The St. Louis Cardinals entered Wrigley Field with their bats warmed up and ready for action again as they jumped on the Chicago Cubs early again in a nationally-broadcast game Saturday night. Kyle Leahy was also solid in his effort to keep the Cubs at bay. JJ Wetherholt was one of the bats that carried St. Louis over Chicago on a foggy 4th of July night.
After a one hour rain delay, JJ Wetherholt showed why he should have been an All-Star when he torched the first pitch from Shota Imanaga 364 feet into the left field fencing at Wrigley giving the Cardinals an immediate 1-0 lead.
The Cardinals defense was also showing off Saturday night as the most irritating Cub of them all named Pete drew a leadoff walk and then tried to steal second, but (spoiler alert) he was unsuccessful thanks to the arm of Pedro Pagés.
The St. Louis Cardinals offense kept adding to their lead in the top of the 3rd inning when Nathan Church and JJ Wetherholt drew walks to start the inning and then Iván Herrera singled up the middle to score Church and make it 2-0 Cardinals.
Congratulations to Jordan Walker on being selected to his first All-Star game. Well deserved, but he was responsible for a big missed opportunity in the top of the 5th inning when JJ Wetherholt slammed a two-out double to the left field wall and Iván Herrera was hit by a pitch (of course). Jordan came up with a chance to add to the Cardinals lead including fouling off a hanging 84 mph sweeper that should have ended up on Waveland Avenue outside of Wrigley Field. Walker would strike out two pitches later and that was a shame.
If told just about any Cardinals fan prior to the game they’d see Kyle Leahy get through 5 full innings without allowing any runs, pretty sure they’d be psyched. That’s what Kyle gave St. Louis Saturday night as he pitched out of a few jams including two on in the bottom of the 5th. He only allowed 3 hits, no runs while striking out 6 and walking 2. We’ll take it. I’d also like to give Leahy some bonus points for making sure PCA’s right foot is a little sore for a couple of days. The hit-by-pitch-in-the-foot probably wasn’t intentional, but I’m not the only Cardinals fan that enjoyed it since it didn’t result in a run or an injury. Couldn’t have happened to a better fella.
The St. Louis Cardinals bullpen took over in the bottom of the 6th inning starting with George Soriano. This was also the part of the game where fog became a major factor where multiple Cardinals infielders including Wetherholt and Winn were motioning that they couldn’t see the ball. The good news is the Cubs batters couldn’t either as Busch and Suzuki struck out and Happ only managed a weak groundout to short where Winn fortunately could see the ball and threw him out.
The Cardinals had another missed opportunity in the top of the 7th inning when Nathan Church drew a one-out walk followed by JJ Wetherholt’s 3rd hit of the game. Iván Herrera hit the ball hard, but unfortunately directly at Dansby Swanson at short who then turned an easy double play to end the inning. The St. Louis lead would remain a razor-thin 2-0 going into the bottom of the 7th.
Ryne Stanek was the Cardinals answer for the bottom of the 7th. He started his relief outing by allowing a leadoff single to Nico Hoerner, but he was able to strike out Michael Conforto and then get a popup into the fog from Amaya into Alec Burleson’s glove for the second out. Dansby Swanson caused all of us to swallow our gum as he hit a drive to very deep left-center, but the wind and fog knocked it down enough that Lars Nootbaar caught the ball while leaning into the Wrigley Field ivy. Whew, that was close.
St. Louis would fortunately add to their small lead in the top of the 8th inning when Jordan Walker crushed a double to left and then scored on a single by Alec Burleson upping the Cardinals lead to 3-0. Alec Burleson then stole second base which stunned Masyn Winn so much that he watched a strike three pitch go right down the middle. I’m told he did that for the sake of not messing up speedster Burleson’s steal. If so, that’s a selfless play, but I’d prefer a hit-and-run instead, but I’m old school that way. The end result would be St. Louis only adding one run.
JoJo Romero was assigned the bottom of the 8th inning where he gave up a leadoff hit to PCA before walking Alex Bregman bringing up the tying run in the form of Michael Busch. He grounded out to JJ Wetherholt as it was not likely going to be a double play, but both runners moved up into scoring position with just one out. Romero then struck out Suzuki for the second out. Next up was the former Cardinals killer Ian Happ. I say “former” because Happ watched a third strike go right past him as the Cubs squandered their best scoring opportunity of the night and I write this with a big smile on my face.
After failing to add any runs in the top of the 9th inning, it was Riley O’Brien’s turn to make sure Chicago didn’t break St. Louis hearts int he bottom of the inning. He started strong with a strikeout of Nico Hoerner. Michael Conforto drew a full-count walk as the Cubs sent up pinch-hitter Pedro Ramirez and he politely grounded into a game-ending double play to Masyn Winn.
The St. Louis Cardinals will go for a Windy City sweep with a Sunday afternoon clash against the tiny bears aka Chicago Cubs. St. Louis will send Matthew Liberatore to the mound while the Chicago Cubs will pin the blame on Javier Assad. First pitch is scheduled for 1:30pm central time and the TV broadcast will be handled by Peacock so now’s the time to find a free 7-day trial.
