ST. LOUIS (AP) Carlos Beltran drove in four runs and rookie left-hander John Gast picked up a win in his major league debut, helping the St. Louis Cardinals cruise past the New York Mets 10-4 on Tuesday night.
Gast (1-0) tossed five shutout innings before giving up four runs in the sixth. He surrendered six hits, struck out three and walked one in a 71-pitch effort to help the Cardinals win for the fifth time in six games and 11th in their last 13.
Beltran slammed a three-run homer in the fifth inning, his team-high tenth, to give St. Louis a 9-0 lead. He also added a run-scoring hit in the third.
Right-hander Dillon Gee (2-5) gave up six runs, five earned, in four innings for the Mets, who lost their fifth straight despite scoring more than three runs for the first time in eight games.
Marlon Byrd hit a two-run homer in the sixth as New York also dropped its 11th in the last 14 games at Busch Stadium.
Gast began the season with 32 consecutive scoreless innings for Triple-A Memphis. The 24-year-old was called up in part to fill the rotation spot of Jake Westbrook, who is on the 15-day disabled list with right elbow inflammation.
Jon Jay also homered for St. Louis with a solo shot in the sixth, his fourth of the year. Beltran went 3 for 5.
St. Louis scored three times in both the first and third innings to take a 6-0 lead.
Allen Craig capped off the early uprising with a two-run single. Matt Holliday doubled in Matt Carpenter for the first run. The first four St. Louis hitters reached safely and the Cardinals scored three times on Gee's first 11 pitches.
Pete Kozma and Carpenter added run-scoring singles in the third. Carpenter reached safely four times.
Former St. Louis pitcher/outfielder Rick Ankiel, who was signed by the Mets on Monday, grounded out as a pinch-hitter in the seventh. Ankiel received a warm ovation from the crowd..
NOTES: St. Louis rookie Shelby Miller (5-2, 1.88 ERA) will face Shaun Marcum (0-3, 8.59) in the third game of the four-game set tomorrow. Miller retired 27 successive batters after giving up a leadoff hit to Eric Young in a 3-0 win over Colorado on Friday. ... New York C John Buck broke out of a 2-for-27 slump with a single in the sixth. ... Ankiel is getting paid at a pro-rated share of the major league minimum $490,000 from the Mets, which comes to $382,896, and that amount is off-set against the $775,000 he was guaranteed under the deal he was released from by the Astros. He can earn an additional $775,000 in performance bonuses from the Mets based on plate appearances.
