Painter Dominates, Phillies Bury Cardinals 12-3 in August Blowout
Andrew Painter threw 7.0 innings of one-run ball with 8 strikeouts and zero walks, and Philadelphia's offense had already built a 7-0 lead before St. Louis recorded a single run. The Phillies didn't just beat the Cardinals on August 22 — they dismantled them.
The story of the night was how fast this one was over in spirit. Bohm singled to left in the first to score Schwarber, and then Sosa's two-run double to center — scoring Bohm and Turner — pushed it to 3-0 before most fans had settled in. That double swung Philadelphia's win probability from 66% to 82%, a 15-point shift in the opening inning that told you everything about where this game was headed. Philadelphia wasn't done in the first, and they certainly weren't done in the third. De La Cruz singled to center to score Arraez and Bohm, a sacrifice fly from Realmuto scored Sosa, and Hill doubled to left to score De La Cruz. Just like that, it was 7-0 after three innings, and Quinn Mathews had already surrendered 10 hits and 7 earned runs across his 5.0 innings of work. That's a line that ends careers of starts, not just games.
Painter, meanwhile, was surgical. Seven innings, five hits, one earned run, no walks, eight strikeouts. He gave the Cardinals nothing to work with and the Phillies' bullpen nothing to worry about until the late innings. St. Louis finally cracked the scoreboard in the sixth when Burleson singled to score Jordan, but Philadelphia answered immediately — Schwarber hit a sacrifice fly to make it 8-1, and then Harper unloaded a 390-foot homer to right center that scored Crawford and Turner and pushed the lead to 11-1. That three-run shot was the punctuation mark on an already-decided contest. Harper finished 1-for-4 with 3 RBI; Schwarber went 2-for-3 with a homer, 2 RBI, and 2 runs scored. Bohm and Sosa each went 2-for-4 as well. This was a full-roster offensive performance.
St. Louis did get a moment of individual dignity in the eighth when Wetherholt launched a 417-foot solo shot to center — the longest homer of the night — finishing 2-for-4 with an RBI. But Schwarber answered with his own 367-foot shot to right in the same inning to make it 12-2, which looks like the appropriate response to a consolation home run. The Cardinals added one more in the ninth on a Fermín groundout, but the final of 12-3 flatters nobody in St. Louis. Philadelphia's offense looks locked in, Painter appears to be pitching as well as anyone in the rotation right now, and the Cardinals' starting pitching gave up 7 earned runs in five innings. That's the kind of outing that changes a team's week.