Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - CARDINALS’ GRUELING Stretch: Masyn Winn and Andre Pallante BATTLE but Offense FALLS FLAT

Episode Date: April 25, 2026

St. Louis Cardinals struggle offensively in a tight 3-2 loss to the Seattle Mariners, kicking off a grueling 17-game stretch. JD Hafron spotlights Masyn Winn’s hitting streak, George Kirby’s pitching dominance, and Andre Pallante’s gritty effort on the mound. The breakdown also covers Gordon Graceffo’s continued bullpen reliability and the lineup’s urgent need for timely hits, especially as key bats like Jordan Walker face slumps. 00:00 Mariners vs Cardinals Recap 06:55 Cardinals Three Stars 21:23 NL Central Wild Night Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms… 🎧 https://lockedonpodcasts.com/podcasts/locked-on-st-louis-cardinals/ Locked On MLB League-Wide: Every Team, Prospects & More 🎧 https://lockedonpodcasts.com/leagues/mlb/ Everydayer Club If you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonstlcardinals.supercast.com/ Follow the show on Twitter/X: @LO_Cardinals Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! 5-Hour ENERGY The funfetti flavor is BACK on https://5hourEnergy.com or Amazon, crack open Confetti Craze 5-hour ENERGY®️ shot today! Indeed Listeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast Gametime Today's episode is brought to you by Gametime. Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase. Terms and conditions apply. FanDuel Today's episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now new customers can bet just five dollars and get two-hundred and fifty dollars in bonus bets if your first bet wins. Visit https://FANDUEL.COM to get started — Play Your Game. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) #ForTheLou #stlcards #mlb #lockedoncardinals #stlouiscardinals Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The grind of 17 games in 17 days starts off with an offensive dud against the Seattle Mariners. This is Locked-on Cardinals. You are Locked-on Cardinals, your daily St. Louis Cardinals podcast, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Hey there, Cardinals fans. I'm J.D. Haffern. And today's episodes being brought to you by Game Time. Download the Game Time map, create an account use code Locked-on for $20 off. of your first purchase.

Today's show, we're checking in on the rest of the NL Central. What a wild night in Major League Baseball, at least for the NL Central. Two stunning comebacks by two teams in our division, and we're not going to like the ending for either one of them. We've also got the three stars of the game, which is basically people I've highlighted, and I'm about to explain why,

because this game on Friday night against the Seattle Mariners was actually a really good baseball game. it was well pitched, well defended. Final score just did not go the Cardinals way. That's the bottom line. But there wasn't a whole lot of offense to go around, so it's kind of hard to find, you know, hey, here was a star of the game.

There really wasn't anything like that in this one. It was just a, it's what this, like this 17 games and 17 days thing is going to be. It's going to be a grind. And it was a grind last night. See starter George Kirby is a really good pitcher. you shouldn't feel any shame that he was the one that you struggled to hit against, that he was baffling your lineup on Friday. He's really, really good.

Heck, this whole Seattle pitching staff is awesome. And it's what led them to so many wins last year. You know, before the trade deadline, remember, the problem was they didn't have any offense. And they had all this pitching and they couldn't score enough. So they went out and brought in guys like former Cardinal Randy, Rosa Rana and A. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. U. Hainio Suarez, who was with Arizona at the time. And then Josh Naylor, who was also with Arizona at the time. And they added those guys to, you know, a little bit of firepower to that lineup. Gino has gone back to Cincinnati now,

which is why they went and made the deal to go get Brennan Donovan from our St. Louis Cardinals. And he's been excellent for him, but unfortunately he's hurt and on the injured list. So we won't see him in this series. And I think I saw that Jeff Jones said something about like the Cardinals won't have the Mariners back in St. Louis until 2028. So who knows when Brendan Donovan ever gets the applause and the standing ovation that all the fans wanted to give them this weekend because of the injury, don't get to do that. We know the Cardinals aren't exactly an offensively gifted team,

despite some of the early success that we've seen from them, you know, specifically Jordan Walker, who was on one of the best heaters. You might see this entire season, like just an incredible pace. And, you know, the old saying is that pitching, good pitching beats good hitting. And we got that from both sides on Friday because Andre Palante was no slouch in this one. And he and George Kirby went toe to toe and Kirby eventually just came out on top.

