MLB Insiders - St. Louis Cardinals

The Pirates face the St. Louis Cardinals in a two game series beginning Wednesday night at PNC Park. The Bucs will toss right-hander Ian Snell. The Redbirds will counter with right-hander Todd Wellemeyer.

The Cardinals' rotation has surprised so far, and Todd Wellemeyer has been a big reason why.

Wellemeyer will look to build off the best effort of his brief career as a starter on Wednesday when the Cardinals open a two-game set with the Pittsburgh Pirates at PNC Park.

st. Louis has a 3.66 ERA from its starters through 21 games, and Wellemeyer (2-0, 3.24 ERA) has been impressive in his first full season as a starting pitcher.

He has 26 strikeouts in 25 innings through four starts, and lasted seven innings in his latest outing, allowing just one run in an 11-1 Cardinals win over San Francisco on Friday.

Pittsburgh will send Ian Snell (2-1, 4.07) to the hill on Wednesday. Snell is coming off his first loss of the season, when he lasted six innings on Friday, allowing three runs in six innings in a 3-2 loss to the Chicago Cubs.

He's pitched well against St. Louis in his career, going 3-3 with a 3.40 ERA, including 1-1 with a 1.93 ERA at PNC Park.

Not only did the Cardinals lose a tough, extra-inning game after erasing a five-run deficit, they probably also lost shortstop Cesar Izturis for a while.

Izturis was hit near the right elbow by a pitch from Brewers right-hander Eric Gagne in the ninth inning and, though he stayed in long enough to score the tying run, he was unable to go to his position for the rest of the game.

X-rays taken were negative but manager Tony La Russa said, "It's a swollen lump. I'd be surprised if he could throw (on Wednesday)."

With 13 pitchers on the club, the Cardinals already were playing a position player short, suggesting strongly that INF Brendan Ryan, whose best position is shortstop, will be pulled off his medical rehabilitation option.

Ryan suffered a rib-cage injury in the last two weeks of spring training and, while he's been on the disabled list, he's been playing and hitting well at Class AA Springfield.

A recall of Ryan would mean a pitcher must go and right-hander Brad Thompson might be the one. He had a rocky outing on Tuesday. Thompson allowed four runs in one inning of relief and didn't help himself by failing to get any outs after fielding a sacrifice bunt attempt by Brewers catcher Jason Kendall and loading the bases.

The Cardinals rallied from being down 8-3.

"We made enough mistakes and they got a bunch of runs, but overall it was a hellacious effort," La Russa said. "You can focus on whatever you want to."

BREWERS 9, CARDINALS 8 (12 innings): RHP Jason Isringhausen suffered one of his few missteps this season when he threw what he called a "lazy curveball" to CF Gabe Kapler, who singled to drive in the winning run with one out in the 12th inning. INF Aaron Miles had four hits and 3B Troy Glaus doubled and singled twice. The Cardinals tied the game with four runs in the seventh and another in the ninth as the Brewers failed to turn what would have been a game-ending double play on 1B Albert Pujols.

--1B Albert Pujols became 2B Albert Pujols for the first time in his Cardinals career when he played there the last four innings defensively. Pujols had played second base in an All-Star Game in 2001. "I was hoping the ball would be hit to him," said manager Tony La Russa. Pujols handled one chance on a forceout.

--RHP Russ Springer worked a scoreless seventh in his first action since coming off the 15-day disabled list.

--INF Aaron Miles had four singles in five at-bats Tuesday at Milwaukee and extended his hitting streak to seven games.

--RHP Kyle Lohse gave up more than two runs for the first time in a game this season when he allowed four in four innings. "I can't fall behind that many guys," said Lohse.

--RHPs Adam Wainwright and Braden Looper both contributed as pinch hitters with a short bench in a 12-inning loss to the Brewers on Tuesday. Wainwright hit a sacrifice fly in the seventh and Looper got a sacrifice bunt down in the 10th.

BY THE NUMBERS: 16 -- Number of hitting streaks of 10 games or longer in 1B Albert Pujols' career.

QUOTE TO NOTE: "No one is as hot as Ryan (Ludwick), but there's no one really struggling." -- Manager Tony La Russa on why the .400-hitting outfielder was not playing regularly.