Harrison Bader powered the playoff-bound St. Louis Cardinals to a 5-2 win Sunday over the visiting Milwaukee Brewers, who also sneaked into the postseason party.
Bader hit a triple, blasted a solo homer and scored twice as the fifth-seeded Cardinals (30-28) will head on the road to face the fourth-seeded San Diego Padres in a National League wild-card series.
With the Philadelphia Phillies and San Francisco Giants also losing Sunday, the Brewers (29-31) grabbed the No. 8 seed in the NL. Milwaukee and the American League's Houston Astros are the first teams ever to make the playoffs with a losing record. The Brewers will face the top-seeded Los Angeles Dodgers.
Cardinals starting pitcher Austin Gomber allowed one run on one hit, two walks and a hit batter in four innings. Reliever Giovanny Gallegos (2-2) pitched two scoreless innings to earn the victory and Alex Reyes closed out the game to earn his first save.
Brewers starting pitcher Brett Anderson (4-4) departed the game during the third inning with a hand injury. He retired six batters and allowed two runs.
The game turned against the Brewers that inning. Bader hit a leadoff triple, then Anderson walked Tyler O'Neill before exiting.
After O'Neill stole second base, Kolten Wong hit a run-scoring infield single off of reliever Freddy Peralta's glove.
Peralta recovered the ball and threw wildly, allowing O'Neill to score and Wong to reach second base. Paul Goldschmidt hit a one-out RBI single, Yadier Molina drew a two-out walk and Paul DeJong's RBI single made it 4-0.
Gomber walked two batters to start the fourth inning, then he threw a wild pitch to advance the runners. Daniel Vogelbach hit a one-out RBI groundout to cut the lead to 4-1, but Gomber struck out Keston Hiura to end the rally.
In the bottom of the inning Bader's homer pushed the Cardinals' lead to 5-1.
The Brewers turned an easy triple play in the eighth inning after Molina hit a grounder to third baseman Jace Peterson at the bag.
Jacob Nottingham's RBI single in the ninth cut the lead to 5-2, but Reyes retired Avisail Garcia on a groundout to end the game.
--Field Level Media
