THE REDBIRD REVIEW
Cardinals 2, Pirates 1.
What a ballgame.
Let us review some of the things that made the competition so special.
1) Lance Lynn, the old grizzly, held his own against the rookie Pittsburgh phenom Paul Skenes. There were a lot of pitcher pounds out there on the mound at PNC Park. A LOT of pitcher pounds. If we go by the combined weight of the two starting pitchers – as officially listed – Lynn + Skenes added up to 515 pounds. Lynn stands 6 feet, 5 inches tall. Skenes is 6 feet, 6 inches. I’d like to see them go at it in a UFC brawl. But Skenes is 15 years younger than the 37-year-old Lynn, so he gets the edge in stamina. But Lynn is more of a ruffian. He’d win a lot of battles in the parking lot of a roadhouse.
2) This was the Millennial pitcher vs. the Gen Z pitcher, which made their matchup even more colorful. True fact: when Lynn, the rookie, pitched for the Cardinals in the 2011 World Series, Skenes was a little fella of 9 years old.
3) Lynn heaved fastballs for five laborious, intense innings. The Pirates couldn’t land a single punch to score a run. And the home team had Lynn surrounded and cornered. Only 10 of Lynn’s pitcher-hitter conflicts came with the bases empty. Lynn pitched to 12 batters when the Pirates had men on base. He confronted seven Pittsburgh hitters with runners lurking in scoring position. Lynn took on two hitters with the bases loaded, and fought his way out of it both times. Lynn was in trouble. He could have gone down. But the Pirates couldn’t make him crack. Lynn used up a lot of pitches to fend the Pirates off. He was a stubborn old cuss.
4) The mountainous Skenes had made his first 11 big-league starts without being charged with a loss. His individual record was 6-0. And now he’s 6-1. Skenes outpitched Lynn in several ways. Skenes went deeper into the game, 8 and ⅓ innings compared to Lynn’s 5 IP. Skenes didn’t allow a walk. The Cardinals dinged him for only four hits, and went down on strikes eight times. Lynn pitched to 22 Pirates and seven reached base. Skenes pitched to 29 Cardinals and only four reached base. But Lynn would not surrender to the Jolly Roger. And the Cardinals got to Skenes for two runs on a solo homer by Nolan Arenado, and a ninth-inning RBI single by Alec Burleson that broke a 1-1 tie. That was it for Skenes. He was done for the night.
5) The Cardinals were a betting-line underdog in this one. And who would question that? Lynn came into this assignment with a 5.21 ERA in his previous 13 starts. Skenes was the talk of baseball. The NL’s starting pitcher in last week’s All-Star Game. Skenes strikes out opponents at a rate of 34.2 percent, and Lynn’s 92 mph fastball doesn’t unnerve hitters. So for the investors who understandably wagered on the Pirates to prevail in this Lynn vs. Skenes clash – well, better luck next time. The idea of beating Skenes made Lynn even more ornery than usual.
6) Lynn grunted for career strikeout No. 2,000 in this game. He finished his shift with 1,013 career strikeouts as a Cardinal. Let’s pause for a minute to express appreciation. The Cardinals have been the Cardinals since 1900, and only six pitchers in franchise history have amassed 1,000 or more strikeouts: Bob Gibson (3,117), Adam Wainwright (2,202), Dizzy Dean (1,095), Chris Carpenter (1,085), Bob Forsch (1,079) and Lance Lynn. Only 16 pitchers have started more games for the Cardinals than Lynn’s 181. And only 20 Cardinal pitchers have been credited with more individual wins than Lynn’s 77. On Tuesday night, Lynn didn’t get the win, but he left the game with a 1-0 lead … and certainly did his part to make this a successful evening for the Cardinals. The record will not show a “W” by Lynn’s name after his effort at Pittsburgh. But that record will show a “L” next to Skenes, and Lynn had a helluva lot to do with that.
7) My favorite pitcher vs. hitter engagement to watch in this tight game was Michael Siani super-pest skills vs. Skenes. The St. Louis center fielder batted ninth and had three plate appearances with Skenes glaring down at him. Skenes had to throw 19 pitches to shoo Siani away in the three at-bats. In those three ABs, Siani fouled off seven pitches. He took five balls out of the strike zone. He watched three called strikes. He had only two swings-and-misses. He put two pitches in play. The first was a groundout. The second time came in the ninth inning, when Siani concluded a six-pitch at-bat by lining an opposite field double on a 98 mph fastball to scoot into scoring position. Siani advanced to third on Masyn Winn’s groundout, and scored on Burleson’s latest RBI delivery. Siani’s at-bats against Skenes were fantastic, and I don’t think any of us would have predicted this before the game.
8) I wanted to look something up. It’s a good stat. Here are my findings: the three hitters who made Skenes throw the most pitches to them in a game this season were Pete Alonso (20), Matt Olson (20), and Michael Siani (19). Siani became only the fifth LH batter to sting Skenes for a double this season. And only one opposing hitter, Michael Busch, fouled off more pitches (8) against Skenes in a game than Siani did last night.
9) The Cardinals are 39-30 when Siani starts a game this season. Not only is Siani providing award-winning caliber defense, but he’s stepping up as a hitter. I wrote a lot about this earlier this week, but let’s do a quick update. Since June 12, Siani is 24 for 82 (.293) with a .318 onbase percentage and .402 slugging percentage. And when batting against right-handed pitchers during this time, Siani is 18 for 60 for a .300 average.
