Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - Herrera Injury Update

Episode Date: April 7, 2025

- Ivan Herrera Injury Update - Yohel Pozo Called Up - Ryan Helsley's Melt Down - Miles Mikolas' Gets Torched - Offense Stays Hot - Pitching Problems 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/ Follow on Twitter/X: @JDSPORTSRADIO Follow the show on Twitter/X: @LO_Cardinals Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Wonderful Pistachios Looking for a snack that’s both delicious and nutritious? Get snackin’ and get crackin’ with the snack that packs a protein punch. Visit WonderfulPistachios.com to learn more. Just Ingredients Visit JustIngredients.us and use code LOCKEDONMLB for 20% off your order! And for more wellness tips, follow @just.ingredients on Instagram. Supply House Join the TradeMaster program today at SupplyHouse.com/TM and start ordering plumbing, HVAC, and electrical supplies with just a few clicks. Plus, use promo code S-H-5 for 5% off your first order. That’s SupplyHouse.com! Monarch Money Take control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONMLB at monarchmoney.com for 50% off your first year. Gametime Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONMLB for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime. FanDuel Right now, new customers can get TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS when your first FIVE DOLLAR BET WINS! Download the app or head to FANDUEL.COM to get started. Bet with FanDuel—Official Partner of the NBA. 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 Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

After getting their hearts ripped out in game one, the Cardinals get their heads kicked in in game two. We'll go over all of the gory details. Plus, we've got an update on the freaky Yvonne Herrera injury in today's episode of 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. I'm J.D. Hapton and I am your host for Locktong Cardinals, part of the Locked on Podcast Network. covering your team every day. Follow me on next to JD Sports Radio and the podcast at L0 underscore Cardinals.

We're on YouTube. Make sure you like, subscribe and comment. Plus you can hit that notification button. That way you don't miss out on any of the new content that we drop. Also available on TikTok and Instagram at Lockedong Cardinals, this is a show serving Cardinal Nation and giving the best fans of baseball, all of the info about the birds or the bat. Is it over yet?

Have the Red Sox stop tattooing balls off of the green monster yet? at like I'm going to hear that noise in my sleep tonight, just boom, boom, like unbelievable. Sunday, Sunday was not a good day at the ballpark for the St. Louis Cardinals, who dropped both games of their double header against the Red Sox, and they did it in completely opposite fashions and ended up losing all three games in Boston to fall two, four, and five on the season. Now, Friday's game, just a quick recap, Friday. Friday, his game the boys got down quick. Thanks to that five run inning by the Red Sox, who's offense had a lot of fun this weekend at the hands of the Cardinals pitching staff. Boy,

are there a number is going to shoot up. Eric Fetty never really looked comfortable on the mound on Friday hung a number of different pitches. Sox took full advantage, roughing him up for six runs on five hits and just three innings. Stephen Matt's got in the game got in three innings. He got touched up for two runs on four hits and three innings. Ryan Fernandez continues to struggle. He was bad. at again, giving up three runs on two hits and just two thirds of an inning. John King has had a rough go as well, gave up two runs on four hits at an inning. The only guy who did give up a run in Friday's game was Chris Roycroft, who came in,

and he came in just to get one out. They're like, dude, somebody finished this. And he was able to get the one out. Offense never quit in that game. It was the home opener for the Red Sox, and, you know, they had the juices flowing. But the offense never quit, man. And they kept scrapping, fighting their way back, nine runs on 13 hits. Normally, that would get you a victory in pretty much every ballpark except

Coors Field and I guess Fenway Park. But every time they got close, the socks would pull away again. Final score on Friday 13.9. Saturday gets rained out. Total bummer. So we all got to pay attention to the Blues game and they set the record, which was really, really cool. Congratulations to the Blues.

And obviously make sure you guys are following Lockdown Blues for all their kind. content. But then you got two games on Sunday for the boys. And in game one, the Cardinals had a very scary moment. Third inning, catcher Yvonne Herrera, who's been on an absolute tear so far this season, leaves the game with a leg injury. And it was really bizarre, like how it looked. After taking a walk, and then he goes to third base on a base head by Aronado, he kind of like, he just didn't look right. Like he looked like something was bugging him. And he looked like something was bugging him in Friday's game. There was a play where he's running through at first base.

