St. LOUIS — When Dylan Carlson felt his hamstring come apart it was just as his game was starting to come together.
The Cardinals’ switch-hitting outfielder, who arrived into his third season in the majors on a gust of last summer’s strong finish, had a .175 batting average on May Day. He spent the next three weeks yanking that average up, batting .333 over his next 19 games, and mirroring that steady pulse of performance the Cardinals saw in last season’s final two months and craved to lengthen and enliven their lineup.
Everything was running in the right direction, until he could not run at all.
