The St. Louis Cardinals needed a big finish to their nine-game road trip and after falling in the first game to the Pirates, bounced back with a big 5-3 win over generational talent Paul Skenes. In the rubber match of the team’s first series against an NL Central opponent, the Cardinals dropped their fourth-straight extra inning game of the year, moving their season record to 5-7.
GAME ONE (L 8-5)
The first game of the series was a stinker, with the Cardinals falling behind 4-0 after the second inning in which starter Matthew Liberatore (0-1) gave up three runs, forcing the offense to work harder against Pirates’ starter Carmen Mlodzinski (1-1). Mlodzinski was looking for a bounce-back start of his own and delivered five quality innings while striking out six Cardinal hitters and never really facing much danger on the base paths.
The Cardinals chipped away in the 5th and 6th innings with Brendan Donovan knocking an RBI single and new catcher Yohel Pozo smashing a 380 foot homer to left to make the score 4-2, although the deficit seemed like it was more than two runs. Liberatore settled in after the second inning and silenced the Pittsburgh hitters until the 7th inning. The lefty was dealing to that point, notching six strikeouts but then allowed a leadoff single. Liberatore’s day would end with his seventh strikeout of the day before giving way to reliever Chris Roycroft, who promptly walked the next batter on four pitches and then allowed two runs to score on a double, putting the game seemingly out of reach.
The Cardinals did scrape together two more runs, the first on a Jordan Walker groundout before Masyn Winn kept his turnaround going with his first homer of the year. It was too little, too late for the Redbirds and they eventually fell 8-4.
GAME TWO (W 5-3)
The Cardinals badly needed a win to end a tough four-game losing streak but this was not going to come easy as game two saw them face budding superstar Paul Skenes (1-1) in freezing temperatures on Tuesday.
The first two innings were tough on the offense, with Skenes putting them down in order and struck out three in the process. The third inning, though, was a different story. Pedro Pages, who is going to be called upon early and often because of Ivan Herrera’s injury, smoked a line drive single to right to lead off the inning. After another strikeout, Masyn Winn followed up with a single of his own before Victor Scott II smashed his first career triple to put the Cardinals ahead 2-0. The scoring was not done yet as Brendan Donovan knocked in Scott with a sharp single before the eventual end of the inning.
Those three runs were what starter Sonny Gray (2-0) needed to cruise through five innings on another frigid evening. Gray out-pitched Skenes during his start with the only run he allowed coming at the hands of Cardinal-killer Bryan Reynolds, who smashed a homer to cut the lead to 3-1. This was the fourth homer that Gray has allowed this season. His day would end after five innings and 71 pitches, the early hook coming as a precaution in the cold temps.
The Cardinals would pounce on Skenes again in the sixth after Donovan started the inning with a double, Nolan Arenado walked, and then Alec Burleson hit a single to drive in Donovan and set up the runners at first and third. The fifth run of the game would come from another quality at-bat from Pages, who drove in Arenado with an RBI groundout.
Steven Matz and Kyle Leahy each threw over an inning in relief, and both kept the Pirates off the board before giving way to JoJo Romero in the hopes of closing the door. The Pirates would not go quietly, however, as Romero allowed a double, single, and RBI groundout to bring the score to 5-2. Manager Oli Marmol then went back to the bullpen and brought out Phil Maton with Ryan Helsley unavailable. Maton notched a strikeout before Reynolds struck again, this time with an RBI double to pull the Pirates within two. Facing formal Cardinal Tommy Pham as the tying run, Maton allowed a 101.6 mph line drive to right that Jordan Walker tracked down to end the game with a 5-3 Cardinal victory.
GAME 3 (L 2-1, 13 innings)
A series win would be a big boost for the Cardinals as they head into Thursday’s off day. Erick Fedde was on the hill looking to rebound from getting hit around in Boston and faced former-ace Mitch Keller in a midweek matinee. Fedde did exactly that and more on Wednesday, throwing six no-hit innings but was pulled after consistent traffic thanks to an error and four walks. In his 88 pitches, Fedde struckout two and had three double plays turned behind him, including a nifty strikeout-caught stealing to wipe away a lead-off walk.
The only problem with Fedde’s start was that Keller was even better, silencing the Cardinals offense into the eighth inning when he was lifted for reliever Caleb Ferguson. Keller struck out six and allowed five base runners over 7.1 innings of work. He was pulled from the game after allowing a Thomas Saggese 0-2 single and a Masyn Winn Walk.
The move to the bullpen looked like it would immediately bite the Pirates. Lars Nootbaar smashed a line drive to left for another hard hit out but then Willson Contreras followed with a sky high pop up between the catcher, third baseman, and pitcher. With two outs, the baserunners were running on any hit and, by horrible luck, the ball dropped at home plate just as Saggese was crossing the chaos. The ball landed at the feet of the third baseman and right into a tag of Saggese at the plate to end the inning with no runs being scored.
Another play at the plate, to define what actually happened loosely, occurred in the top of the 10th inning. The extra-inning affair was already the Cardinals’ fourth of the season and their losing streak in such games continued.
With the Manfred Man on second to start the away half of the 10th, Pedro Pages smacked a routine single to left. However, pinch runner Michael Siani was sent home on the play and thrown out by about half of a baseline. The questionable at best send took all the air out of the Cardinals rally and they appeared ready to take on another loss in the bottom of the inning. JoJo Romero got the ball again and got out of a jam with runners on first and second with only one out. Romero got a pop out and fly out to move the game to the 11th inning.
After a scoreless top half, it looked like the Pirates wanted to return the favor to St. Louis. Ryan Helsley entered the game and struck out Andrew McCutchen when a one-out single by Joey Bart went right to Lars Nootbaar who came up firing home to nail the winning run, also by half of a baseline. A smashed grounder to third was cleanly handled by Arenado to extend the game further into the 12th.
Starting off the 12th was Lars Nootbaar, who’s grounder to the right side moved Manfred Man Willson Contreras to third. Arenado was intentionally walked and then Marmol chose to pinch-hit for Siani, inserting Jordan Walker into the lineup after a scheduled day off. Walker capitalized with a seeing-eye single through the hole at second base, scoring Contreras and Arenado moves up to third. Pages followed with a soft grounder to third but Arenado strayed too far off the bag and was tagged for the second out of the inning. Victor Scott II would follow with two runners on but popped out to go to the bottom of the inning with a 1-0 lead. After two quick outs by reliever Steven Matz, former friend Tommy Pham cashed in the runner from third with a two-out single, extending the game into the 13th inning with each team working with a bare bullpen.
Back to back strikeouts opened the top half of the inning and an intentional walk brought the struggling Willson Contreras to the plate with another opportunity for a big hit. A harmless grounder to second gave the Pirates another prime chance to end the marathon game against reliever Chris Roycroft (0-2), who took the mound for the third time in four days. The tall righty promptly walked the first two batters he faced, loading the bases with no outs for McCutchen. The command issues continued in the at-bat with the long-time Pirate and eventually ended when McCutchen smacked a grounder to short that Winn fired home to force the runner out at home but the bases remained loaded. The tight-roping would eventually end when Joey Bart launched a long fly ball to left that would fall for a game-ending single. Justin Lawrence (1-0) nabbed the victory for the Pirates.
The Cardinals have a needed off-day on Thursday before heading back to St. Louis for a six-game home stand against the Phillies and the Astros.
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