And I don't remember the exact play of what I don't know. We ground it out or whatever happened. But he runs through the bag and he kind of does this weird skip maneuver. And when I first saw that, I thought like his hamstring or something, something was catching. And that I was like, oh, boy, I was like, I hope he's okay. And he didn't come out of the game. And then we didn't hear anything about it.

Then in this first game on Sunday, he has this where like it looks like he's dealing with something. Like he just doesn't look like he feels good. But he stayed in the game. And Luke and Baker then popped out. And the next thing you know, the Cardinals trainer and manager Ali Marmal have got Yvonne Herrera and they're helping him to the dugout. Like he can't even put any weight on his. It was either the leg itself or it was the foot. We weren't totally sure at the time.

It was the left side. The first thing I thought, like my mind went to the worst place possible and went to like an Achilles injury of some sort, which would have been devastating. But luckily, we got word later on that what he was dealing with is some left knee inflammation. And he is going to go on the injured list. But the good news was that the imaging came back clean. Everything was structurally sound. They're going to send him back to St. Louis for more testing and stuff just to make sure everything's cool. but from what they gathered on Sunday,

they don't think it's going to be a long stint on the IEL. They feel like they got pretty lucky here with whatever it is that started bugging him in his left knee. Herrera's been one of the top hitters, not only in this lineup, but in Major League Baseball. Batty 3.81, he's got a team leading four home runs and 11 RBI. So that's going to be a huge piece of the puzzle that is missing.

And if there's one position where you don't want an injury to occur at during a double header, it's at catcher. Because it's not like you got like four or five of them sitting around there. Because now after Herrera had to leave in the first game and the third inning, you got to bring Pedro Pajas in. And your emergency catcher is Wilson Contreras. Now, granted, Contraris has been a catcher almost his entire career. But you're not trying to, you know, go down that road again where Contreras has to sometimes

fill in as a catcher. I'm sure he'd be prepared to do it. I'm sure he's still got his gear and stuff. but we don't really want to go there. We would like to leave him at first base. The Cardinals actually don't have another catcher on their 40-man roster, so they're going to have to make a move of some sort to bring up the guys from AAA. The options that they had, they've already made a decision, by the way,

but the options they had were Gavin Collins, who's a 29-year-old catcher, hitting 455 with 6 RBIs and 11 a bat so far. The Cardle's top pitching prospect, Jimmy Crooks, who was hitting 267 with a dinger and four ribbies and 15 at bats and who they ended up deciding on, which I completely agreed with. They decided to choose the thick and meaty, 27-year-old Joelle Pozo, who is hitting 333 with two home runs and six RBIs and 21 at bats. I go do his stats because I don't know a lot about this guy. And I go to the stats and kind of a deep.

and hitter in the minor leagues. With a career average of 298, last year he was with Oakland's AAA squad, 324, 15 dingers. The year before that, 306, 18 home runs with Texas's AAA in 2022. He hit 320 in 2021. He hit 337 with 23 home runs. Got called up that year for a cup of coffee with the Rangers. This spring, he had a home run for the Cardinals off of Cotei Senga when they were taking on the Mets.

I don't know why he hasn't gotten more chances at the major leagues. I don't know. I don't have an answer for you, but he's a thick guy. They got him listed at 5-11, and it says 200 pounds, but I don't believe that. I believe he's a bigger man than that. But some people are going to be upset that they're not calling up crooks because people want to see crooks play. But you want crooks playing every day.

You know, you want him constantly getting at bats and stuff. and that wouldn't happen with this call-up, you know, since it doesn't appear to be a long-term issue for Herrera, thank you baseball gods. But you grab Joel to be the backup. And when Herrera returns, hopefully, sooner rather than later, hopefully it's not a long-term thing on the IL here. And you send him right back down to Memphis or you make another 40-man move

and try to slip them through waivers or whatever you've got to do. But with Herrera goals, on, Pedro Paul has credit to him. He steps up in a big way and was awesome in game one. Like for a couple of endings he was in there, two for four, two doubles, three RBIs, throws out a guy trying to take second base. He picks off another guy in first base.