10) The defensive play of the game was made by Cardinals catcher Willson Contreras. Fifth inning, bases loaded, two outs, St. Louis up 1-0, Lynn trying to tough it out. Nick Gonzales was up for the Pirates. He tapped a pitch to the left side, a good amount of space from home plate. Contreras sprinted, pounced, wheeled around, and lasered a perfect throw to first baseman Paul Goldschmidt for the final out. Crisis averted. Lynn hollered and pumped his fist. Contreras hollered, and winked. It was the best play made by a St. Louis catcher since Yadier Molina retired.
11) Now, about Burleson: Biscuit came through again. Siani on third. A 1-1 game. Skenes came at Burleson with a 99 mph fastball. Fouled off. Skenes stayed with the plan and came right back with another 99 mph fastball. Fouled off. Skenes, determined to win the challenge, took aim at Burly for a third time with a 98 mph fastball. Burleson lined a single to right. RBI. Cards lead 2-1.
12) Burleson has 60 RBIs on the season. But he’s cashed in 22 RBIs in July, the most in the National League and tied for second in the majors. Through Tuesday, Burleson was batting .347 in July with a .358 OBP and .627 slugging rate.
13) Since the start of June, Burleson is hitting .302 with a .330 OBP, .560 slug, 13 home runs and 42 RBI. Those 42 runs batted in are the most by an NL hitter since June 1 – and second overall to Aaron Judge (44.)
14) My favorite Burleson stat of the day: he has driven in a run in 13 different games this month. That’s the most games with an RBI by a major-league hitter in July. And since June 23, Burleson has come through with an RBI 10 times to snap a tie and give the Cardinals the lead.
15) It was good to see Arenado smile after he attacked a first-pitch curveball by Skenes for a pull-shot home run to left. The launch gave the Cardinals a 1-0 lead and was Arenado’s 10th of the season. That’s two solo homers for Arenado in the last five games. In a related note, 16 of the last 19 homers struck by St. Louis have been solo shots. And 11 of the team’s last 12 home runs were solos.
16) Lefty JoJo Romero had another distressing outing, giving up two hits and a run while retiring only one batter in the fifth. The Cards’ 1-0 lead was gone. Romero isn’t safe with a lead. In his last 17 appearances dating back to June 3, he has a 6.00 ERA and four blown saves and has allowed a .320 average, .393 OBP and .560 slug. And in his last 10 appearances, Romero has been tagged for three earned runs in 6 and ⅔ innings – and has struck out only one of 32 batters faced.
17) The other St. Louis relievers were just about perfect Tuesday. John King, Andrew Kittredge, Ryan Fernandez and Ryan Helsley combined for 3 and ⅔ innings, gave up one hit, didn’t walk a batter, and struck out five. Kittredge got a double-play grounder in the seventh. Fernandez got a crucial double-play grounder in the eighth after replacing Romero to prevent the Pirates from taking the lead. Helsley struck out the side in the ninth (on just 13 pitches) and pocketed his 33rd save of the season. The Cardinals lead the majors with 37 saves. Helsley leads all MLB relievers with 33 saves, and has a save-opportunity success rate of 94 percent. The St. Louis bullpen ranks fourth in the majors with a 3.43 ERA and is third in Win Probability Added.
18) The Cardinals and Pirates are closely matched. The division rivals have played eight games against each other this season and six of the eight were decided by one run. The Cards are 5–3 against the Pirates; three of the wins were by one run and a fourth came by two runs. And all three Pittsburgh victories over St. Louis were one-run wins. The teams will do it again Wednesday at 11:35 a.m. STL time.
19) The Cardinals’ defense leads the NL with 94 ground-ball double plays this season. Only Oakland (95) has turned more GIDP. The strong defense is a factor in STL’s 3.94 ERA that has improved to No. 14 in the majors. The Cardinals’ 20 defensive runs saved ranks 13th in the majors.
20) Accounting Department: With the win, the Cardinals remained five games behind first-place Milwaukee in the NL Central. But the Cardinals are now only two games behind the Braves in the bid for the NL’s No. 1 wild card spot. The Cardinals are the No. 2 wild card, a half-game ahead of the No. 3 Mets. In other wild-card considerations, the Cardinals lead the Padres by one game, the Diamondbacks by 1 and ½ games, and the Pirates by two games. The Cubs are Reds each trail the Cardinals by five games … the Cardinals still have the NL’s best record (38-24) since May 12 … St. Louis is 43-34 since April 24 for the third-best record in the NL over that time.
Thanks for reading!
–Bernie
A 2023 inductee into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, Bernie has provided informed opinions and perspective on St. Louis sports through his columns, radio shows and podcasts since 1985.
Please follow Bernie on X @b_miklasz and Threads @miklaszb
For weekly Cards talk, listen to the “Seeing Red” podcast with Will Leitch and Miklasz. It’s available on Apple, Spotify, or where you get your podcasts. Follow @seeingredpod on X for a direct link.
Stats used in my baseball columns are sourced from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, StatHead, Baseball Savant, Baseball Prospectus, Brooks Baseball Net, and Sports Info Solutions and Cots Contracts unless otherwise noted.
For the last 36 years Bernie Miklasz has entertained, enlightened, and connected with generations of St. Louis sports fans.
While best known for his voice as the lead sports columnist at the Post-Dispatch for 26 years, Bernie has also written for The Athletic, Dallas Morning News and Baltimore News American. A 2023 inductee into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, Bernie has hosted radio shows in St. Louis, Dallas, Baltimore and Washington D.C.
Bernie, his wife Kirsten and their cats reside in the Skinker-DeBaliviere neighborhood of St. Louis.
