ST. LOUIS -- It’s looking like Groundhog Day for the Diamondbacks.
Once again on Sunday afternoon at Busch Stadium, Arizona surrendered a late lead only to have a ninth-inning rally short-circuited by a Nolan Arenado web gem. The Cardinals won, 4-3, swept the series and handed the D-backs a season-high fifth straight loss.
“There's a lot of frustration,” manager Torey Lovullo said. “You know, there's frustration in the coaches’ room. There's frustration in the players’ space. We're going to get this thing turned around, but it's just tough to stomach right now.”
The five losses have come by a total of six runs, with all three games in St. Louis being decided by a single run.
“I think a good bit of it's just, like, the offense not responding,” outfielder Corbin Carroll said. “We've got to take the brunt of it there and look and see what adjustments can be made in terms of … approach, pitch selection, kind of all that stuff.”
After forcing All-Star closer Ryan Helsley to throw 31 pitches the day before, making him unavailable out of St. Louis’ bullpen, the stage was set for a breakthrough rally against Phil Maton in the ninth with Arizona trailing by one run. Alek Thomas led off with a double and Geraldo Perdomo was hit by a pitch, giving the Diamondbacks two on with no out.
But Maton struck out Carroll, and Arenado, a 10-time Gold Glove winner, made a running catch on a Ketel Marte foul ball a split second before crashing into the front row of seats behind third base. Maton was then able to strike out Lourdes Gurriel Jr. to end the game.
“We're all extremely frustrated,” Lovullo said. “I think when you get into that state of mind, you want to be the guy, you want to say, ‘I'm the one that's going to get this one to turn for this group,’ and you get outside of yourself a little bit, you don't stay with your approach. You know, it's just a good lesson in being yourself at all times and going out there and trying to execute pitch by pitch, at-bat by at-bat.”
The Diamondbacks jumped on Cardinals starter Sonny Gray early. In the first inning, Marte hit a one-out single and moved to third on a Josh Naylor double. They both scored on a nice piece of hitting by Eugenio Suárez, who took a low-and-away sweeper the other way for a two-out, two-run single.
Suárez doubled in the sixth and scored on a Pavin Smith single to snap a 2-all tie. Suárez had three hits, and his 38 RBIs at Busch Stadium are the most among visiting players since 2016.
D-backs starter Brandon Pfaadt was given the lead twice, but he couldn’t hold it either time.
The Cardinals responded in the bottom of the first with an RBI single by Iván Herrera, and Masyn Winn’s solo home run tied the game at 2 in the third inning. Herrera’s sacrifice fly in the bottom of the sixth tied the game at 3 right after Smith’s single had regained the lead for the Diamondbacks.
Pfaadt allowed three runs on five hits and one walk in 5 2/3 innings. He struck out five.
Pfaadt said the team needs to turn the page.
“We've lost a lot of close ballgames. … Go back home, turn things around and start winning those games and get right back on top,” Pfaadt said. “So, it's a tough pill to swallow on this road trip, but I think [if] we get home and turn things around, we'll be just right where we need to.”
Jordan Walker led off the seventh for the Cardinals with an infield single and moved to second on a swinging bunt from Pedro Pagés. With three of the next four St. Louis hitters batting from the left side, Lovullo brought in lefty Jalen Beeks only to have Victor Scott II’s hard-hit grounder carom off of Marte’s glove, scoring Walker to give St. Louis a 4-3 lead. Scott’s drive, which left his bat at 101.5 mph and took a tough hop right in front of Marte, was ruled a hit.
The Diamondbacks will try to turn things around at home with a three-game series against the Pirates starting on Monday.
“Every day is urgent to us,” Lovullo said. “We don't take anything for granted here. We don't live in that space. So at times, I think we try too hard. We’ve just got to pull back and do what we do best and do our thing.”