Wainwright finds groove after bizarre out at first

WASHINGTON -- On the first pitch Adam Wainwright threw after taking an inning-ending ground ball to the shin, Adam Eaton homered. Five pitches later, Victor Robles added a solo shot. And three batters after that, there were two on and still only one out.

Had the play hurt Wainwright more than he let on? As he proved for the remainder of his outing Tuesday evening in the Cardinals’ 3-2 victory over the Nationals, not even close.

“It might’ve looked like he hit it harder than he did,” Wainwright said of opposing starter Anibal Sanchez’s comebacker, which after striking him, resulted in an unusual final out. “It was off the very end. I had kind of timed it to where I could move my foot or not move my foot, but I wasn’t sure it was going to get through or not.”

The 37-year-old right-hander struck out the next two batters on just seven pitches to escape the third, the beginning of a stretch where he somewhat quietly retired 12 of the next 13 he faced.

And Wainwright was still only on 80 pitches -- 55 for strikes -- when manager Mike Shildt removed him with one retired in the seventh, following Eaton’s bloop single and a sinker that caught Robles in the knee. By then, Kolten Wong’s bases-loaded bunt single, followed by Harrison Bader’s two-run single completed a three-run fourth inning that had staked the Cards to a lead Wainwright and the bullpen held.

“I thought he was masterful,” Shildt said of his starter’s deepest outing of the season. “He got a couple balls out over the plate. The one to Eaton was just a cutter in he was able to get to. But he was great.”

Tyler Webb came on and induced a double-play grounder out of Juan Soto to escape the seventh, and John Gant and Andrew Miller combined for the final six outs on St. Louis’ fourth straight win and ninth out of 10.

It all meant Wainwright finished his 248th game with batterymate Yadier Molina as the victor, while tying two of his childhood idols for 10th on the all-time list.

The Braves’ Tom Glavine and Javy Lopez also worked 248 games together, with Wainwright watching many of those as a Braves fan growing up in Georgia.

Kick save and a beauty?
The blow to Wainwright’s leg proved more blessing than curse, coming after he found himself in a bases-loaded jam with two outs in the second.

Sanchez sent the ball back up the middle. Wainwright managed to kick the ball somehow, and it rolled directly to first baseman Paul Goldschmidt, who stepped on the bag for the inning-ending out. Even Wainwright had to grin as he walked back toward the Cardinals' dugout.

“It was one of those where, if it’s blistered, you kind of squint and maybe turn your foot a little bit,” Wainwright said. “But that one was like, 'All right, I’m going to just let that one wear it, and we’ll take our chances that it has a good bounce.' It might’ve had the best bounce I’ve ever seen.”

Another day, another bunt single
A day after Bader registered his first bunt single in the eighth inning of Monday’s series-opening win, Wong came up with the bases loaded and two outs and dropped Sanchez’s offering perfectly down the third-base line.

“You look around, you see the infield back, and [Sanchez] was kind of on tonight, too,” Wong explained. “It was one of those things where, I knew that I just wanted to try and get something started. If I put down a good bunt, it’s one of those where these guys are too far back: they wouldn’t get me.”

Not so sweet 16
Molina did get on base with a fourth-inning walk, but he struck out once and flew out twice Tuesday while seeing his career high-tying hitting streak snapped at 16 games.

The streak matched the 36-year-old’s two previous stretches of 16 games with a hit, both put together during the 2017 season.