He was all over the place for a few winnings there. And he had the Cardinals set up for a victory. Score was four to two in the ninth inning. Hells Bells coming out of the bowl. open, everything's going to be fine, right? No. That's when the meltdown happened. And it was painful to watch. We're going to discuss it next and go through all of this pain together on locked on cardless. Every check your bank account and wonder, where did all my money go? Well, if that's happened to you, it's certainly happened to me before. Between dining out online

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Leave your comments on YouTube as well as on next. Anytime you want, your feedback is always welcome and encouraged. Every closer is going to have games where their stuff just ain't any good. It happens to every closer, all the best of them. You know, if you go through Cardinals history and you go and look at Trevor Rosenthal and Lee Smith and Jason is Ringhausen and Dennis Sackersley and Tom Hinky and Bruce Suter and all of these greats that they've had. At one point or another, they've gotten lit up or they have a bad game where they can't find the strike zone. It just happens.

And unfortunately, for Ryan Helsley and the Cardinals, Sunday was the day. Today's the day. Helsley, you're raining and out closer of the year, right? Best in the business in the National League. league comes in to close out a four to two ball game. Seems like easy, peasy limit squeezy, right? And for whatever reason, my man could not throw a strike to save his life. It was all over the place. Five straight fastballs of Trevor Story. Only one is a strike. Walk number one. Next batter, the now immortal, Willier-Abreu, takes four straight pitches,

two sliders, two fastballs, walk number two. And it's one thing when you're like, When you're a closer and you basically use one or two pitches, sometimes you go to three or four. Helsley's got a couple more, but basically it's a one-two thing, fastball slider. One of your pitches feels funky. You can sometimes get by because your second one is usually pretty good. But when both of your two main pitches are off, you're kind of screwed. And Ryan Helsley was screwed. He throws two straight balls to the rookie Campbell before coming back in the count.

Campbell hit a hit a missile to center field. He got him to line out to Siani, he was in center field at the time. Your next batter is Gonzalez. He gets ahead 02 on him before he hangs a slayer, which would have been a strike, but he hung it up and then, gets hit for a double, makes it four to three. We got runners on second and third. Your next hitter is Connor Wong, walks him on five pitches. So there's walk number three in the inning already. And the whole time, the crowded Fenway is losing its mind. They're all over Ryan Helsley, man. It was like a college crowd,

just needling him for every single ball that he threw. And it kind of makes me jealous because when I see crowds like the way they were at Fenway over the weekend, it's a rowdyer bunch. And I just wish the fans at St. Louis, when they do show up, would be a little more aggressive and be a little more rowdy.

Yeah, at the ball games. We're a very polite crowd in St. Louis. They're not saying there's anything wrong with it, but I would just like it to be more of a home field advantage and get a little under the skin of the opponent more often because that is what happened today. Like, no doubt, the crowd in Boston played a factor in things that were going on with Ryan Helsley. They, they were in his head. You can see it. I'm not sure how you could ignore it when they're all just all over you. So I'm just, high five to the Boston crowd, man. They got, They got his head.

So now you got the bases juice, right? And one of their best hitters, Jared Durand's coming up. And I'm like, oh, boy, this is the guy that I was really worried about in the series. Helsley gets the strikeout. And you're like, okay, okay, now you're one out away from escaping this mess. But you got to go get Rafael Devers. And Devers, who had the serious struggles early on in the season, well documented, like 15 strikeouts in his earth 19 a bat, something ridiculous.

You would not have guessed if this is the same guy. who was going through that through the first few games of the season because he was mashing things in this series. So a very dangerous hitter. You know, this is not some guy that easy strikeout right now. Helsley gets ahead of him, O2. So now you're one strike away from getting out of this. Somehow, some way.

You're going to pull off a Houdini act. You got to believe, right? O2. I'm not going to come back from that, is he? And then the wheels came off again. Halsley throws three sliders, three straight. None of them really close to the zone. Then he goes fastball, because now he's got to throw a strike, right?

That's nowhere really close to the zone. And he walks Devers after having him down O2, walks him. That's walk number four in the inning, brings home the game tying run, ends up striking out Bregman to end the inning, which is, you know, no small feat there. But what a gut-wrenching, heart-ripping. just mind-numbing 37-pitch ninth inning where Helsley only got 16 strikes.

