Brewers 8, Marlins 3
Yovani Gallardo excelled with his arm and bat and Corey Hart reached a milestone as the Brewers dumped the Florida Marlins 8-3 on Thursday night in the opener of a four-game set.
Gallardo (14-7) allowed three runs and seven hits with nine strikeouts over 6 2/3 innings to reach a career high in wins and improve to 3-0 with a 1.95 ERA in his last four starts. The right-hander struck out four batters in a row at one point and carried a four-hit shutout into the seventh.
Hart had three hits, including his career-high 30th home run of the season in the first off Florida starter Anibal Sanchez (12-11). Two frames later, Hart singled home a run, stole second and scored on a base hit by Rickie Weeks as Milwaukee built a 3-0 edge.
Gallardo increased the bulge to 5-0 with a two-run single in the sixth. The 24-year-old leads all pitchers with four homers and 10 RBI this season.
Gallardo’s night came to an abrupt end when singles by Mike Stanton, Brad Davis and Cameron Maybin plated two runs in the seventh. Gallardo departed and Dan Uggla greeted Kameron Loe with a run-scoring single to cut the deficit to 5-3.
Milwaukee answered with back-to-back homers by Weeks and Prince Fielder in a span of three pitches in the bottom of the frame against Sandy Romero, who was making his major league debut.
Sanchez was charged with five runs and 10 hits in 5 2/3 frames for Florida (76-76), which had its three-game winning streak snapped in its attempt to close out a third consecutive winning season that would tie a franchise best.
Florida’s Logan Morrison walked in the seventh to extend his streak of reaching base safely to 42 straight, tying New York Yankees Mark Teixeira for the highest this season and four off the club record set by Luis Castillo in 2006.