MILWAUKEE -- Orlando Arcia's stay in the Minor Leagues was much shorter than expected and his return to the Majors could not have gone much better.
Five days after he was demoted to Triple-A Colorado Springs amid a season-long slump, Arcia returned in the middle of Wednesday's 3-2 win over the Cardinals and delivered the winning hit, a single in the seventh inning that sent the Brewers to their 15th victory in 20 games. Arcia was needed when the Brewers placed shortstop Tyler Saladino on the 10-day disabled list with a sprained left ankle sustained in a loss the night before.
If it was all a bit of a blur, one couldn't blame Arcia. He woke up in Memphis, where the SkySox completed a series against the Cardinals' Triple-A affiliate the day before, and didn't arrive at Miller Park until 90 minutes or so after the first pitch
"'Murph' asked me if I was ready," said Arcia, referring to bench coach Pat Murphy. "I told him I was ready to go. I got in the cages and got some swings in with [assistant hitting coach] Jason Lane and was ready for the situation."
The situation arrived in the seventh, when Arcia entered the game as part of a double switch with lights-out reliever Jeremy Jeffress and watched the Cardinals score twice for a 2-1 lead.
Milwaukee struck right back in the bottom of the inning with Christian Yelich's tying home run. Five batters later, Arcia stepped to the plate for the first time with two outs and two runners aboard, punching a go-ahead single to right field off Sam Tuivailala for a lead the Brewers would hold.
"I think he's going to be alright," said Jesus Aguilar, who scored on the play. "He's got to believe it -- believe in the process. Today, he showed what he can do with his bat, and I'm happy for him."
Arcia was hitting .194/.233/.273 and had ceded playing time to a surging Saladino before the Brewers sent Arcia down to Colorado Springs. He went 4-for-15 in four games before Wednesday's recall.
With Saladino sidelined, Arcia figures to be Milwaukee's primary shortstop again.
"He'll play shortstop Friday night," Counsell said. "He's just going to be playing and he has to try to produce while he's up here. The situation was -- there was a player in Tyler who we'd brought aboard and was playing pretty well. That kind of gave us leeway to do something like that, but now with the injury, that's on hold. [Arcia] will do a good job."
Asked about his demotion, Arcia said, "I understood. Things weren't going my way and they wanted me to go down there to work on my hitting and reset everything."
X-rays were negative for Saladino. The Brewers don't expect to have a timeline for his recovery until swelling subsides, general manger David Stearns said.
Saladino, who was on crutches Wednesday morning but able to put some weight on that leg, felt fortunate the injury was not worse.
"That's for sure," he said. "It hurt pretty bad, so I didn't really know. … I saw [the replay] once. That was enough for me."
That replay showed Saladino severely roll his left ankle taking a feed at second base from fellow infielder Hernan Perez in the third inning. With two outs, Saladino said he wasn't sure whether Perez would shovel the baseball to second or throw to first. When Perez did the former, Saladino misjudged his distance from the bag and caught the front edge of it.

The timing is terrible. Saladino, 28, had just been installed as the Brewers' primary shortstop in the wake of Arcia's demotion. Saladino has a .981 OPS through 39 Brewers plate appearances.
"It's not something you can control," Saladino said, "so it's not something I'm going to be worried about. Just stay positive, and get my pom-poms ready for the boys."
On Wednesday, Arcia gave him something to cheer for.