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The Series
St. Louis Cardinals (28-15) at San Diego Padres (20-23)
May 20-22
Petco Park, San Diego

How We Got Here
This is the first series of 2013 between these two teams, who split their six games last year. Each team swept their home series: the Cardinals did the honors in St. Louis last May 21-23, while San Diego returned the favor Sept. 10-12 (which caused just a little bit of angst at the time, which I remembered when looking to see what I blogged about then).

As for this season, the Cardinals travel back to the West Coast after going 7-3 on a productive home stand — they lost just one game in each series to the Rockies, Mets and Brewers. They are 13-4 in May, have the best record in the National League, keep jockeying with the Texas Rangers for the best record in the majors (they are 29-15 today) and currently lead the NL Central by 2 1/2 games over both the Pirates and Reds. All of this, of course, with the injuries that have occurred and, though now settled down, the bullpen blowups of a few weeks ago. Oh, and the roller coaster hitting.

After a 10-16 April, the Padres are 10-7 in May and inching toward .500 for the first time in 2013. They just split a four-game series with the Washington Nationals in San Diego, including a 13-4 win yesterday in which they scored seven earned runs off Dan Haren. The Padres are currently in fourth place in the NL West, 4 1/2 games behind the Arizona Diamondbacks in first and 3 1/2 behind the Colorado Rockies and San Francisco Giants, who are tied for second.

» Continue reading “The Cardinals Bird’s Eye View: Hello, San Diego”

Kind of appropriate on the official High Sock Sunday, where those ages 15 and under received their own St. Louis Cardinals high socks, that the Cardinals kid pitchers were the biggest contributors — even if, unlike most of their teammates and manager, they weren’t wearing high socks.

Photo: St. Louis Post-Dispatch

But their long pants and (presumably) regular (though unseen) socks helped John Gast and Seth Maness carry the Cardinals to a 4-2 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday.

The win took the series for the Cards also, plus pushed the Brewers to 10 1/2 games back in last place of the National League Central.

Cardinals starters continue to maintain the best ERA in the majors, now at 2.63. Thanks to the bullpen makeover that brought Maness to the majors a couple weeks ago, the bullpen ERA is improving also — it’s now 4.55. Combined, the Cardinals lead the majors in ERA at 3.16.

The Cardinals rookie pitchers also seem to lead the league in ticking off former Cardinal and now Brewer Kyle Lohse, who was the losing pitcher yesterday and has lost three times to the Cards this season — twice to Shelby Miller and now to Gast.

» Continue reading “Cardinals Kids Pitchers Come Through In Win”

There’s news about Jaime Garcia following his start last night — and it’s not good.

From Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Cardinals lefthander Jaime Garcia appeared to be a different pitcher in his last three innings Friday night, rather than his first three, when he pitched perfect baseball against the Milwaukee Brewers.

It turns out Garcia, who allowed a total of six runs in the fourth and sixth innings, courtesy of two Aramis Ramirez home runs, was hurt.

Garcia said that there were times when he thought about asking out of the game because the pain was so intense.

Goold also reports that Garcia will be placed on the 15-day disabled list tomorrow morning, with Mitchell Boggs being recalled from Triple A Memphis to replace him on the roster.

Garcia had an MRI this morning, and will visit Dr. James Andrews “in the coming days,” according to Goold. As we all recall, Garcia had shoulder trouble last season.

Garcia insisted last year that the team allow him to take a rehab approach instead of going for surgery. Having now attempted to rehab the shoulder without surgery, the surgical repair is back in the discussion and may be the most likely outcome at this point.

That certainly looks like it will be the case.

At Memphis, Boggs pitched 5 1/3 innings and allowed three earned runs on five hits with five walks and four strikeouts. His ERA was 5.06.

With his return to St. Louis, that obviously means someone else will be taking Garcia’s spot in the rotation. Joe Kelly? Seth Maness? Carlos Martinez? And, looking down the road and depending on how things go in his own recovery, Chris Carpenter?

All is finally right in the 2013 St. Louis Cardinals baseball world.

Yes, first place and again having the best record in the majors this morning and terrific starting pitching are all perfectly wonderful. But still, something very important was missing.

