In a season full of memories, Pagés adds his best yet

ST. LOUIS -- Pedro Pagés’ journey to the big leagues started in the back of an Uber with tears streaming down his cheeks as he FaceTimed with his father to show him images of The Gateway Arch and Busch Stadium off in the distance. It hit what he thought was a zenith on Father’s Day when he homered at Wrigley Field with dad, Edgar, and other family members sitting a dozen rows behind home plate.

However, Pagés' improbable MLB journey added another tearjerker of a chapter on Sept. 7, when he broke a scoreless tie with a two-run home run in the eighth against Mariners right-hander Logan Gilbert. Just to make the night even sweeter, Pagés was behind the plate to catch a shutout started by Kyle Gibson and closed by Ryan Helsley as the Cardinals defeated the Mariners, 2-0, at Busch Stadium.

“This one is at the top, man,” said Pagés, who was the only Cardinals player this past season with multiple go-ahead homers in the eighth inning or later. “It’s a lot of fun going out there and helping the team win. Putting those two runs up with how [Gilbert] was throwing, it means a lot to me. This one is going to be up there for me.”

Gilbert, an All-Star this season despite his record suffering because of the lack of run support from the Mariners' struggling offense, didn’t allow his first hit until Lars Nootbaar tagged an elevated curveball for a double in the fifth. The Cards' next hit didn’t come until the eighth, when Pagés got just the offering he was looking for from Gilbert.

“My first two at-bats, I was looking heater the whole time and he got me with the heater in the second at-bat,” Pagés recalled. “In that last at-bat he started me off with a heater and then he went curveball, and I was like, ‘I’m going to sit slider and hopefully see it up.’ He ended up throwing that pitch and I got a good swing off.”

Held to just one run a night earlier in a loss to the Mariners, the Cardinals had to be wondering where their offense would come from with Gilbert blowing hitters away most of the night. Pagés, who homered twice earlier in the week in Milwaukee for the first multihomer game of his MLB career, gave the Redbirds all the offense they would need with one swing.

“Across the way, man, Gilbert was gross,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said. “That’s straight filth there, he was efficient, and he commanded it.

“[The Pagés home run] was so cool and the dugout loved every second of it. His approach has been good and to come up with that homer there, that was awesome.”

For Pagés, the winning homer was just the latest, storybook chapter in what will undoubtedly be an unforgettable rookie season. He got to the big leagues literally by Uber on April 4 when Triple-A Memphis was playing in Indianapolis, and the Cardinals needed a second catcher after Willson Contreras was hit on the back of his hand.

With just one MLB game under his belt, he was shipped back to the Minor Leagues a week later and got one other stint in the big leagues from April 21 to May 5. Three days later, Contreras fractured his left forearm after being hit by the swinging bat of J.D. Martinez and Pagés got a return trip to St. Louis. Another injury to Contreras -- this time a finger fracture -- allowed Pagés to return to playing daily for the Cards.

Not only did he give the Cardinals some surprising pop from behind the plate -- he hit seven home runs and had strung together an 11-game hitting streak earlier -- but he has became a favorite of the pitching staff for how he prepared and framed pitches.

“Pedro takes it all pretty serious -- being able to get out of innings, blocking balls, stealing strikes and he’s fun to throw to,” said Gibson, who notched his 1,500th career strikeout during the fifth inning. “It was such a cool thing that he’s the one to get the swing after he called and caught a great game.”

Pagés, who got engaged to his long-time girlfriend in Spring Training, said he never would have guessed that his first MLB season would be so packed with memories. This one, the Statcast-projected 402-foot homer off Gilbert, shot to the top of the list, he said.

“It was a dream come true coming up here and it’s like I’m living my dream,” he said. “I’ve always worked so hard for this and I’m going to keep showing up as the same person and grinding. It’s a lot of fun and I want to keep enjoying it.”