PHOENIX — If the St. Louis Cardinals are going to continue rotating in a rookie or reliever as an understudy for the rotation during these long, consecutive stretches of games they’re going to need fewer short, complicated starts.
Or, to survive the run, they must score like they did Friday.
The Cardinals got a run on their first out of the game and set a pace Arizona could not match until eventually their pitching did in a 8-6 victory at Chase Field.
Tyler O’Neill hit his second home run since returning from the injured list, and Nolan Arenado turned on the eighth pitch of his at-bat to guide an 87-mph cutter in on his hands beyond the wall for his 11th home run of the season. Those swings powered the Cardinals past the ongoing search for big-league success from prospect Johan Oviedo and the trickle-down troubles abbreviated starts cause.
The Cardinals won to maintain a half-game lead over the Chicago Cubs and the Arizona Diamondbacks couldn’t turn their perpetual chances Friday into anything but a 12th consecutive loss.
They had already stranded nine batters entering the eighth inning when for the second consecutive game Ryan Helsley was asked to slip free of a bases-loaded mess. That is an example of the cascade effect of inefficient or ineffective outings from the starter, fill-in or otherwise. The Cardinals had seven runs by the end of the fourth, and yet the team had to use a reliever to bridge the middle-inning gap and then call on relievers for consecutive days as the lead began to erode.
Jake Woodford (1-0) handled 2 2/3 innings with six strikeouts and one hit to defang Arizona while he was on the mound. Helsley didn’t duck trouble Friday — the Diamondbacks tagged him with a two-run single — but Daniel Ponce de Leon quelled that rally. A day after getting his second career save, he struck out David Peralta to leave the potential tying run watching from first base.
Paul Goldschmidt reached on an error, stole third, and scored on a sacrifice fly to give the Cardinals an added cushion.
Ultimately a game they twice led by four runs came to Ponce de Leon for his second save in as many nights. Arizona got the tying run into scoring position before finishing the evening like they spent it — abandoning runners.
Ponce de Leon rattled free with consecutive groundouts for the save.
In his fourth start as the pitcher inserted to the rotation so the regular gets an extra day of rest, Oviedo walked the leadoff hitter in his first three innings. All three scored. The righthander had six walks total and at least one in each of his first four innings. That caused his pitch count to rise, the Cardinals bullpen to remain active in case of trouble, and his chances of claiming his first win in the majors to shrink all while the Cardinals maintained a drumbeat on offense.
The first three batters of the third inning reached base against Oviedo without a ball leaving the infield. The first two walks, and an infield single brought home a run. Oviedo spoke Thursday about how in several starts this season he’s found himself working outside the strike zone and then in. He wanted to flip that approach — “Outs are on pitches in the strike zone,” manager Mike Shildt has stressed – and did at times. With two runners on base, Oviedo was able to strike out No. 7 hitter Nick Ahmed to regain a footing on the inning, and momentarily calm the bullpen.
He was a groundball away from escaping the inning.
He got it to just the right person.
Tim Locastro pulled a groundball to Arenado at third. The eight-time Gold Glove-winner, in one balletic move he’s practiced hundreds of times, snagged the ball, tapped third with his cleat, and pushed off to complete a jump-throw to first for the double play. That play coupled with Oviedo’s quicker fourth inning gave him a shot at five innings. He came up shy as his 91st pitch was sizzled for a single and the bullpen had to deal with the rest.
Throwing opposite the seasoned, established lefty Madison Bumgarner, Oviedo pitched deeper into the game despite the phalanx of walks. Oviedo threw one pitch less than Bumgarner’s 92 and got one out more than Bumgarner’s four innings. But despite seven runs as a tailwind and a clear effort to shepherd him through five innings so he could qualify for the win, Oviedo came two outs shy, yielding the mound to a fellow rookie, Woodford.
A one-out double and a single, eased along to second by an error, chased Oviedo from the game and gave Woodford a tidy inning.
The righthander had started warming more than an inning early as the walks started to mount and Oviedo teetered. In the fifth, Woodford struck out both batters he faced to keep the two runners he inherited stuck at their bases. When the righthander caught No. 3 hitter Eduardo Escobar looking at a curveball for strike 3, Woodford had struck out five of the first six batters he faced. That set a new career best before he got out of his second inning of work.
Woodford challenged hitters like he had a four-run lead.
Oviedo didn’t, even when he started with one.
Before Oviedo’s first pitch, the Cardinals seized a 4-0 lead on Bumgarner, the former World Series MVP. True to the evening, Bumgarner invited trouble with walks. The lefty sailed a cutter here, missed with a cutter there, and walked the first two batters he faced. Toss in Tommy Edman’s 10th stolen base and a wild pitch, mix, stir, and add Goldschmidt’s fly ball to left field for a sacrifice fly and a quick 1-0 lead. Yadier Molina doubled home Dylan Carlson from first, and then O’Neill authored an encore from Thursday.
Molina has doubled in three consecutive games.
O’Neill has homered to drive him in in two consecutive games.
O’Neill’s drive to the left-field seats off Bumgarner doubled the Cardinals’ lead and gave him his first home run off a lefty since Aug. 26, 2018. His previous nine homers this season had all come against righthanded pitchers.
Arizona nibbled away at the Cardinals’ lead by turning Oviedo’s walks into runs, but were always playing catchup. Runs in the first and second cleaved the lead in half, but only briefly as the Cardinals widened it again with Arenado’s solo homer in the third and two more runs in the fourth. Still facing Bumgarner and still benefiting from his walks, the Cardinals regained the four-run lead Woodford took over when Lane Thomas drew a walk in the fourth. He took second on Oviedo’s bunt attempt that became catcher Carson Kelly’s error to second. With Edman at the plate, Thomas blitzed for third and, in stride, hurdled over Edman’s hard groundball to left field. Thomas kept his balance, turned at third, and scored.
Oviedo scored one batter later on Carlson’ double to the right-center gap. The double was Carlson’s second extra-base hit of the month and his first since May 1.
