Despite having allowed seven earned runs in back-to-back starts, Wade Miley does have something to build on as he toes the rubber for the Arizona Diamondbacks on Wednesday in the third contest of a four-game series versus the St. Louis Cardinals.
Miley is 0-4 with a 9.14 earned run average over his last four starts and all seven runs he allowed in Friday's loss at the Chicago Cubs came on three home runs. That included a grand slam in the third, but the left-hander did retire 13 of the final 14 batters faced.
Arizona will hope that will give its hurler some momentum heading into tonight's start.
"I just tried to give us a little help," Miley said of the rough early start. "So I just tried to go as deep as I could. Just trying to log innings at that point."
The 26-year-old is 3-5 with a 5.01 ERA in 11 starts this year and lost his only other previous start against the Cardinals. That came on May 9 of last year as he gave up three runs on 10 hits over 5 2/3 innings.
In need of a spot start due to Saturday's doubleheader, the Cardinals will turn to sophomore hurler Joe Kelly for his first start of 2013 and 17th appearance.
The 24-year-old righty is 0-2 with a 6.75 ERA this year after going 5-7 as a rookie a season ago. Kelly posted a 3.53 ERA while making 24 appearances and 16 starts.
Kelly has faced the Diamondbacks twice in relief this season, including April 3 when he allowed home runs to Paul Goldschmidt and Martin Prado over 1 2/3 innings of work.
Both the Cardinals and Diamondbacks will need innings out of their pitchers on Wednesday after last night's game went 14 innings. The 4 hour, 53-minute- affair finally came to an end when Goldschmidt singled home the go-ahead run in the top of the 14th frame and Diamondbacks closer Heath Bell survived a leadoff double to log his 10th save of the season.
Goldschmidt's NL-leading 49th run of the season came off Cardinals reliever Victor Marte, the sixth hurler of the night used by St. Louis.
"He's been on a role this year for us and we've kind of ridden him," Arizona manager Kirk Gibson said of Goldschmidt. "We got in a situation where they had to pitch to him. He's just got a great approach."
After needing six pitchers to get through the game's first nine innings, Josh Collmenter picked up a well-deserved victory by logging four scoreless innings of relief before Bell came on to get the save.
Goldschmidt finished with three hits and A.J. Pollock belted a three-run blast for the Diamondbacks, who rebounded from Monday's series-opening 7-1 loss to win for the sixth time in nine games.
David Freese collected four hits to extend his career-long hitting streak to 14 games, while Allen Craig clubbed a two-run homer and Shane Robinson added a solo shot. Still, St. Louis went a woeful 3-for-16 with runners in scoring position.
"You want to win these games, especially these long nights," Freese said. "You have to hand it to those guys over there. They want to win every inning. They took care of business tonight."
Matt Carpenter extended his hit streak to 13 games and also became the first player in Cardinals history to get hit by a pitch three times in one game.
St. Louis will try to avoid losing two in a row for the first time since a three-game slide from April 27-29
The Diamondbacks won for just the second time in their last seven in St. Louis and are 4-9 in the previous 13 encounters overall.
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