ST. LOUIS -- Royals starter Homer Bailey had his second straight rough start. After allowing six runs over 4 1/3 innings in his previous start, Bailey got roughed up for five runs in 1 2/3 innings this time, putting the Royals in a 5-0 hole they could not overcome in a 10-3 loss to the Cardinals on Wednesday at Busch Stadium.

The two teams split the split doubleheader. Kansas City won the first game, 8-2.

• Box score

Marcell Ozuna powered an opposite-field three-run homer in the first off Bailey, then Matt Carpenter drilled a two-run shot in the second. Ozuna’s home run came on a 3-2 fastball that was on the outer half of the plate and up.

“It wasn’t a terrible pitch,” Royals manager Ned Yost said. “But he fought off pitch after pitch after pitch and finally got one enough that he could power it out the other way. It wasn’t a horrible pitch.”

Bailey said, though, that he missed his location to Ozuna.

“We were actually trying to go in, so I completely yanked that one,” Bailey said. “We were going to go in right there. Even though it was a miss, it wasn't that terrible of a pitch. He happened to just be able to keep it in line."

Bailey had no trouble throwing strikes -- he got to two strikes on each of the first eight hitters he faced. But Bailey simply had trouble putting hitters away. In all, Bailey gave up four hits, walked two batters and hit another.

"A lot of foul balls,” Bailey said. “They laid off some really good pitches, so just go back and try to figure out what I'm missing here."

Kansas City may be nearing a decision on Bailey’s future. His ERA ballooned to 6.13. And general manager Dayton Moore said recently that reliever Glenn Sparkman could be fighting for a rotation spot soon.

“I didn’t think Bailey’s stuff was that bad,” Yost said. “I thought it was pretty good.”

Sparkman turned in 1 1/3 innings of scoreless relief work and lowered his ERA to 2.95.

The Royals crawled back, first with a two-run third on RBI hits by Adalberto Mondesi and Jorge Soler. Hunter Dozier smoked his 10th home run this season in the fifth, making it 5-3.

But the Cards added a run off reliever Richard Lovelady in the sixth on Dexter Fowler’s home run, then added four more off Scott Barlow in the seventh.

“I thought our offense was doing a good job of pressuring them every inning,” Yost said. “We got [Adam] Wainwright’s pitch count up. I was just hoping we could hold it [at 5-3] and then break through. I thought [Jorge Lopez] gave us two good innings out of the 'pen. Sparky [Sparkman] did a good job.”