Carlson homers, but errors costly for Cards

Errors have been an issue during the Cardinals’ current road trip.

Entering Sunday, the Cardinals had committed 10 errors and given up six unearned runs in their past six games. In the series finale at Arizona, those problems continued to hurt St. Louis, which committed three errors and allowed a pair of unearned runs in a 9-2 loss at Chase Field.

• Box score

Cardinals manager Mike Shildt said the loss isn’t one that should negate the successful weekend that St. Louis had, as it took three of the four games against Arizona.

“You move on,” Shildt said. “It wasn't a clean game, that's for sure. Didn't help our own cause. … You know, we did some things well, but not enough of them.”

The Cardinals took an early 2-0 lead, as Dylan Carlson hit a solo homer in the first and Andrew Knizner added an RBI double in the second. But starter Kwang Hyun Kim allowed four runs in five innings, and St. Louis trailed, 4-2, heading into the sixth.

In the sixth, left-hander Tyler Webb struggled to keep the D-backs off the board, as he gave up five runs (three earned) on two hits and two walks -- one of which came against Carson Kelly with the bases loaded -- in one-third of an inning. The Cardinals have issued 14 bases-loaded walks this season, the most in MLB, as no other team has allowed more than nine.

Knizner, who went 2-for-4 as Yadier Molina took a day off, said he and Webb were trying to be aggressive in forcing contact from Kelly, after Ketel Marte had been intentionally walked to load the bases.

“We were going right after Kelly right there,” Knizner said. “He's not the fastest runner, so we put Marte on. Put him on to set up that double play, so we were trying to go right at him, get him to swing the bat. We weren't really scared at all. We were trying to attack them and make them put that thing in play, and hopefully, we could roll two.”

Webb was replaced by right-hander Jake Woodford, who couldn't replicate his success from Friday night. Woodford gave up two hits -- a 65.2 mph single to Christian Walker and a 66.3 mph single to Josh Reddick, each of which plated runs.

With one out and the bases loaded, Woodford got Nick Ahmed to hit a ground ball. José Rondón tagged third base for a forceout, but his throw to first was wild and couldn't be corralled by Paul Goldschmidt, allowing Eduardo Escobar to score and extending the inning.

“Guys are going to make an error here and there,” Knizner said. “We just had a couple strung together. You look at this series as a whole, we played pretty good baseball. Just because we lost today, you don't want to get down."

Although the Cardinals had 10 hits, they went 1-for-11 with runners in scoring position. Meanwhile, the D-backs had 13 hits while snapping a 13-game losing streak.

“They were due to get some things to bounce their way on the little skid they had,” Knizner said. “They got a couple balls to fall in, and on our offensive side, we had hit a couple balls hard that didn't fall in. That's just the game of baseball. Things bounced their way today.”