One Big Inning Sinks Liberatore, Cardinals in 6-2 Loss to Athletics

The Cardinal Chronicle
One Big Inning Sinks Liberatore, Cardinals in 6-2 Loss to Athletics
St. Louis, MO
By Ray Mileur

WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. — For four innings Wednesday night, Matthew Liberatore looked as if he might turn in another steady road start for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Then came the fifth inning.

Nick Kurtz delivered the swing that changed the game, launching a grand slam in the bottom of the fifth, and the Athletics pulled away for a 6-2 win over the Cardinals at Sutter Health Park. The loss dropped St. Louis to 24-18 and evened the series after the Cardinals had taken Tuesday night's opener, 6-4.

Liberatore entered the night looking to win his third straight start and carried a 1-0 lead into the fifth. He had worked quickly through the early innings, completing the first three frames on just 22 pitches, while keeping the Athletics off the board despite some hard contact. The left-hander also recorded his third pickoff of the season, tying him for the major league lead.

But the fifth inning got away from him.

After the Athletics put two runners aboard, Liberatore loaded the bases with one out. Kurtz then turned on a slider and drove it over Victor Scott II’s glove in center field for his sixth home run of the season. The grand slam gave the Athletics a 4-1 lead and became the defining moment of the night.

Liberatore did finish the inning, but it took him 43 pitches to do it. His final line reflected the damage: five innings, nine hits, four earned runs and five strikeouts. He took the loss and fell to 2-2.

That was the ballgame in plain English. One inning, one swing, and a night that had been leaning St. Louis’ way was suddenly in the hands of the Athletics’ bullpen.

The Cardinals had chances. Plenty of them, in fact. St. Louis finished with 13 hits, the same total as the Athletics, but managed only two runs. That kind of line will make a manager age in real time. It was not a night where the Cardinals were overmatched at the plate. It was a night where they could not find enough timely hits to cash in the opportunities they created.

St. Louis broke through in the fourth inning when Nathan Church singled off J.T. Ginn to drive in the game's first run. The Cardinals still led 1-0 when Liberatore took the mound in the bottom of the fifth, but Kurtz's slam flipped the score and the feel of the game in one swing.

The Cardinals cut the deficit to 4-2 in the seventh when Iván Herrera brought home a run with a sacrifice fly, but the Athletics answered in the bottom half. Henry Bolte added a sacrifice fly off Gordon Graceffo to stretch the lead to 5-2, and Zack Gelof followed with a solo homer in the eighth to close out the scoring.

Ginn earned the win for the Athletics, improving to 2-1 after allowing one unearned run over six innings. He gave up nine hits but kept the Cardinals from putting together the kind of crooked number that usually follows that much traffic. That was the difference. St. Louis had baserunners. The Athletics had the big swing.

For the Cardinals’ bullpen, Matt Svanson opened the relief work in the sixth. JoJo Bruihl and Graceffo followed, with Graceffo charged with the final two Athletics runs. The Athletics scored once in the seventh and once in the eighth to keep the Cardinals from building any late momentum.

The loss also cooled some of the momentum St. Louis had carried into the middle game of the series. The Cardinals came into Wednesday with one of the best road records in baseball and had gone 2-2 on the California portion of the trip after splitting four games in San Diego and taking the opener against the Athletics.

Still, the larger takeaway is not complicated. Liberatore was efficient early, competitive throughout, and one pitch away from limiting the damage. But at this level, one misplaced pitch with the bases loaded can undo four clean innings in a hurry. That is the hard math of a big-league start.

The Cardinals will try to take the series Thursday afternoon, sending right-hander Michael McGreevy to the mound against left-hander Jacob Lopez.

First pitch is scheduled for 2:05 p.m. CDT, with the game airing on MLB Network, Cards.TV and KMOX.

The Cardinal Chronicle, in association with Gateway Sports
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