ST. LOUIS — On a night when their starter was hit hard early and could not get through a fourth inning in their first matchup of the season against their longtime rival Cubs, the Cardinals received a combination of power at the plate and poise from their bullpen to come away with a win.

The Cardinals combined for three homers, the first of which came in the first inning and on the first pitch newcomer Nelson Velazquez saw in the majors in nearly two years, and had their bullpen cover six scoreless innings to lead them to a 6-5 win over the Cubs on Friday at Busch Stadium.

Velazquez's homer off Cubs starter Shota Imanaga erased a 3-0 deficit the Cardinals found themselves in after starter Andre Pallante allowed a three-run homer to Ian Happ in the first inning. A solo homer in the fourth inning from Thomas Saggese drew them back into a tie after Pallante allowed an RBI single to Michael Busch in the second.

And Ivan Herrera's solo shot off Imanaga in the fifth provided a one-run cushion that grew to two with Jose Fermin's RBI single with two outs in the eighth.

Behind Pallante, the Cardinals received scoreles work from six different relief arms.

That work began with Justin Bruihl's scoreless fourth and culminated in the ninth. Closer Riley O'Brien allowed a run but managed to secure his 14th save of the year and snap the Cardinals' four-game losing streak in front of an announced crowd of 37,564.

Squaring up the splitter

On the home runs from Saggese and Herrera hit, the two right-handers took flight on the pitch the Cubs left-hander had found most effective at keeping opposing hitters grounded.

Saggese and Herrera pulled homers to left-center field on Imanaga’s splitter.

Saggese fell behind 1-2 in his at-bat versus the lefty, earned a fifth pitch by fouling off a fastball and reached the sixth pitch of his at-bat by taking a splitter for a ball. The second splitter he saw was hit 402 feet for his first homer of the season.

An inning later, Herrera took Imanaga’s sinker at the top of the strike zone for a strike to begin his at-bat and then drove the next pitch, a splitter placed on the outer half of the plate, to left-center field for a solo homer that moved the Cardinals past the Cubs.

Imanaga entered the start having kept his opposition to a .150 batting average and a .260 slugging percentage on his splitter. That pitch garnered most of his whiff (43%) and was a put-away pitch for 25% of his strikeouts, per Statcast.

Bridging to the back end

With Pallante’s night over after a season-low three innings, a combined effort from the Cardinals middle relievers kept the Cubs scoreless long enough to hand over a lead to their leverage arms.

The Cardinals received a scoreless inning apiece from Bruihl, Gordon Graceffo and George Soriano. Their efforts handed over a lead to lefty JoJo Romero at the start of the eighth.

The Cardinals’ middle relief arms kept the Cubs to one hit from the fourth to the sixth inning. The only hit in that span came in the fourth off Bruihl, who was the only of the three middle relief arms who faced more than three batters in his appearance.

Bruihl began the relief outing by striking out Pete Crow-Armstrong and coaxing a ground-ball out from Nico Hoerner for the inning’s second out. Bruihl worked ahead of Michael Busch by landing a pair of sinkers for strikes before allowing Busch to single for the third time two pitches later.

An errant sweeper hit Alex Bregman and advanced Busch into scoring position for Happ.

Bruihl neutralized Happ by getting him to hammer a first-pitch sinker for a groundout that kicked off the scoreless relief work that followed Pallante's early exit.

First-inning firepower

In the first inning of their first meeting of the season, both NL Central clubs sent souvenirs into one another’s bullpens.

A top of the first that began with a brisk enough pace that allowed Pallante to record the first two outs on eight pitches hit turbulence with back-to-back singles from Busch and Bregman. The singles put runners on the corners Ian Happ.

With his pitch count at 17 before the switch-hitting Happ stepped up to face him, Pallante began the longtime Cub with a slider that clipped the corner of zone for a strike. The next pitch, a fastball Pallante dialed 96.5 mph, caught too much of the strike zone. It was left over the middle of the plate and deposited into the Cardinals’ bullpen in right-center field for a three-run homer.

When the Cardinals’ first chances to bat came up, they put two runners on without even having to swing a bat.

Herrera was hit by the second pitch he saw from Imanaga and Walker watched five pitches from the lefty to earn him a one-out walk that gave Velazquez two runners on base in his first at-bat after being called up from Class AAA Memphis earlier in the day.

Velazquez evened the game with a home that landed in the visitor's bullpen.

Wasting no time in return

The placement as the No. 4 hitter and designated hitter in the Cardinals’ lineup ended a stretch of 705 days since Velazquez last appeared in a big league lineup.

He wasted little time in making his presence felt.

Velazquez pounced on the first pitch he saw from Imanaga and sent it 411 feet to left-center field to push across three runs against the club that drafted him in 2017.

Velazquez was met at the top step of the Cardinals dugout by his teammates and had the team’s home run chain placed around his neck as he made his way down the dugout steps. The home run swing earned Velazquez, a spring training standout who missed the cut of breaking camp with the Cardinals, a curtain call from the Busch Stadium crowd.

Before Velazquez was called up, he last appeared in the majors on June 23, 2024, with the Royals. Velazquez, who debuted in the majors with the Cubs in 2022, spent time within Royals’ and Pirates’ minor league systems as well as in the Mexican League in 2025 before inking a minor league deal with the Cardinals last January.

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