Willson Contreras hit two two-run home runs, and the St. Louis Cardinals came back to defeat the Kansas City Royals 8-5 on Friday night.
Contreras started the scoring in the first inning with a two-run homer that hit the top of the bullpen fence in right field and added another two-run homer in the ninth inning, blasting his 15th home run 424 feet to left. This was his 15th game with multiple home runs.
“An absolute tank to left,” said Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol. “Some really good at-bats and big swings by Contreras.”
After falling behind 5-3 in the fifth inning, the Cardinals scored five runs on seven hits against six relievers.
Will Smith (0-4) retired only one of the three batters he faced in the eighth inning. After a failed challenge by Kansas City on a possible inning-ending double play grounder, St. Louis took a 6-5 lead with a two-out, two-run double from Victor Scott II.
“I was telling myself if he’s safe, it’s going to be definitely a critical situation in the ballgame,” Scott said. “Being able to come through right there is definitely special. There’s runners on base, so I’m just trying to do damage.”
Contreras, Alex Burleson, and Brendan Donovan each had three of the Cardinals’ 13 hits.
Matthew Liberatore (3-3) pitched three hitless innings in relief of Miles Mikolas, who gave up five runs on eight hits in four innings.
“My goodness, look at what (Liberatore) did,” Marmol said. “36 pitches, three innings, didn’t give up anything at all. His stuff was sharp. He was pretty dominant. It was good to go to him early. (He) just shut them down.”
Mikolas has a 7.11 ERA over his last five starts. Ryan Hensley allowed a hit and a walk while earning his 37th save.
“I felt like we had a pretty good game plan going in,” said Michael Massey. “I felt like we did a pretty good job against him.”
Burleson hit his team-leading 20th home run to right field in the third inning, giving the Cardinals a 3-0 lead.
Kyle Isbel’s third-inning RBI triple ended his 0-for-21 slump, scoring the first run Mikolas allowed to the Royals after 19 career scoreless innings. RBI singles by Massey and Salvador Perez tied the game.