So we're on to extra innings. So it goes from 4-2 to 4-4, and you can just tell. You were like, we're screwed. We are screwed. The Cardinals go quietly against the Roll of this Chapman and their half of the inning, and then it's Willier-A-you again,

walk-off single against Fernandez to win at, cards go down 5-4. And fans, you know, online and stuff, they're hitting me up and asking, you know, why are they leaving Helsley out there to just, just rot? And he's struggling. He's not throwing strikes. Why does Ali not come get him?

And I'll say this, you normally, don't pull your NL reliever of the year in a safe situation. You trust him. He's your guy. You believe he's going to get those final three outs for you. He was one strike away from finishing it. And then it just went and it vanished again. So I know it's tough to watch, but that's your dude.

Like, you're going to go down in flames with him. And that's what happened today. You also got a double-headed to think about. So you don't really want to warm up another guy and bring him in and then burn another pitcher so that you're short of getting game two. You're also thinking, yeah, I got Miles of Michaelis on the Mountain Game 2 as well, so things might not be good. So I might need some relief pitcher.

So I know. You want them to focus on, go get the first winning game one, right? Win that one, worry about game two later. But I'm just speculating why I would think Ollie would not have brought him out and go with a lefty to face Devers instead after all the issues. But again, he was one strike away.

He almost pulled it off until he didn't, right? It sucked. It was painful to watch, but these things happen. and you can't like melt down about all of it. Not this early in the season. If this becomes a trend and Helsley has issues for like his next five outings, then we can go back here and hit this panic button that I got displayed. But right now, one off, one bad day,

you got to believe that he's going to have better days in the future. But the Cardinals are now 0 and 3 in extra innings games this year. So that's no good. And hockey wouldn't be so bad. They'd be, what, 4-2-0 and 3, I think? But instead they're 4 and 5 because game 2 was a freaking train wreck from inning number one. Miles Michael's on the bump. They just kind of knew this thing was going to go sideways, didn't you?

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You're trying to figure out who are the good waiver pickups, who should I be dropping, who should I be concerned about, will you're a bray you? All right, I picked him up. After seeing what he did at the Cardinals and what he's been doing since the start of the season, I'm not missing out on this hot streak. So this is something that I picked up from Lockdown Fantasy. They were like, yeah, trust this.

Look where he's hitting in the order and stuff. So you can trust them too. Give them a try if you haven't already on YouTube or wherever you listen to your podcast. The Cardinals get destroyed in game two by a score of 18 to 7. There's really no way to sugarcoat any of this. They got destroyed. And I honestly, I don't know a Cardinal fan

that I interacted with or spoke with today that didn't feel this game coming on with Miles Michaelis getting the start. Michaelis was fine against the Angels in his first start. But the way the Red Sox were swinging the bats in that first game on Friday, not nearly as good in the second game in game one, I should say, on Sunday. But you just could sense it, right? You know, the momentum swing where they came back and overcame Ryan Housley

and got this huge momentum swing going their way. heading into game two on Sunday night. And I even told my wife, I was like, this one is probably going to be bad because she was like, I'm going to watch the game with you. I'm like, all right, just a heads up. It may not go very well because Miles Michaelis is starting. I even suggested to her to put some money on the socks and their hitters and bet the over, which she did not do.

She totally forgot was playing on her TikTok instead, but it missed opportunity for sure. Hopefully you didn't miss out on that opportunity. But you just had a sense that it was not going to be a good night for Miles Michaelis. The socks had a rookie making his major league debut on the hill. And in the first inning, the Cardinals were doing all the right things. Look like they were going to get the better part of this guy. Back-to-back doubles by Contreras and Donovan, got the birds on the board one nothing.

Aronada works a really nice at bat, works a walk. And they got this kid on the ropes. You know, he's all nervous. His first start, he's at Fenway Park making his debut, parents in the crowd. Cardinals at the play already losing one-the-nothing, first and second. one out, and then the Cardinals shoot themselves in the foot. When Brennan Donovan was not the fleetest of foot, mind you, gets picked off second base, trying to time the pitcher's delivery.