But credit to Andre for keeping the Cardinals in this game, he never let things get out of hand. There were opportunities where it could have. but he didn't and he looked really good striking out of season high eight mariners a few of them in key situations held them to only three runs on four hit and five and a third innings you're going to take that all day every day for Andre Palante. The problem was Kirby gave up just two runs on five hits and six innings. He was just as good if not better and outside of one inning had this offense completely shut down. So I want to give the first star of the game to Andre Palante. That's what we're going to do because outside of the one pitch that Josh

Nailor sent over the wall to break up the two to two tie, I thought he pitched pretty well. I'll never approve of the walks that he allows. He gives up a lot of them, three more of them on Friday, which gave him 14 and 25 in a third innings, second highest total for a starter in the National League. You just can't live like that. Eventually, they will burn you. So you got to cut down on the free passes. That's a problem. The real bite, the ass and this was the two-out hits that he gave up. Second inning, a Rosarana hits a lead-off double, because of course he does. And then with two outs, Cole Young gets a center-cut fastball, first pitch, and singles

of men to make it one of nothing. Second run comes around after a lead-off walk to Taylor, who then steals second base, moves into scoring position, but Palante gets the back-to-back strikeouts. You're thinking, okay, it's going to work his way around this one. But instead, Dominic Canzon, singles in the second. the shift hole at shortstop to make it two to nothing. And I'm sure the shifts work. I'm sure they do.

I don't have the stats in front of me. I'm sure they do or they wouldn't do them. But am I wrong or does it always seem like half the time that they go into a shift that the batter puts it right where someone would be normally standing if you just played straight away? You know, it is so frustrating and it is so annoying. Again, I'm sure that's not the case. but every time it happens, I cringe a little because I'm like,

if you just played normal, we weren't in this shift, that would not have made it into the outfield. But again, I'm sure it works or they wouldn't do it. Then the final mistake was on Naylor's home run where he's trying to beat him in. And instead, you know, he's trying to just, he's really trying to jam him. He's trying to push inside. And instead, threw it right into Naylor's sweet spot,

right into it. low and into a left-hander is a very risky proposition. Josh Naylor made it pay for that one. But all in all, I thought Palante was better than decent with the eight strikeouts. You know, if you're going to walk guys to get out of trouble, you're going to have to figure out of ways to miss bats and get some swing and miss and strike guys out. And he was doing that in this game.

So I thought he was decent. It was enough to keep them in the game, which is what you're asking for from your starter. You know, unfortunately, the offense just couldn't get the Seattle pitching staff to break. They got them to bend a little bit, but they never allowed the Cardinals to take the lead in this game. I want to jump in and talk about the offense and the other two stars of the game coming up next on Locked on Cardinals. MLB season is back. You can feel it. We've got a fresh start in St. Louis, obviously, with a lot of younger players, a lot of energy in the ballpark. definitely on Friday. You can feel that. Yeah, you know, they were talking to Ozzie Smith up in the telecast and he was talking there's a buzz at the ballpark. People are excited about this young team. So you got expectations and whether it's a breakout rookie that you want to follow like JJ Weatherholt or the division race, which is crazy right now in the NL Central. There's nothing like being in the ballpark for all the action. The only problem is getting your tickets. That can feel like a grind. Long Q surprise fees. Price is jumping up at checkout. Don't need that. And that's where game time comes in. The game time app gives fans.

