St. Louis Cardinals at Atlanta Braves: Final Score & Recap

The St. Louis Cardinals erased a five-run first-inning deficit to defeat the Atlanta Braves 11-5 at Truist Park on July 2, 2026, in a game that turned almost entirely on a single seven-run seventh inning. The DiamondIQ model opened with Atlanta favored at 59% to win at home, and that edge held through six innings before collapsing to zero as the Cardinals rewrote the scoreboard in the seventh.

The decisive sequence began when Nathan Church connected on a home run off Tyler Kinley, a swing that shifted win probability by 22.7 percentage points and immediately reframed the game's complexion. JJ Wetherholt followed with a single off Dylan Lee worth 17.8 percentage points, and Jordan Walker added another single off Ian Hamilton for an additional 11.4-point swing, the three plays together accounting for more than half a game's worth of leverage in a single inning. It was the only inning of the night in which either team managed a run after the opening frame, with St. Louis adding one more in the ninth to set the final margin. Lars Nootbaar had briefly threatened to extend Atlanta's lead in the sixth when he grounded into a double play off Kinley, a play that cost the Cardinals 7.0 percentage points, but that loss proved irrelevant given what followed.

Church finished as the game's most impactful offensive contributor at plus-27.4% WPA, though his RE24 of minus-0.2 suggested his damage was concentrated rather than accumulating across multiple base-state contexts. Jordan Walker at plus-14.1% WPA and plus-3.3 RE24 demonstrated broader run-environment value throughout his appearances, while Masyn Winn added plus-11.3% WPA and plus-1.9 RE24. On the pitching side, Hurston Waldrep led Atlanta's staff at plus-13.8% WPA, holding St. Louis scoreless across the middle innings, with Ryan Fernandez contributing plus-9.6% for the Cardinals.