It looked like he was trying to time it, get a good jump, and they were going to, like, steal a base. And instead, first move, he takes off, and the kid turns around and picks him off they get him at third two outs was the second boneheaded running mistake by britt and donovan on the sunday because he also got thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double in the top of the ninth inning of game one cardinals had the lead four to two and it like you look like they were going to add some insurance and he gets gunned out at second base trying to stretch it which ends the inning prematurely and gives all the momentum back to boston and you saw what happened here he gets off out number two, and then Alec Berlinson strikes out, and the threat is over.

Like, it's just gone. Like, it never happens. So now it's only one to nothing. You got this kid on the hill. He's rattled, ready to crumble, and you let him off the hook. You let him off the hook. Right then and there, it felt like the Cardinals were screwed. Because, as I mentioned, And I did not trust Miles Michaelis in this start at all. And my intuition was absolutely correct because they just blistered Miles all over the ballpark after a lead off strikeout, which I was like, hey, Miles Michaelis starts an hour with the strikeout. Then I'm like, oh, there he is.

Three straight hits, scores one run. Second inning, Boston goes single, double, single to begin the inning. It's two to one. He gets Duran to pop out, but he walks Devers. That brings in their new golden boy, Alex Bregman, who smash. as a slider over the middle of the dish for a double off the monster to make it four to one. And it just kept going downhill from there. Best player in the league not named Aaron Judge in the early going comes up next.

Mr. Willier-Abreu. They were giving an MVP chance to him at Fenway Park tonight. And he smokes a fastball over the heart of the play for a double in the gap. That makes it six to one. Third inning, Michaelis comes out. He gets two quick outs, but then three straight singles. makes it seven to one. And Michaelis is out. Mercifully, they pull Michaelis, leaves with runners on the corner.

Gordon Gricepho comes in to face Alex Bregman. And yeah, it wasn't good. Gricepho grooves a fastball right down the middle. 96 miles an hour, right down the shoot. And Bragman blasts it to the flagpole in center field to make it 10 to 1 in the game's over. really pretty much over from there. Michaelis' final line. Look away because this is gruesome.

Two and two-thirds innings. Nine runs, eight of them earned on 11 hits, one walk, one strikeout. Disgusting. Disgusting. And then Gressepo, friend of the show, God bless him. Called up to be the 27th man for this doubleheader.

Got to be used just as bad. seven runs, nine hits and three innings of work. And they had one thing in common. They continuously, both of them, kept missing over the heart of the plate. They could not hit the corners to save their life. Everything was just grooved over the heart. Whether it was up or down in the zone, it didn't matter. It was always right there.

And the Red Sox basically used them for batting practice. Like the green monster got its ass kicked. for Sunday night baseball. Like they were, they even did a montage of Red Sox players hitting missiles off the green monster. They're like, dude, listen to the sounds of these and just one after another. Just pop it off the monster. They said what at one point in the game, they said that they had 19 balls that the Red Sox had hit that were at 100 miles per hour or more.

19 just in the Sunday night game. They played at 18. They banged out 22 hits in the game. For the series, the Red Sox scored 36 runs and had 46 hits in three games. That is an average of 12 runs and 15 hits per game. That is unacceptable. That is completely unacceptable. At any level of baseball, I don't care if it's t-ball, much less the major leagues.

Now one starter for the Cardinals in this series got through five innings. Fetti gone after three. Palante out after four and a third. Michaelis, two and two thirds. Now Palante, in my opinion, pitched better than his line reads. Gave up two runs on four hits, struck out six. He walks three. He was not very efficient for sure.

But the Red Sox hitters, they were battling him. There was some really long, tough at bats. that just kept driving up Palante's pitch count. But to get 10 innings from your starters in three games, that's brutal. That is brutal. Your closer, one of the best in baseball having a meltdown and throwing 37 bitches

and blowing the game on top of that is catastrophic. Because guess what? At the very least, he's now worthless for Monday's game in Pittsburgh. He's not going to be able to go. on the positive side of things, because I don't want to just be negative, but on the positive side of things, not that there was a lot of them, the Cardinals' offense continues to absolutely rake at the plate. They score seven runs in game two on 12 hits,

which now gives them 10 or more hits in every game so far to start the season, which sets a new National League record. They're now one game short of tiny MLB record set by Cleveland in 1999. So that's cool. Thomas and Jacey, who got called up after Gorman got hurt. He appeared in both games on Sunday. Two for four on the day, four RBIs, including an absolute tank shot while wearing batting gloves because it was a chilly night.