Photo: St. Louis Post-Dispatch

No more.

David Freese has finally hit his first home run.

And, just to make sure everyone really paid attention, he hit a grand slam.

Although the description on the Cards website to go along with the video is much more descriptive: “David Freese unloads on a Wily Peralta pitch for a majestic grand slam to straightaway center, opening up an early 5-0 lead.”

Watch and experience the majesty.

It really is a good thing that Matt Holliday singled, Allen Craig walked and Yadier Molina singled to all be on base when Freese stepped to the plate though — as Jaime Garcia needed all those runs, plus the two Holliday drove in and the one Jon Jay drove in for seven Cards runs overall since he gave up two three-run homers to Aramis Ramirez for six Brewers runs.

Uh, Jaime? Yikes.

» Continue reading “Cardinals Win! Freese Finally Homers!”

We know the 2013 St. Louis Cardinals are good — they have the best record in the National League this morning and lately have jockeyed back and forth with the Texas Rangers for the best record in the majors. So when they do lose, which has only happened 14 times in 40 games, it’s interesting.

They’ve only had losing “streaks” twice this season — back-to-back defeats on April 3 and 5 to the Diamondbacks and Giants, then three in a row April 27-29 to the Pirates and Reds. (I was there for the two Pirates losses. Sorry, my fault.)

And, as Jenifer Langosch reported in recapping yesterday’s Cardinals 5-2 loss to the New York Mets,

The Cardinals have lost the past four games in which a left-hander has started against them. Those four starters combined to allow three earned runs in 28 innings. In the same span, St. Louis has gone 12-1 and scored 46 runs against right-handed starters.

The discrepancy is evident in the team batting average, as well. Through a quarter of the season, the Cardinals are batting 50 points higher against right-handers (.275) than they are against lefties (.225).

Those four games against lefties have included the three most recent losses — yesterday to Jon Niese, on Mother’s Day to Jorge De La Rosa of the Rockies, May 8 to the Cubs and Travis Wood and April 28 to Jeff Locke and the Pirates.

But what about the other Cardinals losses — do they hit better but still lose against righties?

Not really. The Cardinals are hitting .191/.257/.283 in games lost by the team, which is 13th out of the 15 teams in the National League. (Behind them: the Nationals, with the Braves last.) By contrast, when they win, they hit extremely well — .302/.365/.445, which is second-best in the NL behind the Rockies. So while the Cards starting pitching has obviously been tremendous, the hitting has been pretty good in those victories as well.

Now, granted, those stats in the Cardinals losses are only based on 14 games compared to 26 games for the wins. Of the 14 losses, three have been shutouts. The most they’ve scored in a loss is nine runs, in that insane 16-inning 10-9 loss to the Diamondbacks back on April 3 (which you can relive via haiku if you so choose).

What about the other side — how is the Cardinals pitching in the games that they lose? Well, duh, of course it’s going to be worse than when they win. But their ERA in losses is 5.46 and opponents are hitting .307 against them, compared to an ERA of 1.81 and an opponents’ batting average of .205 in victories.

Granted, those stats take into account games we don’t want to remember with the bullpen issues — Mitchell Boggs has two losses this season, as does Fernando Salas, and Joe Kelly has one. The rest of the losses are from the starters: Adam Wainwright now has three after yesterday, Jaime Garcia and Shelby Miller each have two, and Lance Lynn and Jake Westbrook one each.

But, all in all, still impressive when you look at the number of losses other team’s starters have — Cole Hamels has six, Edwin Jackson and Jeff Samardzija have five each as do Stephen Strasburg and Kris Medlen.

If you’re wondering how the Cardinals do in games following one of their losses this season, we should feel fairly optimistic about today. Their record is 10-3, the team ERA is an NL-best 2.48 and they’re hitting .252/.326/.358.

Plus, even more encouragingly, today is Friday. The Cards are 4-2 on this day, have a team ERA of 1.08 and are hitting .266/.327/.451. Matt Holliday especially likes Fridays, as he’s hitting .421/.542./737 with two homers. Carlos Beltran has five Friday homers. And we’ll just overlook the Friday pitching stats … other than to say it’s obviously an extremely small sample size when it comes tonight’s starter.

