Weekend At Bernie’s: The Entertaining Cardinals Are Winning In A Lot Of Different Ways. It’s Been An Adventure.

WEEKEND AT BERNIE’S

Where did that boring team go?

I don’t know, but I hope they stay there.

What we’re seeing lately is a thrilling, confident team that never stops competing.

The gung-ho Cardinals are putting on a show. And the best thing about the their coming-alive, staying-alive hot streak is the variety of wins and the plurality of players that have made the success possible.

A high-scoring offense has overcome shaky performances by the starting pitching. The pitchers have won a share of low-scoring games. The team’s younger hitters have emerged to carry the attack and compensate for the lower-impact production from Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado.

In going 9-2 in their last 1, the Cardinals have won three one-run games and  ambushed opponents for five comeback victories. They’ve prevailed four times when they needed a lot of runs to win: 10-5 over the Angels, 7-6 over the Angels, 10-6 over the Red Sox and 7-6 over the Cubs. The Cards have won five times when their pitchers gave up four runs or fewer. They’ve won seven times when the offense erupts for five or more runs.

Winning in every way.

The late-inning bullpen work has been tremendous all season but can’t be fireproof every time. And when the three liquidators Andrew Kittredge, JoJo Romero and Ryan Helsley were human and hittable on Saturday night, their teammates put up seven runs for a protective cushion, and the Cardinals held on for a 7-6 victory over the Cubs.

The youngest Cardinal, Masyn Winn, continues to come through and extended his hitting streak to 12 games on Saturday. The oldest Cardinal, Matt Carpenter, came off the bench Saturday to sting the Cubs with a two-out, game-tying RBI that made it possible for the home team’s four-run eighth inning that changed everything.

There is so much to like right now. A combination of winning baseball, exciting baseball and entertaining baseball is particularly captivating after six weeks of boring baseball.

Saturday’s late-inning, winning adventure at Busch Stadium seemed – and felt – like old times, before the Cardinal collapse of 2023.

Alec Burleson’s bull-run rumble home to score the tying run on Carpenter’s single — completed with an impressively nimble slide  — was worth the cost of a ticket. What a show! For one the few times this season fans and media were humming about the enjoyable baseball at Busch Stadium instead of stressing over empty seats at Busch Stadium.

“That’s what it is about right there,” manager Oli Marmol told reporters after Saturday’s win. “The place was packed and we put on a good show. The crowd was electric, man, and the players fed off of that.”

The Cardinals have won a season-best four consecutive games. They’re 6-1 on the current homestand that concludes (weather permitting) Sunday night.

Since May 12, the Cardinals have a 9-2 record for an .818 winning percentage that’s No. 1 in the NL and fourth in the majors over that time. Back on May 11, they had a 15-24 record for a .385 winning percentage that was 13th in the NL and 25th in the majors.

The Redbirds have rebounded from a depressing 1-8 start to May to even this month’s mark to 10-10.

The win over the Cubs gave the Cards a 12-12 record at home this year; that matters because they were a sorry 6-11 at Busch Stadium as recently as May 7.

The Cardinals have made a push to move their way up in the NL Central standings. After losing at Milwaukee on May 11, the Cards trailed the first-place Brewers by 9 games, the second-place Cubs by 7 and 1/2, the third-place Pirates by 2 and ½, and fourth-place Cincinnati by 2 games.

Two weeks later, the Cardinals are in third place, ahead of the Pirates and Reds. And the Redbirds are 5 and ½ games behind the Brewers and 2 games behind the Cubs.

On May 11 the Cardinals had a 10.4 percent chance of making the postseason according to the FanGraphs playoff odds. After winning Saturday the Cards’ playoff probability has increased to 29.3 percent. They’ve made progress but must avoid stalling during a three-city, nine game roadie that begins Monday and will take them to Cincinnati, Philadelphia and Houston.

Let’s explore a few matters …

1. The Cardinals can score plenty of runs without being carried by Goldschmidt and Arenado.

The Cardinals have 38 RBIs on their 6-1 homestand and only four were delivered (collectively) by Arenado and Goldy. A total of 32 RBIs have come from their rambunctious delegation of younger hitters: Winn, Lars Nootbaa, Nolan Gorman, Brendan Donovan 5, Michael Siani, Ivan Herrera and Alec Burleson.

During the 9-2 streak Goldschmidt and Arenado have been responsible for nine of the team’s 57 RBI and seven of the 34 extra-base hits. Other hitters have come forward to take the lead, and that’s a positive and overdue development. One example: in the 9-2 run three younger Cardinals – Nootbaar, Winn and Gorman – have combined for 23 RBIs and 25 extra-base hits.

2. Notes on the homestand: Even with a loss on Sunday the Cardinals would finish with a 6-2 record in a fruitful residency at Busch Stadium.

– In the seven home games the Cards have averaged 5.9 runs, batted .294 and produced an .811 OPS.

– In winning six of seven games, the Cardinals have batted .377 and put up a mighty .929 OPS with runners in scoring position.

