Game Recap - May 22 - Cardinals complete sweep of Orioles

23/05/2024 00:03

Cardinals take series finale with late rally, win 5-3 for 8th win in last 10 games.

Top-line Results

In a game with sloppy defense on both sides and a long rain delay, the Cardinals outlast the Orioles to complete their first series sweep in 7 tries this season.

Pre-Game Notes

• Middleton continues his rehab with an appearance today at Springfield. If all goes well, he goes back-to-back tomorrow with a decision on next steps on Friday, per STLToday.com. O'Brien continues to progress in intensity but has not yet climbed a mound. He is still a ways away. Not much new reported on Gallegos, Edman and Matz. Packy Naughton is in the rehab pipeline now. 3 appearances in Rookie League, 8 Ks.
• Weather may be a concern in this game, too. Another wash-out against a team not coming back here would really pack the late season schedule. Cards have already lost one day-off in August due to making up a rain-out with the Mess.

Line-up (and roster) Machinations

• For the regular game, each team gets to add a pitcher (27th man rule). But not the suspended game. Roycroft is the 27th man for this afternoon's tilt.
• As a side note on the Memphis team, Graceffo pitched a gem last night. And lost 1-0.
• No relievers used last night and day off tomorrow. Most relievers should be available. I'd guess Liberatore, Kittredge and Romero are on the "avoid using" list, but not untouchable.
• Former teammates John Means for the O's and Kyle Gibson for the Cardinals.
• Winn in the lead-off spot with Donovan moving in to second. Carlson in for him in left. Pages catching. Goldy at DH. Burleson at first. Gorman gets this game off as a reward for driving in all the runs in the prior game.
• Means seems like the kind of pitcher that can put a guy in a slump for a week.

The Game

T1 - Henderson opens the game with a K. Rutschman singles. WP advances him to second. O'Hearn lines out to DC on a nice play. Gibson struggling a bit with command early. Santander pops to Arenado. O's really struggling with RISP this series. We know the feeling, don't we?

B1 - Winn pops out on first pitch. Nootbar lines out sharply (100 mph). Goldy with a single to left. Well struck. xBA of .930. Arenado fouls out. He is cold again.

T2 - Westburg lines out. Cowser flies out. Hays grounds out 1u.

B2 - Burleson fouls out. Carlson walks. Donovan forces Carlson with sharp rap to first. They missed the DP, but Pages pops out. 0-0. If you are just joining, you haven't missed a thing.

T3 - Urias raps a sharp single off Arenado's glove. Ruled a hit (reasonably, IMO). Arenado follows by booting a made-to-order DP ball. This is getting to be a bit infectious, with infielder errors on grounders. Third game in row. Talk about putting your pitcher under stress. Henderson up. Uh-oh. He singles in a run. Siani misses on throw to third, advancing Henderson to 2nd. He compounded a poor throw execution-wise, poor decision baseball-wise, allowing trail runner to advance. The VEB hex lives. This has the making of an extraordinarily ugly inning. Rutschman up. He K's. O'Hearn out 4-3, for a second run. Would have been a double play if Siani throws into second on the hit. Santander singles against the shift, scoring a third run. Westburg out F8. Gibson at 68 pitches. He had to get six outs that inning. Orioles up 3-0.

B3 - Siani walks. Somewhere, there is someone in Baltimore throwing their hands up in the air and bemoaning a lead-off walk with a 3 run lead. Winn lines out to left. Nootbar is once again victim of missed strikes on pitches by LH pitcher to LH batter on the outside corner. He can commiserate with Matt Carpenter on that phenomenon. Most missed call in baseball. Takes 3 outside pitches for a backwards K. Oli gets himself excused for pointing out that Nootbar has a better feel for the strike zone than the home plate umpire does. Goldy F7. Ominous storm clouds. That is a weather observation, not a metaphor for how the game is going.

T4 - Cowser singles to left center. Hays forces him, 1-4. Urias flies out to right. McCann K's. Gibson at 84 pitches. 3 runs, all unearned.

Storm delay. They bring the tarp out, in advance of the weather rolling in. I don't say rain delay, because there is no rain (yet). They are clearing the seating bowl of fans, so there is a bad moon rising. To the concourse! There isn't a chance this is a way of monetizing weather delays, is it? Naw. Only a cynic would think that. If this delay lasts, both teams lose their starter. Again, the O's will have an extra inning to cover with their bullpen. This probably hurts the O's worse, and their manager is not thrilled with the turn of events.

B4 - Same as the suspended game, Arenado leads off after the delay. Another lefty, Irvin, in relief for the O's. He doubles to lead-off the inning. Burleson grounds out 1-3, advancing Arenado. Carlson fouls out, Donovan lines out.

T5 - King in place of Gibson. He walks Henderson to start the inning. Ugh. Rutschman out F9. O'Hearn forces Henderson 1-6, but Winn unable to make return throw to complete the GIDP. Been a tough series defensively for him. Santander out on force play, 6-3. O's still up 3-0.

B5 - Irvin remains in. Pages K's. He is really struggling to read pitches. Siani flies out. Winn puts a charge into one for a double to the LC gap. Nootbar plates the run with a sharp single to center. Funny what happens when he swings the bat. Throw misses cut-off, but Noot misses chance to advance. No idea what happened there. Been a super tough series for him. I wonder if the strike zone thing is taking him out of his game. Goldy out F7. O's lead now 3-1. I suspect they will run out of lefties before the Cards run out of at-bats.