the advantage with constant innovation. It's how you unlock amazing tickets and experiences. And you do it in just a few taps, very simple to use. It's backed by the game time guarantee, 100% authentic tickets delivered on time every time at the best price. And the fees that you see right there when you pick out your tickets, that's what you're playing. That's what you're paying, period. Seat views, zone deals, follow your favorite team like the Cardinals get alerts when new deals drop. take the guesswork. Out of buying

there will be tickets with Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, use code locked on, $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Again, create an account, redeem code L-O-C-E-D-O-N for $20 off. Download the GameTime app today. Thanks for making Lockdown Cardinals. Your first listen of the day. Thank you for making

locked on the number one sports podcast network. Baseball is finally back to celebrate. We're giving you a full month of the everyday or club. For free. If you haven't done it yet, go to Lockdown STL Cardinals, Dad, SuperCats. dot com. Use the code finally. F-I-N-A-L-L-Y. You unlock every episode ad-free, get access to our private listener group chat. Tap the link in the show notes. It's there for you. Use the code finally. Claim your first free month. My second star of the game, excuse me, is going to go to

Mason Wend. Mason Wynn. How good is E-Ben? Unbelievable, right? Two for four in this game, has the Cardinals only two RBIs of the game extended his hitting streak to nine in a row. So far in April he's had hits at all but three games that he's appeared in. He's hitting 321 for the month, 11 ribbies and 53 of bats. Remember how slow the season started for Mason Wynn? And now we're looking up and you're like, okay, all is good. Looks like Mason Wynn can hit again. Since the nine game hitting streak began, he's raised his batting average from one.

154 to 270. It's pretty good. 116 points. Take that. He's now got the second best batting average on the team. And he's about to take the lead over from Jordan Walker, who's betting averages starting to sink pretty quick. First that he had in this one came in the fourth inning. Burley walks. Gorman hits a ground roll double with two outs, which was a little bit of a bummer for Gorman because

early was going to score on that. But so second and third, two outs, brings up Mason when. You're looking for a two out hit. Right guy, right spot. You know, if there was one guy in the lineup that you wanted up in that situation at this moment and time, Mason win, hot a center on your team. Bloops won into right field just gets enough, just gets enough. Blueprint to right field scores both runners, briefly ties this game up at 2-2.

You put it in play and things can happen. You strike out and almost no percentage of anything is going to go your way. 99.9% nothing will happen positive for you if you strike out. But Mason Wing gets just enough. Find some grass gives the hometown crowd a little something to cheer about. Everybody got excited. All of a sudden we're looking at a two-two ball game. Second hit came in the seventh inning when he let off with a single to left but was

ultimately stranded. He also turned a nice DEP with JJ to end the threat in the sixth. that arm of his is such a difference maker. How many times have we seen it this year already where a normal human being arm is not getting the guy at first base? And JJ and Mason, they turn it quick enough at second. And he unleashes fury over to first base and gets the guy by, you know, a millisecond, which is what happened here.

So it was really nice to end that threat in the sixth inning. The arm just, it's special. You almost always feel like he's going to get the guy no matter what. A lot of confidence in that arm when he uncorks one that we're going to get that guy over first. It's also really nice to see Mason win healthy. Part of the reason they gave him the day off on Wednesday, which I know a lot of people were a little worked up about, was getting somebody like Mason win two days of rest instead of one.

17 games, 17 days, trek from hell. this is the gauntlet. This is going to be rough. If you finish at 500 after this, you're winning. You're winning at life. I don't think it's going to happen. But that's the ultimate goal. Obviously, you want to win all the games.

But if you can finish it 500 after what we're going to do in these next 17 days, then that is something special. And you're going to need all hands on deck for it. And eventually, guys are going to have to take a day off here and there. But giving them the two days rest, before this whole thing started. You're hoping your backups could have done a little more damage against the Marlins didn't happen.

