Central STL News

On Wednesday night at Busch Stadium, the St. Louis Cardinals lost 2-1 to the Pittsburgh Pirates despite a strong pitching performance from Sonny Gray. The defeat marked the Cardinals’ seventh loss in their last eight home games.

Gray allowed only three hits over seven innings and faced just three batters in five of those frames. However, a misplay at first base during the sixth inning proved costly. With runners on first and second, Willson Contreras fielded a ground ball but hesitated before throwing to second as Jared Triolo ran in the throwing lane. As Gray covered first base, he did not see Contreras’ underhand throw, resulting in an error charged to Contreras.

“It was just a weird play, and I wouldn’t say anyone would be at fault,” Gray said about the sequence. “Just a weird play. Overall, I felt good and under control. Even in the sixth, I didn’t feel like it was speeding up on me, and I kept the game slowed down.”

Two batters later, former Cardinal Tommy Pham hit a two-run single that gave Pittsburgh all the runs they needed.

The Cardinals’ offense struggled against Pirates rookie Bubba Chandler, who pitched four scoreless innings out of the bullpen in his second Major League appearance. Chandler struck out three and allowed one hit while consistently throwing fastballs that reached up to 100.6 mph.

Chandler’s approach exploited a known weakness for St. Louis hitters this season: hitting fastballs. Several key players—including Lars Nootbaar, Willson Contreras, Nolan Gorman, Masyn Winn, and Pedro Pagés—have high strikeout rates in at-bats ending with fastballs this year. Only Iván Herrera and Alec Burleson have fared well against high velocity pitches.

“It was 100 [mph], and if you look at our production against fastballs, it’s not very good, and they kept throwing it,” said manager Oliver Marmol after his team failed to record a hit after the fifth inning.

“Overall, you look at some of the guys in our lineup, that has been their struggles -- production on the fastball. It’s not a secret, and guys continue to ramp that up against us, and we have to figure out a way to combat that and move it forward," Marmol said. "But [Chandler] has a live arm with good secondary stuff, and he did well against us. His stuff was good, but our overall production collectively as a club against fastballs needs to improve.”

Despite allowing two runs in the sixth inning due to defensive miscues behind him, Gray finished strong by retiring all three batters he faced in his final frame.

“If I had still been worried about that [sixth-inning misplay], I give up four or five runs and that inning gets completely away from us,” Gray said after striking out two batters in his last inning of work. “You go out there and be a professional and you move onto the next pitch.

“We just came up short, and that’s a tough feeling.”

The loss means St. Louis has now dropped seven of twelve meetings with Pittsburgh this season—the second time in three years they have lost the season series to their division rival.