ST. LOUIS _ Last season's Cardinals team average was .256. They have two of their eight regulars hitting above that figure this year.
The 2018 team average, instead, is .235 after a 3-2 loss Wednesday at Busch Stadium to the Milwaukee Brewers, marking the third one-run game the Cardinals have lost out of three, all of them to the division rival Brewers.
Starter and loser Adam Wainwright was efficient enough, lasting seven innings in a game for the first time since last July 22. In throwing just 91 pitches, he walked no one and allowed three runs, two of them on bases-empty homers, one of which right fielder Harrison Bader fervently thought he should have caught.
The Cardinals had one of those early-day-game-after-late-night-game lineups as they played without suspended (one game) catcher Yadier Molina, Dexter Fowler and Paul DeJong from their starting lineup. DeJong and Fowler both took pinch hit at-bats. Both struck out, with Fowler stranding two runners with his game-ending strikeout. And three of the seven hits were by the substitutes for the regulars _ Francisco Pena, Bader and Greg Garcia.
So it wasn't the lineup manager Mike Matheny trotted out. Besides, the Brewers were in the same position, playing without injured regulars Christian Yelich, Lorenzo Cain and Manny Pina.
One of the telling statistics on a 2-4 home stand with Arizona and Milwaukee was that the Cardinals were nine for 43 (.209) with runners in scoring position, including one for 18 (.056) the last two days. And, counting Wednesday's nine-strikeout output, they struck out 55 times in the 56 innings in which they batted, including 12 in 23 at-bats (four hits) by DeJong, who entered the home stand having hit safely in six road games with three home runs.
DeJong still is hitting .295, or 60 points over the Cardinals' team average. But he said, "I've got to get back to where I'm best, which is looking out (over the plate) and trying to drive the ball to right field. I don't think I've done that once this year.
"I'm getting a little pull happy with my shoulders and just missing pitches. I'm missing pitches early and then I'm thinking inside and then I'm swinging over the top of off-speed pitches. But I've got to make some adjustments, for sure. I was pretty good at Busch last year."
In 2017, DeJong hit .358 at home with 42 strikeouts, compared to .231 on the road with 82 whiffs.
"Being home for the first time, there were a lot of emotions running," DeJong said. "I'm going to try to do a better job of corralling that. Go on this road trip (to Cincinnati and Chicago) and try to get back into my groove so I can some back to Busch and play the way I know I can play."
DeJong, who is two for 11 with men in scoring position, noted that Matt Carpenter had won Tuesday's game with an 11th-inning home run but said, "There's plenty of opportunities early in the game that we can do more damage."
The Cardinals aren't the only slumbering offense. When Wednesday's games started, they were eighth out of 15 National League teams in batting average, with four of the seven teams below them playoff clubs last year in Arizona, Chicago, Colorado and National League champion Los Angeles, which was last at .224.
The Cleveland Indians, division titlists in the American League, were at .158. AL teams were hitting .235 and NL teams. .239.
"It's early," Matheny said. "I can't speak for the rest of the league. But (the Cardinals) will get to where they're supposed to be. I'm excited to see our offense really start clicking and usually that happens at the top of the order, getting guys on base and the damage starts happening. It will come in waves, too."
Marcell Ozuna had a ninth-inning single Wednesday, extending his hitting streak to 10 games. One of the other Cardinals' hits was a ninth-inning homer by Tommy Pham, who had to wait several minutes while the umpiring crew waited for word from New York that Pham's drive to left actually had cleared the wall rather than having hit off the wall, as originally had been ruled.
Though Wednesday's conditions were ideal at 70 degrees, Pham said that, generally, "It's been really cold. It's tough to grip the bat. You don't really have the feel of your hands. If you miss-hit a ball, your hands are stinging. Cold weather, I believe, favors the pitchers. Plus, personally, I'm not used to the cold weather.
"But, with our offense, everyone is really, really close to where they want to be. We are a good team and we know that. And the schedule has been tough on us, too. We're playing really good teams."
The defense has been reliable enough that of the opposition's 49 runs scored, only two have been unearned. "And our pitching has been great," said Pham. "We're going to start clicking sooner rather than later."
On the bases, the Cardinals really haven't been a factor, stealing only five bases in nine attempts, with Pham being nabbed twice in four tries, most recently at second base in the first inning on Wednesday.
"I need to play better," said Pham, "because the better I play I'm so dynamic I can help the team out in many ways. But, right now, I haven't put it all together yet.
"I got caught stealing today and that really hurt me. If anybody really wears it on his sleeve, it's probably me. So I will be better. Lesson learned today for me. I will be better."
Wainwright was better than his first outing when he lasted only 3 2/3 innings in the home opener. "That's how I expect to go out and carry this team," said Wainwright. "That's the way you're supposed to pitch. That's the way I expect to pitch.
"If I was being honest, that first start, I was a little antsy, a little jumpy. That first inning, I wanted to show everybody that I was back."
Matheny said, "I thought he was great. We were really short in the (bull)pen. We only had so many innings of coverage. He had to eat up some innings and he did it, kept us in striking distance, which is all we could ask."
But there is striking distance. And just striking out. There has been much of each.
The Cardinals have fanned 114 times in 12 games, ranking in the top several in the league, at an average of 9.5 whiffs per game. Their strikeout figure per game last year was 8.3
That's only one strikeout a game but one more ball put in play per game could lead to that run which wins it.
