(Photo credit: Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports)
The reeling St. Louis Cardinals were looking for a turnaround during a slump that saw them lose seven of eight games and finish three games under .500.
Perhaps Nolan Arenado’s walk-off grand slam in the 10th inning, which gave him a 10-6 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers on Wednesday, could do the trick.
“This was a big turnaround that could move this group forward in many ways,” said Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol. “We needed this.”
St. Louis will look to build on its comeback victory Thursday afternoon in the finale of a three-game series at Busch Stadium. The Brewers won the opener 3-2 on Tuesday.
The Cardinals made another change to their roster on Wednesday, sending underperforming infielder Nolan Gorman to Triple-A Memphis and bringing back infielder Jose Fermin, who reached base twice and scored two runs in the win.
Before the series, the Cardinals promoted Luken Baker from Memphis and released Brandon Crawford. Baker hit a two-run pinch-hit home run in his first at-bat on Wednesday as the team’s newly assembled bench had a big game.
St. Louis will start Miles Mikolas (8-10, 5.41 ERA) in the series finale. After meeting the quality start metric in four of five starts in July, Mikolas is 0-2 with a 9.22 ERA this month.
In his last start, a 7-6 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers on Friday, Mikolas allowed two runs in the first five innings. Then he allowed three runs in the sixth inning and scored two runs after leaving the field.
“As far as my last couple of starts, I haven’t felt this good in a long time,” Mikolas said. “I had a good long bullpen session the other day. We had a couple extra days in between. I was able to do a little bit more in my bullpen, talk to (pitching coach) Dusty (Blake) and try to get a handle on things. It showed.”
Mikolas is 1-1 with a 6.75 ERA in two starts against Milwaukee this season. He has allowed eight runs on 15 hits in 10 2/3 innings, with eight strikeouts and three walks.
In 18 career appearances against the Brewers, 17 of them starts, he is 10-6 with a 4.09 ERA.
The Brewers, whose six-game winning streak ended Wednesday, will start with Freddy Peralta (8-7, 4.00) and will look for another win in the series.
Peralta earned a 2-1 victory over the Cleveland Guardians in his last start on Saturday, allowing one run on four hits in six innings while striking out two batters and walking them.
He needed just 81 pitches to get 18 outs, but had no objections to manager Pat Murphy’s decision to move to the bullpen.
“I knew the guys were fresh behind me and I was happy with that decision,” Peralta said. “We made the decision together and for me it was the best decision because we were leading by one point. They’ve seen me twice, some of them even three times at the top of the lineup.”
Milwaukee won Peralta’s two starts against the Cardinals earlier this season, but he
were not taken into account in the decisions.
He held St. Louis to three runs on 12 hits in 12 innings, striking out 15 batters and walking just three. Peralta has a 3-6 record with a 5.25 ERA in 17 career games against the Cardinals, including 13 starts.
–Field level media
