St. Louis on a 5-game skid faces Rogers, who has held lefties to a .178 average this season, leaving the Cardinals' right-handed bats to carry the offense

BAL  5 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 -- 8
STL  0 1 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 -- 7

Baltimore held on to win last night, 8-7, in game 2 of the three-game series at Busch Stadium. The Cardinals scored 6 runs in the fifth inning to tie the game after trailing 7-1, but a Christian Encarnacion-Strand RBI double in the ninth gave Baltimore the decisive run. Ivan Herrera went 3-for-4 and Bryan Torres was 3-for-3 to pace the St. Louis offense.

THE BREAKDOWN

WHAT WORKED
- Bryan Torres was 3-for-3 with a stolen base and scored in the fifth-inning rally.
- Ivan Herrera went 3-for-4 with a walk and scored in the Cardinals' comeback frame.
- St. Louis scored 6 runs in the fifth inning to erase a 7-1 deficit and tie the game.
- Luis Gastelum struck out all 3 batters he faced in a scoreless inning of relief.

WHAT DIDN'T
- Michael McGreevy allowed 7 earned runs on 10 hits, including 2 home runs, across 5.0 innings.
- Leody Taveras's 3-run home run capped a 5-run Baltimore first inning and put St. Louis in an early hole.
- Riley O'Brien allowed the game-winning run in the ninth on 2 hits, ending the Cardinals' bid to complete the comeback.
- St. Louis went scoreless from the sixth inning on after tying the game in the fifth.

BOTTOM LINE

Edge: Rogers' 2026 splits against right-handed batters -- .275 average and .768 OPS allowed -- give Iván Herrera, Jordan Walker, and José Fermín the only structural offensive advantage in this afternoon's order. With the remaining six lineup spots batting left, St. Louis needs its three RHBs to carry the offensive weight.

Threat: Six of the nine projected Cardinals starters bat left, running squarely into Rogers' most punishing 2026 split: a .178 average and .505 OPS allowed against left-handed batters. Wetherholt, Burleson, Church, Gorman, Torres, and Crooks face a left-hander who has been nearly untouchable against their side of the plate this season.

Watch: St. Louis enters this afternoon's series finale riding a 5-game losing streak, with Baltimore already holding a 2-0 series lead and no confirmed starter posted for the Cardinals. The margin for error is effectively zero.

Ivan Herrera. Herrera is 2-for-3 against Rogers in career plate appearances, posting a career .667/.667/.667 slash with no strikeouts in those 3 trips. At 3 trips, that history is a note of record, not a tendency -- far too small a sample to project. His case today is structural: he bats right-handed, the side Rogers has been more hittable against in 2026.

Jordan Walker. Walker's 2 career plate appearances against Rogers have both resulted in reaching base -- a hit and a walk -- for a career 2.000 slugging percentage against him. At 2 trips, that line is a numerical coincidence, not a tendency. His case today, like Herrera's, rests on the platoon split rather than the history.

Trevor Rogers. The left-handed hitter suppression is a multi-year pattern: in 2025, Rogers held left-handed batters to a .159 average and .427 OPS across 78 plate appearances, establishing that today's left-handed Cardinals starters face a historically rooted disadvantage rather than a single-season sample.

Trevor Rogers. The right-handed bat vulnerability extends across seasons as well -- in 2025, Rogers allowed a .185 average and .519 OPS against right-handed hitters across 345 plate appearances, giving the Cardinals' right-handed bats multi-year standing as their primary offensive window today.

-- Trevor Rogers. If Rogers works into a second pass through the Cardinals order, watch for elevated production -- his 2026 second-pass OPS allowed rises to 0.793 across 207 PA, compared to 0.556 in the first pass. Rogers has pitched into a third pass in 23 of 24 starts.

-- Carlos Narváez. If any Cardinal reaches base, watch for stolen base attempts -- Narváez's caught-stealing rate is 17.6% this season, the lowest published figure among Baltimore's catchers.

-- Cardinals bullpen. If the TBD Cardinals starter exits early, watch the bullpen workload -- St. Louis has already logged 496.3 relief innings this season, pacing toward a franchise record.