McGreevy comfy enough in St. Louis to shake off rough start

July 28th, 2025

ST. LOUIS -- Finally a member of the Cardinals’ rotation on a full-time basis -- unlike the previous four times this season when he was summoned from Triple-A to make spot starts or relief appearances -- worked on better furnishing his St. Louis apartment earlier this week by purchasing two bed frames and some accompanying furniture.

On Sunday afternoon, he got a rather harsh reminder that life in the big leagues might not always be as comfortable as in his brief MLB forays over the previous two seasons.

McGreevy, who grew up 60 miles north of San Diego and rooted for the Padres as a child, got battered early and often by his former favorite team in the Cardinals’ 9-2 loss at Busch Stadium.

In the first sign that the day might be a rough one for McGreevy -- who entered with just five walks in 51 1/3 career innings -- he lost Padres leadoff hitter Fernando Tatis Jr. after going up 0-2 in the count. Things only got worse as the Padres throttled the rookie for nine hits and seven runs in 4 2/3 innings.

“Baseball is not a nice game,” McGreevy said, taking full accountability for the loss because of the frequency with which he fell behind in counts. “But it’s about keeping my head high at the end of the day. One outing doesn’t define me. I know that I’ve got [the Padres] next week [in San Diego] and it’s going to be better.”

It was a disappointing end to a series against a Padres team the Cardinals are trying to run down in the race for the National League’s final Wild Card berth. The Cards won the first two games of the series to pull within 1 1/2 games, but the Padres captured the final two to earn a split.

The two teams play a three-game series in San Diego starting Friday. There could be more fireworks after benches emptied twice during the series, with six players being hit in St. Louis.

“That’s baseball,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said of the series split. “That’s a loaded roster, and I thought we held our own pretty damn good. You look at what we did in the first two games, when we played clean baseball. They outexecuted us over the last two, and you split the series. We’ll see them again shortly.”

The ugly end to the series also increased the likelihood that the Cardinals pursue a path as sellers before the MLB Trade Deadline on Thursday. Despite an 0-for-3 day that extended his slump to 2-for-22, Nolan Arenado’s trade market appears to be strong, sources told MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand.

Several MLB teams are in the market for an everyday third baseman, including three in the NL Central -- the Cubs, Reds and Brewers. Some teams view Arenado as a potential consolation prize if they fail to land Arizona slugger Eugenio Suárez.

Arenado would have to approve any trade, as he has a no-trade clause in his contract. He used that to squash a deal to the Astros last December. The Astros, Phillies, Mariners and Tigers are also in the market for a third baseman.

Arenado entered Sunday tied for fourth among all MLB third sackers with 4 outs above average.

McGreevy’s outing was vastly different from the one in Colorado on Monday, when he limited the Rockies to seven hits and two runs (one earned) over seven innings. His performance prompted the Cardinals to designate for assignment Erick Fedde to open a spot in the rotation for the No. 18 overall pick of the 2021 MLB Draft.

As a pitch-to-contact sinkerball hurler, McGreevy fanned just one Colorado hitter and was repeatedly able to work his way out of trouble. That didn’t work on Sunday, as the first three Padres reached against him in the first inning, when San Diego scored twice. San Diego superstar Manny Machado doubled in a run in the first, singled during a third-inning rally and doubled in two more runs in a four-run fourth inning.

“It was really awesome to start off 0-2 to Tatis, but it’s absolutely unacceptable to throw four straight balls after that,” McGreevy said, referring to his game-opening walk. “I need to be more competitive than that.

“From then on, it was just inconsistency with the slider. That’s my strikeout pitch, my rollover pitch and my weak contact pitch. The misses were too uncompetitive to a good team that kind of honey-holed me and was able to cross off the slider and zone in on different areas. They take advantage of mistakes.”