But, you know, you sacrifice one game so that you can be healthier for these next 17. And right now, Maine's one looks really, really healthy. He looks good. He looks strong. His lower base looks great, like running-wise. Everything about it is right where you wanted. So had the knee lashed.

year. The hip was already bothering him this year. He's had a history of back issue. So when you can get Mason win, an extra day of rest, it makes a whole lot of sense to do it. It just sucks the Cardinals, you know, lost to the Marlins and lost that series because they let him and Walker and Burleson have the day off at the same time. Should they have broken that up a little bit? Maybe given one or two of them a day off last night instead. You can argue that. You can argue that if you want. But That was the point. And I know that a lot of people were upset at Ali and the team for basically laying down in that game and putting out the B squad. But the idea is that it will help them for this 17 games and 17 days.

Third start of the game, I'm going to give this one to Gordon Grecepto, friend of the show, came on to take on the eighth and the ninth innings and didn't allow a base runner. struck out too. There were a couple hardhead balls off them. I'm not going to lie. There were a couple. I was like, oh, boy, that was the middle of the summer. These might be gone. But you got a lot of room to play with in the Bush Stadium outfield. So you use it. Why not use it? It's there at your disposal. He has not been scored upon in his last five appearances. And that last run was an unearned run. His last earned run came, what, six appearances ago back on April 7th. And that's, and that's, and that's, That's the only earned run. Gordon Gricepho is given up this season in 10 appearances. The ERA is now down to 0.66. His whip is at 0.88. Very impressive stuff from Gordon Gricepho. I've really enjoyed watching him and watching his maturity this year.

You know, he's come up a couple times, and it felt like he wasn't ready. And so far this year, he's looked fantastic. And now when you go and you look at that bullpen, you feel, at least I feel, I don't want to speak for everybody, but I feel like you can truly trust Grisopho, like I'm not anxious when he comes into a game. George Soriano, which some people are kind of, they're on the fence with. I don't feel that bad when he comes into a game. Jojo and Riley O'Brien clearly are your two top arms. I got no issues with any of those four coming in.

everyone else really makes me nervous every time they come on. I'm like, oh, gosh, Justin Brule. God bless him. I want to see success, but I don't think he's very good. I just don't. I didn't think he was very good when they got him on this offseason. I was like, oh, that's who we're going to roll with. He walked two more guys and hit a dude on Friday.

He's now got 10 walks, hit three guys, and giving up nine runs, eight of them earned on nine hits in 13 and a third innings. that's terrible. That's the terrible stat line. And he's a, you know, they don't really call him lefty specialists anymore, but he's brought in in situations that is built for him to succeed. Not great, Bob. And I said this offseason that I did not like the depth that they had from the left side for the bullpen coming into the season. When they brought up, they're like, yeah, we're going to, Justin Brule. And I was like, uh, okay. maybe you know something I don't guess not it's not working out he's not very good

jojo Romero you trusted you still do it's fantastic but they did very little to address anything else for the the left-handed side of the bullpen and you're seeing you're seeing the repercussions you know thinking that maybe packing noton could help him bummer but another injury and you couldn't really rely on him in the first place knowing at all the arm injuries that he had before. So if that was your plan, then that was a terrible plan. Soriano came into this one to get two outs. I know he had that, that rough appearance against Houston, but I don't know. For whatever reason, I just have more confidence, him. I think that's been a good pickup. Andre Greenio flipped for Soriano, I think has worked out for the Cardinals so far.

So it's just maybe it's just me. I don't know. When he comes in, I feel like he's going to get the out. I don't know why. Excuse me. Other notables from the game. Nolan Gorman had a couple more hits, including that ground rule double that we mentioned, which costs him the RBI. Jordan Walker has really gone cold, going three for his last 20. He's got no RBIs in the last five games and 10 strikeouts. That's not what we want. He has struck out at least twice in seven straight games, at least twice in seven straight games. and he's up 33 whiffs on the season, which is tied for the seventh highest total on the national week.

Friday, not only did he strike out twice, but he also grounded into that inning, inning double play in the eighth inning, which ended a possible rally. Pitchers are starting to get him to fish again. Are you noticing that? Eyeball test says throw breaking stuff away and then bust them in.

