Carpenter, DeJong mash blasts in victory

ST. LOUIS -- It was with some risk that the Cardinals chose to forgo potential instant impact players available at the July 31 non-waiver Trade Deadline and instead turn over several key spots to a group of rising young stars. Turns out, they received that instant-impact anyway.
The most successful month the Cardinals have had in a half century closed with a 12-5 victory over the Reds at Busch Stadium on Friday. And fittingly, it was a rookie pitcher who led the way.
Austin Gomber opened the month with his first career win and closed August with his fifth. Along the way, the Cardinals netted a Major League-best 22 wins, 12 of which were credited to rookie pitchers. Jack Flaherty had four. Dakota Hudson notched three out of the 'pen.
"We expect to win," Gomber said. "For us to be 12-0 this month just says something about how we've been doing as an organization, how we were prepared when we came up, and how we're able to go out there and execute."

All combined, a collection of five rookies covered 40 percent of the team's August innings and posted a combined 2.53 ERA. The Cardinals won all 12 games in which they featured a rookie starter.
"I can't say enough about these guys," shortstop Paul DeJong said after his five-RBI night. "These rookies are fearless. They trust their stuff. They work with Yadi [Molina]. They trust the defense. And obviously, they can swing it, too."
With those contributions, the Cardinals used the month of August to reassert themselves as serious postseason contenders. Friday closed with the Cardinals still maintaining a half-game lead over the Brewers for the National League's top Wild Card spot. They trail the Cubs by 3 1/2 games in the NL Central and have now won the opening game in seven consecutive series.
One more win this weekend would net the Cardinals a franchise-record 11th straight series victory.
"Obviously, it's been important, the contributions from the young guys," manager Mike Shildt said. "The one thing we appreciate the most about how they go about it is their competitiveness and their aggression and their desire to compete and to excel. Clearly, that's been a big asset for us. But, I can't say that it hasn't been a collaborative effort from everybody that's been involved in the clubhouse."

Gomber's night began inauspiciously with the Reds stringing together four consecutive hits to score two first-inning runs. But the left-hander erased that deficit himself with a two-out, two-run double an inning later. Matt Carpenter followed with a two-run homer, his NL-leading 35th of the season.
DeJong's three-run shot off Reds starter Homer Bailey in the third ran the lead to five. Bailey, who tried to help out a weary Reds bullpen by getting through the fifth, dropped to 1-13 on the season. The Reds have lost 18 of his 19 starts.

In contrast, the Cardinals improved to 7-0 behind Gomber when he starts, their lone lefty in the rotation. He pitched a career-high seven innings and became the first Cardinals southpaw to win a game in which he allowed 10 hits since Joe Magrane in 1987. The Reds did not score off Gomber after the first.
"This guy is not going to give in," Shildt said. "He's going to bear down and make tough pitches and he did that."
Fellow rookie Jordan Hicks quelled Cincinnati's final threat of the night by stranding the potential tying run at second after entering behind Brett Cecil in the eighth. Rookie infielder Patrick Wisdom then kickstarted a five-run bottom half of the inning with his second career homer.

MOMENTS THAT MATTERED
Billy blunder: It was a misread by elite defender Billy Hamilton that opened the floodgates for the Cardinals to score four second-inning runs. Hamilton initially broke in when Gomber drove a pitch to straightaway center with two outs and two on. By the time Hamilton recovered and retreated, the ball, which came off Gomber's bat with an exit velocity of 100.2 mph, had drifted over his head. The ball had a catch probability of 56 percent. Gomber has driven in four runs in his last two starts.

"The first thing I thought when I made contact was, 'Wow, I just hit that really hard,'" Gomber said. "And then, my second thought was, 'Whoa, that's probably going to be right at him.' But he was playing pretty shallow, maybe didn't get the best read on it. It fell. That's probably the best swing I've taken my entire life."
Hicks wiggles out of jam: After Cecil allowed three of the four batters he faced to reach, Shildt called on Hicks to close out the eighth. Hicks was hardly dominant, as he gave up a pair of hits and walked the bases loaded. But with the count full against cleanup hitter Eugenio Suárez, Hicks induced a groundout to preserve the Cardinals' then two-run lead.

"They had the bases loaded, and he just bore down," Shildt said. "He made his pitch, stayed engaged, and he's got the quality stuff, obviously."
SOUND SMART
The last time the Cardinals finished a month with 22 wins was in 1968, when they won 22 games in June and 24 in July. They hadn't won 22 games in August since going 22-9 in 1946.
Carpenter joined Jim Edmonds, Stan Musial and Johnny Mize as the only left-handed batters in franchise history with 35 or more home runs in a season. Edmonds had been the most recent to accomplish the feat when he hit 42 homers in 2004.
YOU GOTTA SEE THIS
Cardinals center fielder Harrison Bader sealed the win with his seventh five-star catch of the season, most in the Majors. With a runner on first, Bader covered 51 feet in 3.4 seconds to snare a line drive off the bat of Tucker Barnhart. The ball registered a 24 percent catch probability via Statcast™.

HE SAID IT
"I feel like it's been a tough month for me, but at the end of the day, I'm driving in runs. There are always positives you can take out of it. " -- DeJong, who drove in a team-best 22 runs while hitting .202 in August
UP NEXT
Daniel Ponce de Leon will be one of three players joining the Cardinals from Triple-A Memphis when rosters expand Saturday, and he'll immediately step in to make a spot start against the Reds with first pitch scheduled for 6:15 p.m. CT. In two career starts, Poncedeleon has allowed one run on five hits in 11 innings. The Cardinals also plan to activate outfielder Marcell Ozuna before the game. Cincinnati will send right-hander Luis Castillo (7-11, 5.07 ERA) to the mound.