Sunday’s Game Report: Cubs 8, Cardinals 3
By Rob Rains
This wasn’t the way Miles Mikolas or the Cardinals wanted to go into the All-Star break.
Mikolas gave up a career-high four home runs, two to ninth-place hitter Pete Crow-Armstrong, and the Cubs finished off the first half of the season with the win over the Cardinals on Sunday to earn a split of the four-game series at Busch Stadium.
The Cubs hit two more homers in the eighth off Andrew Kittredge, with Ian Happ and Christopher Morel going back-to-back, Morel’s second of the game.
The six homers tied the most the Cubs have ever hit in a game against the Cardinals in their long rivalry. It also tied the most ever hit by an opposing team at Busch Stadium 3.
“Couldn’t keep it in the park,” was manager Oli Marmol’s summation.
The four home runs off Mikolas came in a span of 15 batters between the third and sixth innings, including back-to-back homers from eighth-place hitter Tomas Nido and Crow-Armstrong in the fifth.
Before that stretch, Mikolas had allowed only one home run to the last 158 batters he had faced dating back to June 5.
The loss left the Cardinals with a 50-46 record at the All-Star break.
Here is how Sunday’s game broke down:
At the plate: Brendan Donovan started in the cleanup spot for the first time in his career and went 3-of-3, also reaching on a walk … Alec Burleson hit his 17th home run of the season to tie Nolan Gorman for the team lead … Pedro Pages’ single drove in the first two runs for the Cardinals in the second … Paul Goldschmidt’s strikeout with a runner on second in the third left him with a .172 average (15-of-87) with a runner in scoring position ths season with 29 strikeouts.
On the mound: Of the eight hits allowed by Mikolas in 5 1/3 innings, six of them went for extra bases – the four homers and two doubles … The two homers off Kittredge increased his season total to eight allowed in 43 innings, the most by a Cardinals reliever … Donovan also caught another fly ball at the wall in left by Suzuki off Kittredge.
Key stat: The last Cardinals pitcher to give up four home runs in a game against the Cubs was Adam Wainwright on Sept. 28. 2019.
Worth noting: Crow-Armstrong became only the second ninth-place hitter since 1985 to hit two homers in a game against the Cardinals. The only other player to do it was Ryan Lavarnway of the Reds on July 19, 2019 … Pages threw out Seiya Suzuki trying to steal second in the third inning. Since June 17, Pages has thrown out six runners while allowing only 10 stolen bases. Combined, Willson Contreras and Ivan Herrera have thrown out six runners in 73 attempts this season … The last time the Cubs hit six homers in a game against the Cardinals was June 4, 1989 … The only other opposing team to hit six homers at Busch 3 was the Reds last season … Donovan has now started at least one game in every spot in the batting order … Happ’s homer was the 26th of his career against the Cardinals, the seventh most all-time by a Cubs player and second among all active players behind Joey Votto’s 36 homers.
Looking ahead: Ryan Helsley will be the Cardinals only representative in Tuesday night’s All-Star game. The team will be off until Friday, when they will open a three-game series against the Braves in Atlanta.
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Oli Marmol post-game interview:
