Cardinals Turn to Bullpen Game as Yamamoto Waits in LA
The Cardinal Chronicle
Cardinals Turn to Bullpen Game as Yamamoto Waits in Los Angeles
St. Louis, MO
By Ray Mileur
The Cardinals opened September with the kind of night that can change the feel of a road trip.
Now they have to prove it was more than one lucky game.
After blasting five home runs in a 13-8 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night, St. Louis returns to Dodger Stadium tonight with a chance to take the series against one of the National League’s best clubs.
First pitch is scheduled for 9:10 p.m. CT, with the Cardinals expected to use a bullpen game against Dodgers right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
That is the contrast.
The Cardinals are trying to piece together innings.
The Dodgers are sending one of their best arms to the mound.
Yamamoto enters at 12-8 with a 2.56 ERA and 153 strikeouts. He also recorded a 1.95 ERA in August, the fourth-best mark among qualified National League pitchers. He has allowed 10 total runs over his last seven starts and has worked at least six innings in each of his last seven starts at Dodger Stadium.
That is not an easy assignment.
But the Cardinals should enter tonight with some confidence after Tuesday’s opener.
St. Louis beat Los Angeles 13-8 in a game that started with power and kept building from there. Ramón Urías and Thomas Saggese went back-to-back in the second inning. The Cardinals added five runs in the third. Jordan Walker launched his 28th home run of the season in the fourth. Saggese homered again in the fifth. Joshua Báez added another home run in the seventh, giving St. Louis five on the night.
For Saggese, it was a career night.
He entered the game with four home runs across 134 major league games, then hit two in one night at Dodger Stadium. That is the kind of performance that can get lost in a season if the team does not build on it, but Tuesday gave the Cardinals something they badly needed: production from more than the expected names.
Leo Bernal made his major league debut and delivered a two-run single for his first career hit. For a young catcher called up as part of September roster expansion, that is a moment worth remembering. The Cardinals have long viewed Bernal as one of the better defensive catching prospects in the system, but getting his first big league hit in that situation, at Dodger Stadium, in a win, gives the night another layer.
Walker’s home run mattered, too.
He now needs one RBI to become the first homegrown Cardinals outfielder with 100 in a season since Ray Lankford in 1998. That is not just a stat note. That is a marker for how much Walker has grown into the middle-order role St. Louis needed him to claim.
Alec Burleson already reached the 100-RBI mark over the weekend. Walker is right there with him. For all the frustration around this season, those are real offensive building blocks.
The Cardinals are now 69-70 and still trying to fight their way back above .500. Tuesday’s win pulled them within four games of the third and final National League Wild Card spot. That does not erase the sweep in Philadelphia, the ugly Baltimore series or the missed opportunity against Pittsburgh. But it does give St. Louis one thing it had been missing lately.
A little life.
Tonight is about protecting it.
A bullpen game against the Dodgers is never comfortable, even with Los Angeles scuffling a bit. The Dodgers are 82-56 and remain in first place in the National League West. They lost Tuesday for the fifth time in seven games, but that lineup can still punish mistakes quickly.
Mookie Betts drove in four runs Tuesday with two doubles. Will Smith returned after nearly three months out with neck inflammation and drove in two runs. Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman, Max Muncy, Teoscar Hernández, Tommy Edman and the rest of the Dodgers lineup still give Los Angeles more than enough firepower to turn one shaky inning into a crooked number.
That is the danger of a bullpen game.
There is no traditional starter to settle the night. Every arm has to do its part. The first pitcher has to keep the game from getting sideways early. The middle innings have to be managed without burning through the entire bullpen. The late innings only matter if the Cardinals can get there with a lead or close enough to make it count.
Ryan Fernandez worked 1 2/3 innings Tuesday, but the rest of the bullpen should be in reasonably good shape. The Cardinals need that to matter.
This cannot become a parade of walks.
It cannot become a game where the Dodgers get extra baserunners in front of Ohtani, Freeman, Betts or Smith. It cannot become another night where the Cardinals are asking the offense to score seven or eight runs just to stay alive.
Throw strikes.
Get early contact.
Keep the ball in the yard.
Make Los Angeles earn every base.
Offensively, the Cardinals have to resist the temptation to think Tuesday automatically carries over. It does not. Yamamoto is a different test from Eric Lauer and the Dodgers bullpen. He can command the strike zone, miss bats and finish hitters once he gets ahead. He has already faced the Cardinals twice in his career and has not allowed a run over 11 innings.
That means St. Louis has to be stubborn.
Do not chase the splitter below the zone. Do not give away early-count outs unless Yamamoto leaves something hittable. Make him work from the stretch. Get traffic in front of Walker, Burleson, Herrera, Báez and Nolan Gorman. Force the Dodgers to defend and make Yamamoto throw more than comfortable innings.
Tuesday’s power was fun.
Tonight may require a different kind of offense.
The Cardinals cannot count on five home runs again. They need better at-bats, baserunners, productive outs and pressure. If Yamamoto gives them a mistake, they have to hit it. If he does not, they still have to find ways to make the game uncomfortable.
This is where September gets interesting.
Victor Scott II is back with speed and defense. Bernal gives the Cardinals another catcher and another young player worth watching. Hancel Rincón adds an arm to a pitching staff that needs coverage. Walker and Burleson continue to push milestone seasons. Báez still has game-changing power. Saggese just reminded everyone he can force his way into the daily conversation with production.
But all of it plays better when the Cardinals win.
Tuesday gave them a start.
Tonight gives them a chance to take the series.
The Dodgers will have Yamamoto.
The Cardinals will have to piece it together.
That is not ideal, but September rarely waits for ideal.
The Cardinals have spent too much of the season talking about tomorrow. Tuesday night was about today. Tonight needs to be the same thing.
Win the innings.
Make Yamamoto work.
Get the bullpen through it.
Take the series in Los Angeles.
Game Info
Matchup: St. Louis Cardinals at Los Angeles Dodgers
When: Wednesday, September 2, 2026
First Pitch: 9:10 p.m. CT / 7:10 p.m. PT
Where: Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles
Probable Pitchers: Cardinals bullpen game/TBD vs. RHP Yoshinobu Yamamoto
Yamamoto: 12-8, 2.56 ERA, 153 SO
Records: Cardinals 69-70; Dodgers 82-56
Broadcast: SportsNet LA / Cardinals.TV Presented by bet365
The Cardinal Chronicle, in association with Gateway Sports & MiLB Today
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Photo Credit: Jordan Walker, St. Louis Cardinals | MLB