━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ BIRD CHATTER — BEAT WRITER MIKE ST. LOUIS — OPENING DAY EXTRA ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ April 14, 1926 From First Card to Final Out — Opening Day begins

April 13, 1926

From First Card to Final Out

Opening Day begins with the card, and ends with the count.

The St. Louis Cardinals and Pittsburgh Pirates opened the season with their regular clubs set, the first official lineups of 1926 put into play.

St. Louis did not wait.

Blades opened with a single. Mueller moved him along. Rogers Hornsby followed with the first of his three hits, driving in the run that put the Cardinals on the board. From there, they were off and running.

That start held.

The game broke in the fifth inning.

Jim Bottomley came through with a three-run home run, the decisive swing of the afternoon. He finished with four runs batted in and carried the club through the middle.

Pittsburgh answered as expected.

The champions did not give it away. They rallied back, cutting the margin and pressing the game tight as it moved toward the finish.

It had to be held.

On the mound, Flint Rhem took it the full distance. No relief. No turn. He worked through the rally and finished the game himself.

Hornsby stayed in it throughout—three hits, steady across the innings, part of every push the Cardinals made.

Final

St. Louis 7

Pittsburgh 6

The first lineup has been played through.

The first result is in the book.

— Mike Allen- Bird Chatter Post