Tony La Russa's shingles or pink-eye or face-cancer kept the St. Louis Cardinals' manager out of the game Tuesday night, but the Cardinals and acting manager Joe Pettini dropped the Chicago Cubs by a score of 6-4, with Chris Carpenter picking up his first win of the season on a tie-breaking single from Daniel Descalso. Albert Pujols went 4-5 with a double and Nick Punto tripled in the win, which helped the Cardinals improve to a 21-15 record on the season. Darwin Barney and Aramis Ramirez had three hits for the Cubs in the loss, which dropped them to 15-19. '
Carpenter and Cubs starter Carlos Zambrano were both dogged by base-hits all game—they combined to give up 21 in 14 innings—but the Cardinals managed to strike against Cubs set-up man Kerry Wood, who walked three batters in addition to allowing the go-ahead single from the Cardinals' utility man.
Wednesday night will pit Cardinals starter Jake Westbrook against new Cubs acquisition Matt Garza.