– The RISP “stars” during the homestand are Nootbaar, Winn, Donovan, Herrera, Arenado and Mike Siani. They’re a combined 17 for 36 (.472) with runners in scoring position and collectively have 23 RBIs in RISP situations.

– The Cardinals have done an exceptional job of two-strike hitting on this homestand, banging out a .265 batting average and delivering 21 RBIs. In fact, 55 percent of the team’s RBIs during this homestand have come on two-strike counts. The Cardinals have five two-strike homers, five two-strike doubles, and a .417 two-strike slugging percentage on the homestand. The Cards also have 15 two-out RBIs.

– The Cardinals have allowed 4.7 runs per game in the seven games at Busch. That’s bad. However, eight of the 33 runs scored against St. Louis pitchers were unearned. The team ERA during the 6-1 homestand is 3.57. The Cardinals have been uncharacteristically sloppy on defense, with too many errors as of late.

3. The wonderful Masyn Winn: during his current 12-game winning streak Winn is batting .378 with a .396 onbase percentage and .622 slug. His escapade includes five doubles, two homers and eight RBIs. There’s a long way to go, but Winn has to be the early leader for the NL Rookie of the Year award. Through Saturday he led NL rookies in batting average, OBP, slugging, OPS and an OPS+ that makes him 27 percent above league average offensively.

4. Miles Mikolas is in better form. In his last three starts, the right-hander has a 3.71 ERA and 3.42 fielding-independent ERA and limited opponents to a .200 average, .273 onbase percentage and .283 slug. Mikolas held the Cubs scoreless in five of his six innings Saturday. The Cubs got him for three runs in the top of the fourth, but Mikolas didn’t let them do further damage during his six-inning start. The Cardinals are 3-0 in his last three starts.

During the team’s 9-2 run Mikolas, Sonny Gray, Lance Lynn and Kyle Gibson collectively have pitched to a 3.98 ERA in nine starts and the Cardinals are 8-1 in those nine games.

5. The Cardinals are pummeling right-handed pitching. And that’s being led by their left-handed hitters. During the 9-2 upturn St. Louis LH batters have blasted RH pitchers for a .324 average, .410 OBP, .517 slug and .927 OPS. In 167 plate appearances their LH batters have thumped RH pitchers for 15 extra-base hits, 20 walks and 23 RBIs. Per wRC+, that performance is 68 percent above league average offensively.

Take a look at these batting averages and OPS figures by the team’s leading LH hitters vs. righties during the 9-2 streak:

* Burleson, .448 … 1.122 OPS
* Nootbaar, .375 … 1.266 OPS
* Gorman, .368 … 1.237 OPS
* Donovan, .333 … .830 OPS

JUST THE FACTS

– In the month of May the Cardinals rank 7th in the majors in batting average (.257), 6th in onbase percentage (.325), 10th in slugging percentage (.401) and 10th in OPS (.726.)

– Top STL pitching prospect Tink Hence turned in his best career start for Double A Springfield on Friday night: six shutout innings, five hits, one walk and a personal best 13 strikeouts. His ERA for the season is down to 2.76. I’d prefer to see Hence get a major-league opportunity instead of the Cardinals going dumpster diving for a pedestrian big-league starter.

– Lefty pitching prospect Quinn Mathews had a rough start for High A Peoria on Friday, allowing five earned runs in six innings against Cedar Rapids. But Matthews struck out seven in that game and has a 2.27 ERA this season in eight starts split between Low A Palm Beach and High A Peoria.

– In Saturday’s loss to the Cardinals the 18 Cubs that came to the plate over the final three innings got to Kittredge, Romero and Helsley for eight hits, a walk, three runs and two earned runs. Before that, the trio had collectively allowed one run and nine hits in 15 innings in over the first 10 games of the team’s 9-2 streak.

– Infielder Jose Fermin should be on the big club’s 26-man roster. Since returning to Triple A Memphis after a brief time with St. Louis, Fermin has hit .378 with a 1.077 OPS in 11 games. In 42 plate appearances over the 11 games he had four doubles, two homers and 10 RBIs. His overall numbers for Memphis this season include a .361 average, .447 OBP, .650 slug, 16 extra-base hits and nine stolen bases without getting caught. Fermin, 25, has done plenty to earn a job at the big-league level. But the Cardinals have this weird tradition of NOT using their best possible 26-man roster.

Thanks for reading and enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

–Bernie

A 2023 inductee into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, Bernie hosts an opinionated sports-talk show on 590 The Fan, KFNS. It airs 3-6 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 4-6 p.m. Friday. Stream live or access the podcast on 590thefan.com or the 590 The Fan St. Louis app.

Please follow Bernie on Twitter @miklasz and on Threads @miklaszb

For weekly Cards talk, listen to the “Seeing Red” podcast with Will Leitch and Miklasz via 590thefan.com or through your preferred podcast platform. Follow @seeingredpod on Twitter for a direct link.

Stats used in my baseball columns are sourced from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, StatHead, Baseball Savant, Baseball Prospectus, Sports Info Solutions, Spotrac and Cot’s Contracts unless otherwise noted.