And that's how you're going to get Jordan Walker out. it is as if he is starting to guess when the fastball is coming. And he's like, all right, as soon as the guy releases it, I'm swinging. And he's missing breaking balls that are either on the outside part of the plate or off the plate by a ton. And that's not going to get it done. Pitchers are just starting to figure it out. So to get him, do it again, outside part of the plate needs to lay off that crap. She's got to lay off that crap.

And that's what he was doing before. You remember, they were trying to do that to him, which, you know, is what the tape says, hey, this is he'll chase on breaking balls low and away. And he stopped doing it. He stopped going after him. He would like, you know, check swing it and they wouldn't be able to get him to go. And as soon as they brought it over the plate with something straight, he would pop it. And that's not happening right now.

Now he's chasing again. And, you know, it hasn't looked all that good the last few games. things peaks and valleys right in baseball i'm not bashing jordan walker right now although he's getting a lot of heat on social media at the moment people like yeah see i told you he sucks he was getting lucky stop it like you can't make knee-jerk reactions like that you just have to you have to weather the storm we knew he was going to cool off and you were going to need other people to step up in his place and that's what you're still looking for so now that he has cooled off a bit uh somebody else has got a take on the weight of the offense.

Mason Wynn's been doing his part. Need some other guys to step up. No one Gorman getting a couple of hits in this one helps, obviously. We need more from Burley. Burley striking out in that eighth inning was a huge, huge part of it. To set Jordan Walker up where, you know, you needed a one-out hit. And him not moving guys over or putting the ball in play, that stung. So you need more from your silver slugger header.

J.J. Weatherholt, like, it's been kind of quite. Wyatt, got to get him going again. And as far as, I mean, not just saying like OBP and stuff, because he does walk and get hit by pitches all the time, but like just doing some damage with the bat. You kind of need that to get going here. Nathan Church got the start in center field for the struggling Victor Scott, looked great defensively at a hit in the ninth inning.

Obviously, this is something that we're going to be monitoring because Victor Scott has looked awful at the plate over like his last 30-some odd appearances. He's only got like two hits. Like it's been bad. Nathan Church has not looked that bad. He's been better offensively. He at least gives you something offensively, which Victor Scott was not doing,

and he plays a very good defense. So we'll see how long Victor Scott's out of the lineup. Well, he kind of does this lab work to get back to where they need him to be. The loss is their first one-run loss of the season. And like I said, it was a good game. It was a good game. Could have gone either way. One more key hit, and we're talking about a Cardinals victory instead.

So that's baseball. that's baseball and unfortunately the rest of the division played pretty well two epic comebacks by the reds and the cubs it's going to make you want to throw up because you don't want these guys winning but i'm going to tell you about them coming up next on locked on cardinals thanks for making locked on cardinals your first list of the day thank you for making locked on the number one sports podcast network cardinals lose their second in a row and only the brewers ended up losing from the division on friday they fall to the pirate six to nothing Paul Skeens was dominant, was toying with a perfect game there for a bit.

I think he took it into the seventh inning before they finally got a base knock off and finished the night with seven strikeouts, one hit against in seven innings. Also their stud rookie, Connor Griffin, who's had a slow start to his major league career since being called up. Starting to heat up, starting to heat up, had his first three hit game of his major league career, also his first major league home run in this one. He drove in three. So another weapon that it looks like starting to figure some things out for the pirates,

which is bad news for our Cardinals. The Reds were down five to nothing to the Detroit Tigers at one point and were able to claw their way back, made it five to three after home runs by Matt McLean and Nathaniel Lowe. And then there was an almost two-hour rain delay, just pouring rain in Cincinnati. They come back out. I thought they were going to call this game because I stayed up to watch a little bit of it. and I thought they were going to call this game. No, they bring them out after almost two hours.

Reds get another dinger from Matt McLean and had a seven to five lead, only to see the Tigers come right back and retake the lead with three runs in the eighth inning. Spencer Torkelson hit a bomb, makes it eight, seven. But in the ninth inning, Nathaniel Lowe again goes yard, hits a walkoff two-run Jack against Kenley Janssen to win the game nine to eight for the Reds.

