Baseball: St. Louis 12 Pittsburgh 3

Carlos Beltran hit two three-run homers Wednesday, had a career-best seven RBI and sent St. Louis coasting to a 12-3 blasting of Pittsburgh. The Cardinals scored all their runs during the first three innings en route to their second straight win. Beltran's first homer came during a four-run first. He added an RBI single in a three-run second and contributed another blast while the Cardinals were scoring five times in the third. That made things easy for Lance Lynn, who picked up the win by giving up two runs on three hits in 6 2/3. He improved to 5-0 and became the second pitcher to reach five victories on Wednesday, joining Tampa Bay's James Shields. St. Louis roughed up A.J. Burnett (1-2) for all 12 runs on 12 hits in 2 2/3. The Cardinals had 17 hits and reached double digits in runs for the sixth time in 24 games. The defending World Series champions scored a season-high 13 runs against Milwaukee last week.