Cards crank on Yanks

Pujols led the charge as St. Louis won the opener of the interleague series 8-1.

ST. LOUIS -- The New York Yankees' latest sloppy loss prompted a tirade from Joe Torre.

Torre's first game in St. Louis since being fired as Cardinals manager a decade ago was far from a happy homecoming. The Cardinals began their second straight high-profile interleague series with a strong start from Jason Marquis and a big game from Albert Pujols in an 8-1 victory over the stumbling Yankees on Friday night.

Torre, who had been hoping a 12-3 victory at Milwaukee on Wednesday would jump-start his team, held a closed-door meeting after the Yankees lost for the eighth time in 10 games on a season-high 12-game trip. He wouldn't discuss the subject matter with the media.

"That's nobody's business," Torre said. "I'm just not very happy. It was an ugly game. We didn't play hard enough, we didn't do anything to help ourselves win.

"It was an embarrassing game."

Marquis (8-3) allowed a run and six hits in eight innings and Pujols singled, doubled and homered for St. Louis, which took two of three from the Boston Red Sox in a World Series rematch that concluded Wednesday.

The Cardinals outscored the Red Sox 16-3 in the first two games and dominated again Friday in front of a sellout crowd of 50,250 -- the largest crowd at Busch Stadium since a manually operated scoreboard was installed in center field and several thousand seats were removed in 1997.

"Right now we're just playing pretty good," Pujols said. "We just need to make sure we stay focused and keep playing hard."

Derek Jeter's 1,800th career hit, an RBI double in the fifth, was the lone highlight for the Yankees, who dropped two games below .500 at 29-31. Three errors contributed to three unearned runs for an already struggling Chien-Ming Wang, who filled in for sore-shouldered Kevin Brown and allowed seven runs in a season-low four innings.

The three-error game tied a season worst for the Yankees, who now have six such games this year.

"It's just unacceptable how we've been playing," Jeter said. "It just looks like we're going through the motions."

Asked how angry Torre was, catcher Jorge Posada said: "I would be angry, too."

Torre managed the Cardinals from 1990-95 and played for them for six years, and was NL MVP in 1971 when he batted a league-leading .363. This was the Yankees' first trip to St. Louis, though, since the 1964 World Series.

Pujols and Jim Edmonds each had two hits and drove in a run in the first three innings, helping the Cardinals build a 7-0 lead. St. Louis has outscored its opponents 178-108 in the first four innings and has won 10 of 12 at home.

"I always say it's always good if you can score some runs early, because you can take the pressure off a little bit on your starter," Pujols said. "If you can take that first step and take the first lead it's always good, and that's what we've been doing."

Marquis won his third straight start and joined Chris Carpenter as the Cardinals' eight-game winners, striking out three and walking two. For the second straight outing, he exhibited none of the control problems that had plagued him in three previous appearances, when he walked 16 in 15 innings.

"Guys go through periods where they struggle a little bit and then they come out of it," pitching coach Dave Duncan said. "He's coming out of it."

The Yankees' fielding woes began in the first, when Wang (3-2) made a wild pickoff throw that allowed Mark Grudzielanek to advance two bases to third. Pujols followed with a run-scoring infield hit despite a fine stop by Jeter in the hole at shortstop and a long one-hop throw that was in time but handcuffed Jason Giambi at first base.

Two more errors led to three unearned runs in the Cardinals' five-run third. Edmonds made a wide turn on his RBI single and Alex Rodriguez, the cutoff man at third, tried to pick him off, but Giambi had left the bag while following Edmonds. Second baseman Robinson Cano's two-out fielding error on Marquis' grounder allowed two runs to score.

Edmonds and Sanders had RBI singles in the inning and another run scored on Posada's passed ball.

Pujols hit his 15th homer to straightaway center in the sixth off a 2-1 fastball from Paul Quantrill, a drive estimated 415 feet.