My wife was excited about that. I was not. And not to be out done, you got the Cubs who can't seem to lose now. Down 4 to nothing to the Dodgers of all people until the seventh inning when they scored three on a triple by Danesby Swanson and a single by Nico Horner. Then Bregman ties the game up in the eighth inning with a solo shot. And then in the night, Swanson goes yard, a two-run blast. And they beat the Los Angeles Dodgers in L.A.

6 to 4. Cubs have now won 10 in a row. It was not that long ago. It was probably 10 days ago when people were like ha ha ha, Cubs in the last place, they stink. 10 in a row now. They have surged to the top of the NL Central along with the Reds. Those two teams tied at 17 and 9. The pirates right behind them at 1511.

Cardinals are at 14 and 11. And then Milwaukee currently in last place, having lost three in a row, they're at 13 and 12, just barely got their head above the 500 mark. Braves of the best record in baseball at 19 and 8. Then you got the Padres at 17 and 8, followed by the Cubs, the Dodgers, the Reds. And then you get your first AL team, the Yankees at 17 and 9.

Yankees have won seven in a row. Or it just be all in L. The whole National League just doing damage so far this year. At the bottom of the standings, it's a bit of a surprise. It is a National League team, but not the one you think. The Phillies are 8 and 18.

18, 8 and 18 with that roster. We could tease the Mets, which we have, but Philly has now lost 10 in a row. You've got Bryce Harper and Trey Turner and Kyle Schwerber. You went out and paid for Adoles Garcia. You've got Christopher Sanchez and Jesus Lazzardo and Aaronola. Zach Wheeler is coming back. We'll see how that helps them out, which is good news because, you know, Wheeler's situation last year was.

It was a bummer. But he's coming back. But kind of wild where the Phillies are right now, considering their payroll and the talent on that roster. Same can be said about the Mets, 9 and 17. They're tied with the Royals, the Red Sox. Nobody expected those teams to struggle the way they are right now at 9 and 17. So surprising teams at the top,

some very surprising teams at the bottom. and then a lot of people in the middle. A lot of the American League just kind of hanging out in the middle right now. So hopefully the Cardinals will be able to get back in the wind column. They've lost two in a row now. We love to see them back in the wind column today. Today's the game is going to be a 115, St. Louis start, by the way.

A little day action. So we'll be cutting another episode that will go into your feed for tomorrow. had a couple of days where I was just, I was out sick. So you can hear my voice a little bit. It's been a little bit rough. But sorry about that. But I'm glad you guys are patient. You got a tough one with Brian Wu and Libby on the mound today.

Libby's still looking for his first one of the season, which seems crazy at this point. But it's happened. And it hasn't been because he pitched bad. ERA 3.67 hasn't given up a ton of runs, had like one, two rough outings. Like, and I wouldn't say rough for it. giving up seven or eight runs, but it just hasn't been able to pick up that victory. And Wu won in two, but he's got a 2.25 ERA. We knew this series was going to be tough on the offense.

Seattle is very, very good when it comes to the pitching side of thing. So I got to figure out a way to get this offense going and scrape a few runs across to beat Wu in the Mariners this afternoon. That'll wrap things up. Thanks for making a lockdown cartilage. If you haven't already, give us a follow on Axe at L.O. underscore Cardinals, TikTok and Instagram and Lockton Cardinals. Like subscribe on. YouTube. If you never miss an episode, check out that every day or club. Use the code finally.

Go to locked on STL car.com to join the club and get that full free month free with the code word finally. For those of you on video, going to send you to the first ever 24-7 national lockdown podcast network YouTube channel. A lot of draft talk, NFL draft in full swing. So a lot of that going on on audio. Make sure your second list is locked on MLB. You're the best fans in baseball for a reason. We'll see you next time on lockdown card.