The fans stayed with him for the ride, fair or foul, as Matt Carpenter stepped from the batter’s box and watched the ball carve a second arch in the St. Louis night sky.
The stadium, full to its limited capacity, went breathless for the 4 ½ seconds of the ball’s flight and watched as it maybe possible could be the hit Carpenter had been chasing for weeks – or just fade into another long strike, prolonging his slump. When it caromed off the foul pole, the crowd and Carpenter roared. His two-run homer earned him a third-inning curtain call from the 12,714 faithful who had to know one of his few hits since February was Monday’s bunt.
Carpenter’s tension released.
Then came the deluge.
After hitting three homers in the first three innings off Washington’s Stephen Strasburg, the Cardinals had a jam session in the fifth inning, scoring nine runs on their way to a 14-3 drubbing of the Nationals. The inning brought pinch-hitter Austin Dean to the plate twice, gave rookie Justin Williams two at-bats with the bases loaded, and did not include an extra-base hit. Those came earlier. The Cardinals were able to convert three walks, seven singles, and an error into their biggest inning of a young season thus far clenched by offensive angst.
The win clipped the Cardinals’ losing streak at three games and gave them a chance to also reset the bullpen for the series finale Wednesday.
Jack Flaherty pitched five sturdy innings and allowed one run on three hits. He struck out the first two batters he faced of the game, elevated a fastball to strikeout Josh Bell when he encountered trouble, and breezed through his final inning on 13 pitches. He turned the game over to the bullpen with a 13-run lead.
How it started: Paul Goldschmidt’s 250th career homer.
How it’s going: Williams got his first RBI of his career in the fifth inning and then his second and third two on a single later in the same inning.
Two teams that intend to be contenders this year, the Nationals and Cardinals took different routes to address the same offensive struggles. The Cardinals traded for Nolan Arenado and turned to the batters they had to add depth and protection to twin pillars, Arenado and Goldschmidt. The Nationals made additions to the middle of the order to augment behind the hitters they had, Trey Turner and rising star Juan Soto. The similar lineups with their twists are hard to miss as Goldschmidt and Arenado bat second and third like Turner and Soto – setting up the middle of the order for scrutiny.
On Monday, Nats newcomers Josh Bell and Kyle Schwarber made their debuts as the Nos. 4 and 5 hitters, and changed the game with two walks, three this, and two runs combined after the fifth inning.
The middle of the Cardinals’ order, undergoing renovations this week, has struggled to provide such backing after Goldschmidt and Arenado. The Nos. 4 and 5 hitters for the Cardinals entered Tuesday’s game with a combined .181 average, a .375 slugging percentage, and a .681 OPS. Those two spots in the order had 27 strikeouts to 13 hits. The cleanup spot had a .302 on-base percentage which seems unpalatable until the No. 5 spot shows its .306 slugging percentage. Both are the 11th lowest in baseball for that spot in the order.
Into that hollow came Carpenter and Paul DeJong on Tuesday – two of the Cardinals struggling the most to produce so far this season.
They left have been in the middle of two rallies.
A day after putting a ball to the left-field wall and another to the right-field wall without getting a hit, Goldschmidt put a ball over the wall for his first home run of the season. In the third, Arenado followed with a tiebreaking two-run homer. Goldschmidt and Arenado had done their part, and the Cardinals had a 3-1 lead for Flaherty. But to be a deep, persistent, ruthless offense the dynamic duo cannot act alone.
After Arenado’s homer – his third of the season – DeJong took a walk from Strasburg. The righthander’s velocity sagged, his feel for his fastball seemed wonky as he leaned again and again on off speed pitches. He had one out, a runner on, and Carpenter up.
Once the Cardinals’ perennial All-Star at leadoff, Carpenter has been meandering offensively for several years – questing for a swing just out of his reach at times. There were many indicators through spring and into the season that his swing had improved, his bat speed had elevated, but the most important indicator of all was lacking: actual hits. Including his spring struggles, Carpenter entered Tuesday’s with three hits in his previous 64 plate appearances. One of those hits was Monday’s bunt. Two came during spring.
Strasburg struck Carpenter out on a curveball in the second inning and started with it again in the fourth. Carpenter ignored two of them for balls.
Ahead in the count 3-1 – the same count when he dropped his bunt Monday – Carpenter got an elevated, hovering, 90-mph fastball and lifted it toward the left field seats. He leaned as he hoped the ball would and watched as it hit the foul pole and dropped in right field.
In the fourth inning, the Nationals reminded the Cardinals that reputation are not made on one inning alone and walked Arenado to give DeJong a chance with the bases loaded. He skipped into a double play. The inning, Carpenter led off with a harder liner that was ruled an error – and the romp was underway.
Strasburg came undone.
The error was followed by a walk, which was followed by a single, which was followed by Williams’ first major-league RBI on a bases-loaded single to right. The Cardinals’ first two outs of the inning were both sacrifice flies, including one from Carpenter to give him three RBIs in the game. Goldschmidt added a two-run single, and Arenado singled in another run as they both matched Carpenter’s three RBIs. Eight of the first nine Cardinals of the inning reached base, and it wasn’t until the lineup wrapped around to its 14th batter – Dean, pinch-hitting for a second time – that the Nats found an escape.
The crowd rose to applaud the inning.
It sounded like a deep exhale.
