ST. LOUIS – Flattered that Rookie of the Year candidate Jackson Merrill waited on the field to congratulate him on what he called the best catch of his young MLB career, Cardinals center fielder Victor Scott II admitted sheepishly that he might not have been as bubbly and happy had he just been robbed of an extra-base hit.

For Scott, his running, leaping, highlight-worthy catch at the wall and his subsequent interaction with Merrill and his Cardinals teammates afterward provided a bit of levity on an otherwise frustrating night for the slumping Cardinals.

When the speedy Scott covered 100 feet, per Statcast, and leaped to rob Merrill of extra bases before slamming into the wall in the third inning, it kept the Cardinals within striking distance of the surging Padres. The Cards ultimately took a fifth-inning lead following Paul Goldschmidt’s two-run homer, but the Padres rallied for two runs in the seventh and one in the ninth to beat St. Louis 7-5 at steamy Busch Stadium.

For Scott, 23, the night of his best catch was somewhat marred by the Cardinals leaving the bases loaded in the second and third innings and stranding 10 runners in a game they desperately needed to win.

“It’s definitely bittersweet to see the outcome of that game and know that we had a lot of situations where we could have put even more runs on the board,” said Scott, who had a line-drive single and a stolen base to key a rally in the second inning, but also struck out two times. “For example, my bases-loaded strikeout [to end the third inning], I’ve got to come through there.”

Scott certainly came through on the defensive side of the ball with the running play he made to save a run in the third inning. Merrill, who played against Scott in 2022 and 2023 when he was at Single-A Lake Elsinore and Double-A San Antonio, drilled a liner that left the bat 100.4 mph into the left-center gap, but Scott ran it down before crashing into the wall as the inning ended. Rather than be upset, Merrill -- with his .292 average, 19 home runs and 75 RBIs -- hung around to congratulate his center field counterpart.

“I've been seeing that man do that [stuff] for two years now, and it's annoying, but it's sick,” said Merrill, who had two hits and a run scored on Tuesday. “For me, I love the game, so every time I see something cool it's like: ‘Ahh, that was dope. You don't see that every day.’

“[Scott’s] got the ‘it’ factor when it comes to baseball. He plays hard. He plays aggressive. And you can tell on defense, he's not afraid of running into a wall. He'll do anything just to catch it. I appreciate the fact that he plays with a lot of heart. Obviously, I want a double or whatever I would've gotten there, but Vic's the man. He's got a bright future ahead of him.”

Scott was shocked to see a smiling Merrill waiting to give him a hug at second base. What meant more to Scott was seeing starting pitcher Miles Mikolas doff his cap and several teammates waiting to congratulate him at the top step of the dugout.

“If that was me, I don’t know if I could do [what Merrill did], but I’m just kidding because that was a class-act reaction,” Scott said with a smile. “As a young outfielder and seeing big leaguers, when they would make a crazy play and then you’d see their teammates celebrating them -- to be in that moment myself, it was kind of a surreal moment for me, for sure.”

“[Scott] has made so many good catches and I’d put that one right up there with some of the better ones he’s made this year," added Mikolas, who held the Padres in check outside of a rocky four-run second inning. "He covers so much ground and what he does out there in center field is a big part of what the pitching staff does. He helps to make up for some of our mistakes sometimes and he’s incredible out there.”

The fastest-rising player in the Cards’ system in 2023, Scott earned an Opening Day start with the Cardinals and then worked his way back to the big leagues following a three-month stint in Triple-A. Since his return on Aug. 5, Scott has hit in 11 of the 19 games he’s appeared in. And he’s made a believer out of Merrill.

“He's fun to watch. He's fast, he can hit, run bases, and he can play out-of-his-mind defense,” Merrill said of Scott. “I've seen him rob me, I've seen him rob my teammates and it's nothing new. … I saw the gap, then I saw him, and I said, 'Oh God, here we go again, bro.'"