Who, of course, is Jaime Garcia and he will be facing the last-place Milwaukee Brewers and Wily Peralta. The Brewers just lost three straight to the Pirates and have only won two of their last 10. Game time is 7:15 p.m. Central at Busch Stadium.



Christine Coleman is the lead St. Louis Cardinals reporter for Aaron Miles’ Fastball. Follow her on Twitter, @CColeman802, or email aaronmilesfastball@gmail.com. Also follow @AMilesFastball for the latest updates.

Say what you will about Ty Wigginton. (Most of you have said plenty.)

But for the second time in three games, Wigginton was directly involved in what ended up the game-winning play as the St. Louis Cardinals again beat the New York Mets by a score of 4-2.

And this time he did nothing but stand there.

Yes, it’s from his days on the Pirates, but somehow it still works …

A wild pitch by Mets reliever Scott Rice while Wigginton was pinch-hitting for Matt Adams, who’d been announced as the pinch-hitter for Seth Maness, allowed Daniel Descalso to race home from third to put the Cardinals up 3-2. Wigginton was then intentionally walked to bring Matt Carpenter to the plate.

Maybe Lance Berkman left a little bit of magic behind in that No. 12 jersey.

Or maybe the Cardinals are just on such a roll right now that everything is going their way.

Whatever works!

And things are definitely working — the Cardinals have won 12 of their last 14 games, are 11-2 this month and have the best record in the majors.

Perhaps that is all because of Ty Wigginton’s mere presence …

(Or not.)

» Continue reading “Wigginton Comes Through Again For The Cardinals – Really!”

John Gast (Screen Shot)

It was a spectacular start to the major league career of John Gast. It was even more spectacular that he got plenty of run support in his debut! The Cardinals defeated the Mets 10-4 Tuesday night.

First off, let’s discuss this smooth lefty!

The first Mets batter Gast faced, Justin Turner, was thrown three pitches. All three pitches were strikes. Poor Justin didn’t know what was going on, it seemed!

The amazing start continued from there for Gast.

He threw 71 pitches over the course of six innings. Of the 71, 48 of those pitches were strikes. He threw three strikeouts.

Gast did give up six hits, a walk and had four earned runs thanks to some struggles in the sixth. According to Jenifer Langosch of MLB.com, “Gast did stumble in the sixth, allowing three straight batters to reach with one out. A botched rundown later extended the inning long enough for Marlon Byrd to connect for a two-run homer. But maintaining his poise, Gast closed his outing with a strikeout — the same result with which he had opened his night.”

Langosch also reported Gast was “[t]he first Cardinals left-hander to make his debut as a starter since Rick Ankiel in 1999. Gast is now the first lefty starter to win a debut since Allen Watson in 2002. Asked how the long-time dream measured up to reality, Gast answered: “It was pretty close.”‘

Very exciting for the 24-year-old. I know I am far from alone in looking forward to more great starts from this guy! » Continue reading “Gast Hot In MLB Debut”

It’s pretty obvious that we have a thing for position players who pitch here at Aaron Miles’ Fastball. And it was 25 years ago today that Jose Oquendo  — then St. Louis Cardinals infielder, now of course Cards third base coach — truly earned his nickname as “The Secret Weapon.”

On May 14, 1988, Oquendo pitched four innings of the St. Louis Cardinals 19-inning 7-5 loss to the Atlanta Braves.

Chris Jaffe wrote all about The Jose Oquendo Game today at The Hardball Times. It’s a terrific read, as the game itself was pretty crazy even without Oquendo’s role in it, due to the moves Cards manager Whitey Herzog needed to make:

Oh, and there was one other odd little wrinkle. Because Herzog had used so many players as pinch-hitters or in double switches or whatever, when Oquendo shifted from first base to the mound, Herzog had no one to put on first. He wasn’t just out of pitchers—he was also out of position players.

