Cincinnati Reds at St. Louis Cardinals: Final Score & Recap
Line Score
| Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | H | E |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CIN | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 11 | 0 |
| STL | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
The Story
The Cincinnati Reds quieted Busch Stadium on Friday night, defeating the St. Louis Cardinals 4-2 in a game that was far more lopsided than the final score suggests. The DiamondIQ model entered the night giving St. Louis a 57 percent chance of winning at home, but that probability eroded steadily before collapsing entirely, finishing at zero. Cincinnati scattered 11 hits against a Cardinals staff that surrendered runs in bunches, while the Reds defense was flawless, committing no errors behind a pitching staff that held St. Louis to just two hits on the night.
The decisive blow came in the top of the seventh inning, when Eugenio Suárez connected on a home run off George Soriano, a swing that shifted win probability by 30.6 percentage points in Cincinnati's favor and, in effect, put the game beyond St. Louis's reach. Suárez finished as the game's top batter by WPA at plus-31.4 percent, with a RE24 of plus-1.9. The Cardinals had their best moment in the bottom of the fifth, when Blaze Jordan laced a double off Rhett Lowder to swing win probability 24.1 points toward St. Louis and account for both of their runs. Jordan finished with a WPA of plus-16.3 and RE24 of plus-1.5. A Tyler Stephenson hit by pitch in the top of the sixth, coming off Dustin May, proved nearly as consequential as it appeared, swinging win probability 11.9 points and contributing to a Stephenson line of plus-23.5 WPA and plus-2.0 RE24 for the evening.
On the mound, the Cardinals' Dustin May actually posted a positive WPA of plus-13.1, limiting damage in his portion of the game, but the Cardinals bullpen could not hold. Tejay Antone was the standout arm for Cincinnati, finishing with a WPA of plus-23.3. He induced a critical pop out from Jordan Walker in the bottom of the eighth, a play that swung win probability 18.7 points away from St. Louis and effectively closed the door on any Cardinals rally. Emilio Pagán then sealed the outcome in the ninth, inducing a Lars Nootbaar strikeout that added another 14.4 percentage points to Cincinnati's win probability. The model leans toward crediting Antone and the late-inning Cincinnati bullpen as the group that converted a one-run lead into a comfortable final margin.