'Everything was good tonight': May looks like old self in strong outing

ST. LOUIS -- When Dustin May got JJ Bleday to swing through a changeup to end a Cincinnati scoring threat in the top of Friday’s fifth inning, his exuberant reaction told several stories in a moment.

May’s image flashed on the Busch Stadium video board, and it didn’t take much strain for an amateur lip reader to interpret the “let’s go!” from May’s mouth.

The first-year Cardinal hasn’t shied from unleashing some fire following big moments. After his eighth strikeout stranded Elly De La Cruz on second to keep a 1-0 deficit stationary, May seemingly celebrated his achievement while aiming to will the Cardinals’ offense to one of its own.

Though the offense came through with a go-ahead swing in the bottom of the inning, May was nevertheless deprived of his sixth win. Eugenio Suárez tapped into his career-long knack for the dramatic, launching a Statcast-projected 435-foot home run off Cards reliever George Soriano in the seventh to propel the Reds past the Cardinals, 4-2.

It was Suarez’s 32nd go-ahead home run in the sixth inning or later, most in the Majors over the span of his career -- and it spoiled May’s first quality start since his one-hit shutout of the Padres on June 15.

“Solid start,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said. “He needed it. We needed it.”

May’s revival on Friday seemed to put him firmly on the other side of a snakebitten span that didn’t look like the body of work that preceded it for much of the summer.

He gritted through back tightness in an early exit from a start in Kansas City on June 21. After some extra rest to get his back shored up, May was knocked from his next start in Atlanta on July 2 shortly after taking a comebacker off the ankle.

Marmol made it clear leading into Friday that those previous ailments were far removed as factors for consideration to explain May’s more recent fluctuations.

“Feeling really good,” Marmol said about May’s physical condition prior to Friday’s game. “Super healthy, feeling strong. Arm’s in a good place, lower half’s in a good place from when he got hit. Just unfortunate that the outings have gone the way they have. But, no reason to think he can’t go out there today and throw a really good one.”

That’s what May did, putting the recent doldrums behind him by leaning into the variety of his expansive arsenal to produce 14 whiffs while limiting the damage of seven Reds hits to just one run.

Even the opposing skipper liked what he saw from the Cards’ starter.

"I thought May threw the ball really well,” Reds manager Terry Francona said. “His last four or five starts haven't been great, but he's got about five or six pitches, good velocity. I thought he threw the ball really well."

Tyler Stephenson’s RBI double in the fourth inning was the only swing to truly harm May, with the other six knocks against him going for singles.

“I’ve really struggled with the ball in play this year, being super high [in] hits,” May said. “Being able to get out of some big situations when they did put the ball in play, and getting a couple big punchouts was cool to see.”

Per Statcast, May registered 14 whiffs on six different pitches, with his changeup standing out as one of his most effective selections, eliciting four empty swings with it.

“The changeup was really good tonight,” May said. “I felt like everything was good tonight. I got a lot of swings and misses on a lot of stuff.”

Mirroring the path of May’s month to this point, the Cardinals’ lineup has been in the midst of a dry spell for about three weeks. As of May’s emphatic escape in the fifth, the Cardinals still didn’t have a hit against Reds starter Rhett Lowder.

Their next batter didn’t get a hit -- but he got hit. Again.

Iván Herrera padded his Major League lead in the HBP department when he was plunked for the 25th time to lead off the Cardinals’ half of the fifth. Nathan Church walked to set up Blaze Jordan for a go-ahead two-run double, the Cards’ first of only two hits on the night.

“We have to get back to just taking some really tough at-bats,” Marmol said. “Regardless of the result, just the style of the at-bat. We haven’t done that as of late, and it’s led to the score being what it is at the end of nine. So, we need to get back to that quicker.”