Rollins' hit streak reaches 37 games, but Cards spank Phils

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- Down eight runs with four outs left, Jimmy Rollins wasn't looking for a walk with his hitting streak on the line.

Rollins kept up his pursuit of Joe DiMaggio's major league-record 56-game hitting streak with a double off a 3-0 pitch in the eighth inning, but it was the lone bright spot for the Philadelphia Phillies in their season opener on Monday.

Albert Pujols homered twice, Scott Rolen hit a grand slam and the St. Louis Cardinals' potent offense pounded out 17 hits in a 13-5 victory.

Rollins was 0-for-3 with a sacrifice fly before he lined a shot off Adam Wainwright down the right-field line.

"If he had thrown a ball and I couldn't get to it, I wouldn't have swung," Rollins said about swinging with a 3-0 count. "I wasn't going to give the at-bat away."

Rollins extended his hitting streak to 37 games after doubling on a 3-0 pitch in the eighth inning. (AP Photo/Tom Mihalek)

Rollins ended the 2005 season with a 36-game hitting streak, the ninth-longest over one season in big-league history and the longest in the majors since 1987, when Paul Molitor hit safely in 39 consecutive games.

"I've been waiting five or six months, so I didn't mind waiting," Rollins said. "It was good to get the first game out of the way."

The old Phillies franchise record of 31 was set by Ed Delahanty in 1899.

"Records are meant to be broken and it's good to have an opportunity to chase them," Rollins said. "But I'm more focused on how we do as a team."

The switch-hitting Rollins didn't get a hit in three at-bats batting left-handed against reigning NL Cy Young Award winner Chris Carpenter and hit a sacrifice fly against left-hander Randy Flores in the sixth. He got his hit from the left side against the right-handed Wainwright.

Rollins' first at-bat ended when Cardinals shortstop David Eckstein made an outstanding sliding catch on a foul pop down the left-field line. He hit a hard liner right at center fielder Jim Edmonds his next time up and grounded out to first base in the fifth inning. Rollins' hit another hard liner to Edmonds for his sacrifice fly.

"I wasn't concerned," he said. "My swing was there."

Carpenter pitched five effective innings for the win, though he wasn't as sharp as he was most of last season, when he went 21-5 and won the NL Cy Young Award. Carpenter allowed four runs and nine hits.

Rolen was 3-for-5 with four RBI, Pujols was 2-for-2 with four RBI and Aaron Miles had four hits, including two doubles and a triple. Every Cardinals starter, including Carpenter, had a hit by the time St. Louis completed an eight-run fourth inning.

"There's no way to explain it, coming here swinging the bats like that," Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa said. "There were a lot of hits in that ballgame, but in the end, we had a couple of big damaging ones."

Pat Burrell and Ryan Howard homered for the Phillies, who ended up with their worst Opening Day loss since the Brooklyn Dodgers' 12-3 victory in 1935.

It was so ugly in Philadelphia that even the mascot had a bad day. The Phillie Phanatic's four-wheeler briefly stalled near the third-base line in the sixth inning, forcing the teams to wait a bit before starting play.

"It was a rough first game for us," manager Charlie Manuel said.

Loser Jon Lieber picked up where he left off in spring training, giving up eight runs and nine hits in 3 1/3 innings.

Lieber finished 17-13 in his first season in Philadelphia and was one of the league's best pitchers over the final month when he was 5-1 with a 2.06 ERA in his last seven starts. But he allowed 12 runs and 19 hits in 10 innings in his last two starts this spring and continued his struggles into his seventh Opening Day start.

"I felt fine. The results are a little embarrassing," Lieber said. "I have nobody to blame but myself."

Lieber struck out the first two batters he faced, before Pujols walked after a close call on a two-strike pitch. Edmonds then

lined a triple into the right-field corner to give St. Louis a 1-0 lead. Lieber fanned Rolen to end the inning, but it only got worse from there.

Pujols, the reigning NL MVP, hit a solo homer in the third and the Cardinals broke it open in the fourth. Miles had a two-run triple off Lieber, and Rolen made it 10-0 when he homered deep into the left-field seats off Julio Santana after Edmonds was intentionally walked to load the bases.

It was Rolen's first regular-season game since July. The four-time All-Star third baseman missed two-thirds of the season with a left shoulder injury that required two operations. Rolen, who became unpopular in Philadelphia after forcing a trade from the Phillies in 2002, was loudly booed every time he came up.

"I'll take three hits on Opening Day anywhere," Rolen said. "I felt better the last two weeks of spring. I felt I could drive the ball. Things change when you get in a major-league stadium, the atmosphere changes, the ball seems to travel a little farther."

The Phillies raised the left-field wall 2½ feet from eight feet and angled it back five feet to cut down on homers -- there were 429 hit in the first two seasons at Citizens Bank Park.

But it didn't matter to Pujols, whose first shot landed deep into the left-field seats and his second one reached the upper deck. Each of the five homers hit went to left-center or left

field, including Howard's opposite-field shot in the sixth.

St. Louis is coming off a disappointing end to a 100-win season. The Cardinals won their second straight NL Central title but lost to wild-card winner Houston in the NL Championship Series. St. Louis has won at least 93 games in five of the last six seasons

but lost to Boston in 2004 in its only World Series appearance in that stretch.

Philadelphia finished one game behind NL wild-card winner Houston and two games behind NL East champion Atlanta.Game notes
The Phillies are 56-66-2 in season openers. St. Louis is 53-60-2 on Opening Day, including 19-32-2 on the road. ... The Cardinals have five more games on the road before playing their home opener at new Busch Stadium against Milwaukee on April 10. ... Center fielder Aaron Rowand, acquired in the trade that sent Jim Thome to the

Chicago White Sox, doubled in his first at-bat for the Phillies.