— Wilbert Robinson’s Brooklyn club rolled into Sportsman’s Park

Wilbert Robinson’s Brooklyn club rolled into Sportsman’s Park yesterday with Dazzy Vance in tow and Zack Wheat riding the middle of the order, and for an afternoon it looked like the sort of company that could make a pitcher sweat through his flannels.

Instead, Flint Rhem stood them up and sent them back with a 3 to 1 beating.

It was the kind of ballgame that settles early into a pitcher’s hands and stays there. Early sun and pitches the cooled the air all afternoon. Rhem had the Robins from the outset, working with a firm arm and a head that never left the business at hand. Brooklyn did not get a clean look at him all afternoon. They scratched, they poked, they tried to start something, but nothing ever gathered into a proper rally.

Robinson’s men are not a careless outfit. They brought with them Zack Wheat, still one of the steadiest bats in the league, a man who has been spoiling pitchers’ afternoons since before some of these youngsters had grown into spikes. But even Wheat found little to work with. Rhem kept the ball where it belonged, out of harm and away from the kind of swing that breaks a game open.

Across the way stood Vance, and that alone ought to have been enough to trouble any club. There are pitchers who throw, and there are pitchers who impose themselves. Vance belongs to the latter. But yesterday the Cardinals did not let him get comfortable.

They did not beat him with a storm. They beat him with timing.

St. Louis struck when the chance came, pushing across their runs without waste and making them stand. There was no wild batting exhibition, no reckless hacking. The Cardinals played it straight — got on, moved men, and made the work count when it had to. Three runs against Vance is not a parade, but on a day like this it was money in the bank.

Once the Cardinals got their margin, the business turned to holding it, and that suited Rhem just fine. As the temperature dropped, so did his slide pitch. Falling right off the table as crisp as the afternoon air.

The Robins kept leaning, as any Robinson club will. They are a seasoned lot, and they do not fold when the game tightens. They chipped away and managed a single tally, enough to remind the park that the thing was not yet buried. But each time Brooklyn tried to build beyond that, Rhem cut them down and sent them back to the bench.

There was no unraveling in the Cardinal defense, no loose play to give the game away. The fielding stood firm behind the pitcher, and the innings moved along without the sort of mistake that turns a clean afternoon sour.

By the late going the shape of it was clear. Brooklyn needed a break to climb back in, and none came. Rhem kept his work straight, the Cardinals kept their heads, and the Robins ran out of room.

Vance took the defeat, his third without a victory, while Rhem collected another for St. Louis, running his mark to four wins against a single loss. It was finished before 3,000 customers in quick time, a brisk affair that never wandered.

For the Cardinals, the victory carries more weight than the bare figures. After a shaky set with Cincinnati, they were in need of a ballgame played clean from start to finish. They got it here — steady pitching, timely hitting, and no foolishness.

Robinson and his club remain in town, and with Wheat still swinging and Vance likely to show again before the set is through, there will be no soft work ahead. But the Cardinals have taken the first crack at them and made it count.

BIRD OF THE DAY — Flint Rhem.

The big right-hander took a seasoned Brooklyn club and kept it in his pocket for nine innings, allowing but a single run and never once letting the game get away from him. No flash, no panic — just command, control, and a firm hand when it mattered.

— Mike Allen, Bird Chatter Post