CHICAGO (AP) – Kris Bryant hit his fourth career grand slam in Chicago’s six-run eighth inning and the Cubs pounded the St. Louis Cardinals 13-5 on Sunday night for their season-high seventh consecutive victory.
Willson Contreras, Anthony Rizzo, and David Bote each drove in two runs, helping the Cubs leapfrog the Cardinals for first place in the NL Central. Ben Zobrist had two hits and made two nice plays in left field as Chicago completed its first three-game sweep of St. Louis since September 2017.
Since opening the season with eight losses in 11 games, the Cubs have been on a roll. They have won 16 of 20 for the first time since they went 16-4 in August 2016.
The crowd of 36,499 chanted “Sweep! Sweep! Sweep!” after Bryant connected with two outs in the eighth, belting a drive to center off Dominic Leone for his fourth homer.
Paul DeJong and Marcell Ozuna homered in the ninth inning for St. Louis, which lost its season-high fourth straight game. Adam Wainwright (3-3) pitched five-plus innings while dropping to 11-4 in 26 career games at Wrigley Field.
The Cardinals got at least one hit in seven innings but left nine runners on base. Jose Quintana (4-1) also received some help from his defense.
Contreras threw out Paul Goldschmidt attempting to steal second in the first. Zobrist cut down Matt Carpenter trying to go from first to third on Goldschmidt’s one-out single in the third, then made a diving grab to rob Yadier Molina of a hit with a runner on first in the fourth.
Contreras’ ninth homer helped Chicago build a 3-0 lead. St. Louis pulled within one on Molina’s two-run double in the sixth, but Kolten Wong left runners on the corners when he bounced out on Quintana’s 103rd and final pitch.
The Cubs poured it on with 10 runs in their last three at-bats. Rizzo doubled in two runs and Contreras added an RBI single in the sixth. Zobrist singled home Albert Almora Jr. in the seventh, and Bote and Almora each doubled in a run before Bryant went deep in the eighth.