So he put on the gloves. He traveled 430 feet, 109 miles per hour off the bat. Like, whoa, where did that come from? Pedro Pahas had that big game in game one after coming in, relief for the injured Herrera, 0 for 5 in game two, long day for him. Brennan Donovan had three hits in game two, was seven for 10 in the series with five RBIs, but two base running blunders by him. He had the blunder throwing home in the extra innings game against the Angels.

So I mean, I'm not hating on Donovan, but got to clean that, clean that crap up. Mason win, who we all know had that, frigid start to the season. Two hits in each of his last four games, six for 11 in the series, two ribbies, three runs scored. Mason's turning it around. He's up to 242 average.

I don't Contrera still, it's still not there yet. Ugly start, but he was two for three in game two. So hopefully he's starting to come around finally. They're going to need that with Herrera's bat out of the lineup for a little bit. No one Aronato. Got it hit in every game this season and is writing a 15 game hitting streak, which dates back to last season. Hitting 3.43, I think.

So as a team, I mean, these numbers are you're like, whoa. They lead the league and batting average of a team at 301. They're OVP first at 380. They're second and slugging in OPS behind only the Yankees. They are third and hits. They're tied for fifth in walks and doubles. They're fifth in home runs. their fourth and runs scored.

They are ninth as far as like least amount of strikeouts. The offense has been a lot of fun to watch. Even in this game on Sunday night where they were way out of hand already. And they kept doing it. They kept coming. They get to, you know, 18 to 7, I know, sucks. But they kept taking good and bads. They weren't quitting.

pitching has been the issue. And after this series, the numbers are ghastly. They're now last in ERA at 6.01, fourth lowest in strikeout, so they're not getting any swing and mess again. Outside of Sunny Gray, like nobody's striking anybody out. Middle of the pack and walks,

third most runs against, 10th and batting average against the 259. In the bullpen, and I mean, it's not like they're all terrible, but the two guys that are struggling the most, Ryan Fernandez and John King, Ryan Fernandez has not been good at all. I don't know what's going on with this dude because he was all right in spring training.

Obviously, he was pretty good last year. And it is not coming together at all so far in 2025. 13.50 ERA. Four innings, okay? Four innings pitch. He's allowed eight runs, six hits, four walks, and only has one strikeout. Where is the real Ryan Fernandez? Who is this guy?

John King, so reliable last year. Has a lot of four runs on seven hits. he's walked three in two innings of work. His ERA, just like Fernandez, 13.50. Cardinals are four and five. They have been very competitive in every single game except for the Sunday night Boston Massacre. They're going to finally face a National League opponent

to start the week. In fact, it's a division opponent. The Pittsburgh Pirates, who are three and seven, who got the win. They got the win on Sunday. A walk-off winner. Old friend Tommy Fam hit the walk-off winner in extra innings, actually. But they're dealing with their own drama right now

because some genius made the decision to take down a Roberto Clemente tribute on the wall and right field. And they were using it. They were using it for advertising instead. They took Roberto Clemente down and. put up an advertisement instead. Can you imagine if the Cardinals did that, like, took down a photo of Stan Musial or, uh, or Bob Gibson or Lou Brock or any of these, you know, Hall of Famers and gods that they've had in their franchise and instead put up, uh, uh, uh, an ad for an adult beverage.

Like what? What are you guys thinking? Apparently they're going to put it back up now. They're like, hey, we're sorry. We screwed up. Like, bro. That's terrible. The Cardinals will have to face Paul Skeens in this series. He's scheduled a pitch on Tuesday. Hopefully the offense continues to do what they're doing, even though Herrera will be out. But the pitchers, they've got to figure some things out.

They've got to do it quickly because now we've got some division opponents. And these are very, very important games. Matthew Libitor. We'll get to start on Monday, 540 start time in St. Louis. Games in Pittsburgh, though, but first pitch to that 540, St. Louis time. You know what I'm talking about. All right. Thanks for making a lockdown Cardinals. Your first list that every day we haven't already. Give us a follow on X at L0 underscore Cardinals in the JD Sports Radio. We're on TikTok and Instagram at Lockdown Cardinals.

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