The Milwaukee Brewers dropped their first game since Saturday tonight, as the Cardinals put together a string of extra-base hits and the Brewers had no response in a 5-1 loss.
The Brewers threatened against Michael McGreevy right away in the first, as Christian Yelich singled, Jake Bauers walked, and Garrett Mitchell hit an infield single to load the bases with two outs for Luis Lara in his second career game. Lara grounded out to third, though, as McGreevy escaped with no runs on the board.
St. Louis then greeted Kyle Harrison rudely, as Masyn Winn, Jordan Walker, and Alec Burleson all doubled to put the Cards up 2-0 after one. Winn’s double was an odd misplay by the defense-first right fielder Lara, who took a ball off the face as he battled the sun.
Cooper Pratt started the second with a single but was caught stealing, and Joey Ortiz and Greg Jones both struck out to allow McGreevy to get through a much cleaner second inning.
Harrison worked his own 1-2-3 inning, including a catch on another adventure for Lara in right field — the rookie got twisted around as he (once again) battled the sun, making the catch and falling into the wall. Still, a nice bounce-back frame for the lefty (and for Lara after his first-inning mishap).
McGreevy worked a clean inning against the top of Milwaukee’s order in the third, while Harrison worked around an error by the second baseman Jones in the bottom of the inning. Lara added another defensive highlight, this time robbing Iván Herrera of a hit on a diving catch (see the second video above).
After yet another 1-2-3 inning for McGreevy in the top of the fourth, the Cards tacked on another run against Harrison with a solo homer by José Fermín, his fourth of the season, to make it 3-0.
McGreevy continued to mow down the Brewer lineup with another 1-2-3 inning in the fifth, though this one came with a heart-stopping 103-mph liner back at McGreevy off the bat of Pratt, though the righty was able to knock it down and prevent a scary moment.
Harrison was pulled after four innings in what was another short start for the 24-year-old pitcher. He threw just 70 pitches, allowing three runs on four hits (all extra-base hits) and no walks, striking out two.
Grant Anderson took the fifth and worked a 1-2-3 inning with a strikeout, and the Brewers went down in order in the sixth, pushing McGreevy to 14 consecutive hitters set down — the last hitter to reach safely was Pratt on his leadoff single in the second.
Anderson stayed in for the bottom of the sixth, allowing a leadoff single to Walker before striking out Nelson Velázquez. Jared Koenig then entered to replace Anderson, promptly allowing a stolen base by Walker before Burleson crushed a two-run homer to right, stretching St. Louis’ lead to 5-0 through six frames.
After William Contreras flew out to start the seventh, Milwaukee finally had a baserunner reach in the form of Mitchell, who doubled into the right-center gap. Lara followed with a single to left, putting runners at the corners and marking the end of McGreevy’s day. He was replaced by Luis Gastelum, making his MLB debut, and Gastelum allowed a Pratt sac fly and an Ortiz double, but pinch-hitter Andrew Vaughn grounded out to end the inning with the deficit still at 5-1.
In an odd move, Vaughn, who replaced the second baseman Jones, stayed in the game to play third base, with Ortiz moving over to second base. Note: Vaughn has played third base before, but just 14 career innings, almost all of which came in 2021 (10 innings). It’s unknown if Brice Turang was unavailable to play for a specific reason or if Pat Murphy just wanted to give him a full day off. We’ll keep you posted as we learn more postgame.
UPDATE: It was, in fact, just a day off for Turang. In other injury news, though, Harrison has reportedly been dealing with elbow soreness, which led to his early exit tonight. He doesn’t seem concerned, though, and indicated it’s a “good time for the All-Star break.”
Garrett Stallings, who made his debut with a scoreless inning against the Reds last week, entered in the seventh and proceeded to work two perfect innings, striking out three.
Offensively, the Brewers didn’t do much of anything in the final two innings, as Yelich drew a leadoff walk in the eighth and Pratt had a two-out single in the ninth, but nobody else reached base, giving the Cardinals a 5-1 win and snapping Milwaukee’s seven-game win streak against the Cardinals and four-game overall win streak.
Harrison, Anderson, and Koenig each had at least one earned run allowed in the loss, while Stallings was the star with two perfect innings to close things out. Mitchell and Pratt each had a pair of hits, while Lara, Ortiz, and Yelich added a hit each, with Mitchell and Ortiz each hitting a double for Milwaukee’s only extra-base hits.
The Brewers will look to bounce back in Thursday’s series finale, as Logan Henderson makes his return to the mound for Milwaukee opposite Andre Pallante for St. Louis. First pitch in that one is once again set for 6:45 p.m.