Time to stay creative. Herzog moved Duane Walker, who had been playing in left, to first. In left he put Jose DeLeon—a starting pitcher. Yes, that’s right—Herzog put a pitcher in left, and a utility player on the mound.

You see, DeLeon was the starting pitcher the day before. He threw 8.2 innings, and so was far too tired in the arm to take the hill today. So that’s why Oquendo was on the mound instead.

Of Herzog’s remaining starting pitchers, he figured DeLeon would be the best bet in the bat and in the field. Not that Herzog wanted to risk DeLeon doing anything in the field. He kept switching DeLeon with right fielder Tom Brunansky. If a lefty was at the plate, he put Brunansky in right and DeLeon in left. When a righty was up, flip them. By the end of the day, DeLeon’s defensive assignment would read like this: LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF.

You really have to click the link for the whole piece though — as I said, it’s a terrific, and entertaining, read.

And keep scrolling down when you’re done reading about the 1988 game — there’s an interesting Stan Musial/Pepper Martin tidbit that occurred on this day in 1944.

Apparently, Ty Wigginton has been hiding wheels.

On a night where nothing came easily, Wigginton was the guy who came through in the clutch. Twitter nearly exploded at the hit (scored a double, but it was in and out of a diving Rick Ankiel’s glove), and then went postal as Wiggy dashed for home on a miscue by the Mets’ pitcher that left home plate wide open.

Here’s how the play went down, as described by Rick Hummel:

Matt Carpenter, who again reached base three times from the leadoff spot, lined a ball off the foot of reliever Scott Rice.

As the ball rolled down the first-base line, Rice started to pursue — as did catcher John Buck, who finally corralled it. This, of course, left nobody covering home.

Third-base coach Jose Oquendo, in Wigginton’s eyesight, pointed that the catcher and pitcher both had gone for the ball. The rest was up to the 35-year-old Wigginton.

“As I was breaking to third, I saw Buck going after the ball and home plate was going to be open, so I took a chance,” Wigginton said.

“The play’s in front of me, so you’re probably the best base coach there is. If you can see the play, you go ahead and take your chance.”

That chance scored a run, and that run broke a 3-3 tie. Clutch? … sure. For one night, anyway.

(Time out. I have to be honest. At precisely the moment pictured above, I was yelling, “No, no, no, no!!” The play developed so quickly, all I knew was Wiggy was trying to score from second on an infield hit that went off the pitcher’s foot. My apologies, Sir Wigginton. I didn’t trust your call. Thank you, though, for proving me wrong with that heads-up play!) » Continue reading “Cards Do Battle And Ride Wiggy’s Wheels To Victory”

John Gast

With an inflamed elbow and an amazing set of pitchers in the minor league system, now seems as good a time as ever to give Jake Westbrook a little break and promote one of the minor league system’s prized pitchers in John Gast.

Fans of John Gast? REJOICE!

Gast, a smooth move having lefty, will get the start for the Cardinals on Tuesday evening against the Mets.

Per Rick Hummel of the Post-Dispatch:

The Cardinals’ starting pitching, which had posted a major league best 2.11 earned run average, took its first hit this year when veteran righthander Jake Westbrook was placed on the 15-day disabled list this morning with right elbow inflammation.

Westbrook, 2-1 with a 1.62 earned run average, will be replaced on the roster by lefthander John Gast, who has been purchased from Class AAA Memphis to start Tuesday here against the New York Mets.

Westbrook gave up nine hits and three earned runs in 5 1/3 innings in his last start Wednesday in Chicago. Righthander Jason Motte, who had been on the 15-day disabled list but will be out for the season, will be moved to the 60-day disabled list to make room for Gast on the 40-man roster.

Gast, the Cardinals’ minor league player of the month for April, is 3-1 with a 1.16 ERA over six starts in Memphis. The sixth-round draft pick out of Florida State University in 2010 began the season with a 32-inning scoreless streak.

Here’s hoping for a good rest and speedy recovery for Jake … and an another amazing pitching performance by the Cardinals pitching staff for Gast!

Miranda Remaklus is a contributor to Aaron Miles’ Fastball and lead writer for Aerys Offsides in the NFL section. Follow her on Twitter @missmiranda.