possession of first in the East with the win at Atlanta.

Cincinnati 8, Milwaukee 4 -- Wily Mo Pena hit his sixth homer in his last eight games for the Reds, a two-run shot off the upper deck at Cincinnati.

Florida 6, New York 5 -- Pinch-hitter Lenny Harris came through with a go-ahead single in the ninth inning at New York, spoiling Scott Erickson’s bid for his first major league win in nearly two years.