T6 - King stays in. Winn boots an ordinary grounder but recovers with a strong throw to get Westburg. Cowser with a backwards K. Hays lines out to third. Quick inning. King just manages to make pitches, doesn't he.

B6 - Irvin still in for O's. Arenado leads off yet another inning. He gets a looping single to right-center on a 0-2 count. Second hit in a row. Burleson pops out. Carlson gets on via E6. Henderson boots a tailor-made double play. The infection spreads. Makes me wonder about the condition of the infield, as everything over there seems to be an adventure. Donovan launches (104 mph) a double into the gap. Orioles throw the ball around and all 3 runners end up scoring. Ruled a double with 2 RBI, Donovan advances to third on throw from outfield, and scores on errant throw by catcher. Pages out 6-3. Siani pops out. Different game all the sudden as both the Birds have exchanged booted GIDPs and the Cardinals somehow end up on top of the stew. Cards now up 4-3.

T7 - Leahy in with a one run lead. Hmmm. He moving up the trust ladder, is he? Urias pops out. McCann out 4-3. That ball was booted too. Henderson walks. Rutschman up. Leahy freezes him with a curve for a called strike 3. Hmmm. Not bad, young Leahy.

B7 - Irvin surprisingly remains in for a fourth inning. Winn greats him with a missile for an HR. Hit streak now at 13. Nootbar backwards K. Those backwards K's on pitches on the outside border are getting annoying. Reality is, even though he thinks those are not strikes, the umpires do. And their point of view matters. At some point, 0-2, I think he's got to think about swinging the bat and taking the ball the other way instead of handing control to the umpires, who seem be enjoying sending him back to the dugout. Irvin 3.1 innings. Allowed 5 runs, 4 earned. Suarez in. Goldy up, naturally goes to 0-2. I'm convinced there is an unwritten speed up rule that requires all Goldy ABs to start 0-2. Goldy ends up popping out. Arenado out 6-3. Cards now up 5-3 after 7.

T8 - Leahy remains in. O'Hearn singles. Santander out F9. A wild pitch advances runner to second. The moment seems to be unnerving Leahy all the sudden. Westburg out 6-3, runner to third. Cowser grounds out 4-3. Leahy collected himself and worked out of it. Tip of the cap to him. Highest leverage situation he has every pitched in. and came out unscathed.

B8 - Be nice to get a run or two here and let Fernandez finish and keep the BP nice and tidy. Of course, if wishes were horses, beggars would ride. Vespi in for Orioles. He is their 27th man, yet another lefty. Burleson extends hit streak to 8 with a single. Carlson out F8. Donovan forces Burly 6-4. No GIDP again. Is there a ban on those today? Pages pops out.

T9 - Fernandez in. Hays singles. Mullins pinch hits. He singles advancing runner to third. Stowers hits ball over Nootbar head, but he makes a great play to catch the ball. Mullins gets caught off first as he didn't expect that ball to be caught. The runner from third tags and scores. Double play (9-3) with an RBI. Cardinals unsuccessfully challenged tag at third. But no matter, Henderson out 6-3 to end the game. Save for Fernandez, who like Leahy experiences his highest ever leverage moment and comes through it. Growth? Sweep for the Cardinals. Final score 5-4. Cards have now won 8 of 10.

Post-Game Notes (and random musings)

• Here is a mark of Cardinal's pitching in this series. Orioles scored 8 runs. 6 of them were unearned. Total of 14 hits. For the series.
• Couple of interesting stats I observe. Through yesterday, Cards are 100 OPS+ over last 28 days, 117 OPS+ last 14 days, 129 OPS+ last 7 days. I'd say the offense is returning to more like what we expect. Except. They are a non-stellar, not even cromulent 71 OPS+ vs LHP. They miss Goldschmidt, Arenado and Contreras. Be nice if they added a RH bat. Or found some of the missing ones.
• For as long as I've been watching baseball, the following has been true: Good teams find ways to win, and if you wait long enough, bad teams find ways to lose, some of them quite creative. Like the Angels trying (and missing) a suicide squeeze play with bases loaded and a LH hitter at the plate. Of all the dumb things to do. The Cardinals seem mired right in between those two extremes. They don't beat themselves a lot, but they are unable to complete sweeps against bad or middling teams (A's, Padres, Marlins, Mets, Red Sox, Angels), so they haven't built momentum. And they have so far shown they aren't really able to compete with first place teams (Dodgers, Phillies, Brewers), compiling an ugly 3-11 record there (before the Orioles' series). The Cards definitely looked better in this series against the O's, who are formidable. I'm curious to see how this next stretch plays out for the Cardinals. Who are they?
• So, I'm no Luddite but I'm also not a big podcast listener. I saw some content by B. Hochman at STLToday.com on Cardinal AAA line-drive rates (a potentially interesting topic) but passed it by because I really don't like podcasts. I prefer to read at my own pace and I don't like annoying others around me by playing media on my phone on a screechy speaker. What is the attraction with podcasts? Is it because you can listen while you are driving to/from work (my trip is 1.8 miles)? I used to listen to CardsTalk and sometimes catch MLB Network on Sirius XM, and wondered if podcasts are just a replacement for that that allows the listener to pick their topic (who wants to listen to A's and Rays stadium drama when there are Redbird AAA line drive rates to discuss?). Someone educate me. I am interested and curious about this social trend.