A lineup waiting for that advertised wave of power to carry them for a bit kept waiting Monday, relying only on all of the offense one hitter could possibly generate on his own with a single swing.
For a day, that was enough.
Paul Goldschmidt socked a solo homer in the bottom of the first inning, and the Cardinals’ pitchers held fast from there for a 1-0 victory against Kansas City at Busch Stadium. Steven Matz had his best home start yet for the Cardinals, and the bullpen ushered the single-run lead through the ninth. Giovanny Gallegos, rested Sunday thanks to Ryan Helsley’s six-out save, pitched the ninth inning for his fifth save of the season.
Gallegos pitched around a two-out single to secure a save in his first appearance since blowing save earlier in the home stand to the New York Mets.
The shutout was the Cardinals' fourth of the season, second to the Mets.
In the first inning, Kansas City right-hander Zack Greinke got ahead on Goldschmidt 0-2. The third pitch found the seats. Goldschmidt lifted his second home run of the season 383 feet to left field for an early lead. It was the game’s only lead.
Greinke held the Cardinals to three hits, erased one with a double play, and did not walk a batter. Other than Goldschmidt touching second on his way around the bases, no Cardinal reached second base safely until the eighth inning when Dylan Carlson started the inning with a double.
While not as efficient as Greinke, Matz (3-1) was more effective.
The Cardinals’ lefty authored six scoreless innings, struck out four, and like Greinke did not walk a batter. The Royals got one baserunner against Matz in each of the first four innings, and each time that runner did not advance as Matz never lost control of an inning. In the second, after Royals’ rookie Bobby Witt Jr. extended his hitting streak to 10 games, Matz struck out Michael A. Taylor looking to end the inning. In the fourth inning, Carlos Santana hit a one-out double, and then did not budge as Matz struck out Hunter Dozier and got a popup to end the inning.
The two Missouri clubs now race each other over Interstate 70 to resume the series with a two-game stop in Kansas City. The afternoon meeting Monday was the rainout from the Royals’ interleague visit to St. Louis in April, and the rescheduled game had to be rescheduled to three hours earlier to race the storms forecast for the St. Louis area Monday afternoon. The brevity of the Royals’ visit and the early start invited a swift pace – and then both pitchers accelerated it.
The lack of walks and runs from Matz and Greinke (0-2) gave the game plenty of pep to get completed before any threat of soggy weather.
The Cardinals nearly doubled their lead in the fifth inning but were left with only a contributing role in one of the finest catches of the season.
Andrew Knizner, who worked Greinke over for 11 pitches in his first at-bat, stung a pitch from Greinke to dead-center field. Knizner’s whack had the distance to leave the ballpark. Taylor had the reach to keep it from doing so. The top two defensive center fielders in the majors based on advanced metrics played in Monday’s game, and the leader in Defensive Runs Saved since the start of last season, Taylor, added to his analytics by robbing Knizner of the homer. Taylor timed his leap and snagged the ball just above the padding.
Including that catch, Greinke retired the final nine Cardinals he faced.
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