Bucs hand Redbirds another home loss

~ Pittsburgh's 6-1 victory dropped St. Louis to 1-6 at Busch Stadium.

ST. LOUIS -- The Cardinals look a lot more like September duds than World Series champions.

Tom Gorzelanny and Matt Capps combined on a four-hitter and Adam LaRoche hit a three-run homer in a 6-1 victory over St. Louis on Tuesday that gave the Pittsburgh Pirates a two-game sweep.

"They're the big dogs in our division, and it's good to get out there and shut them down," Gorzelanny said. "If we can keep doing that, you're going to be seeing a lot of good things out of us."

The Cardinals' 6-7 start is the worst by a World Series winner since the 1998 Florida Marlins were 1-11. St. Louis completed a 1-3 homestand, scoring 10 runs in a victory over Milwaukee and totaling five runs in the losses. After going 49-31 last season, the NL's second-best home record, the Cardinals are 1-6 at Busch Stadium.

St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa watches the his team in the ninth inning against the Pittsburgh Pirates in a baseball game Tuesday, April 17, 2007, in St. Louis. The Pirates won 6-1. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

"I'm glad we're going away then, so we can play better," said Albert Pujols, who was 0-for-7 with two walks in the series and is batting .160. "I've seen what this team can do."

Gorzelanny (2-0) fell just short of his first complete game in 15 major league starts, allowing one run and four hits in 8 1/3 innings with two strikeouts and three walks. He faced the minimum through four innings, benefiting from a pair of double plays, and had a 12-inning scoreless streak before the Cardinals scored in the fifth on a pair of hits and Gary Bennett's sacrifice fly.

Gorzelanny was the Pirates' minor league pitcher of the year last season.

After So Taguchi doubled with one out in the ninth and Pujols walked, Capps came in and struck out Scott Rolen and Preston Wilson.

In his first game at Busch Stadium since striking out the Tigers' Brandon Inge for the last out of the World Series, Adam Wainwright (1-1) gave up five runs -- four earned -- and eight hits in six innings. He has allowed 11 earned runs in 17 2/3 innings against the Pirates, a 5.60 ERA.

"I threw a lot of pitches over the plate, just bad, bad pitches," Wainwright said. "I'm really getting tired of telling all the media folks that it wasn't good because I feel like I've been doing that a lot lately. So results-wise, it finally caught up to me."

Pittsburgh entered the series with four straight losses. The Pirates are 6-2 on the road -- they didn't get their sixth road win last year until June 9 and finished 24-57 away from home, the worst record in the NL.

St. Louis committed two errors during the first three at-bats of the game. Chris Duffy drew a four-pitch walk leading off, Jack Wilson singled to right, and Duffy scored when Preston Wilson overran the ball.

Jack Wilson took third when shortstop David Eckstein threw high to first on Jason Bay's grounder, and scored on Xavier Nady's single.

Jack Wilson and Bay singled with one out in the third ahead of LaRoche's second homer, and only his fifth hit in 40 at-bats on a drive just inside the right-field foul pole.

"I don't know how it stayed fair, the way things are going, but it did," LaRoche said. "As soon as I hit it I thought, 'Oh, that's foul.' I've had some pretty good-hit balls right at people, so that was nice."