​The Cardinals found themselves stuck in a rough four-start stretch for Matthew Liberatore, a run in which he dropped two decisions and surrendered seven homers, leaving his spot in the rotation feeling precarious. Yet Liberatore managed to halt the skid in dramatic fashion, delivering not one but two strong outings against the struggling Atlanta Braves. Two weeks after he limited Atlanta to one hit and one earned run across five innings, he shut out the Braves for six innings, receiving run support in the form of a Lars Nootbaar three-run homer as St. Louis rolled to a 4-1 victory at Busch Stadium.
“He was unbelievable, and in the first couple of innings I thought we were going to be able to take a day off on defense,” Nootbaar quipped to Cardinals.TV after belting his third homer since returning from double heel surgery last October. “When Liberatore is on like that, he’s one of the best pitchers in baseball. He proved it tonight and had a great game.” For the Cardinals, it marked their second consecutive win and propelled them to win No. 50 on the season. They had defeated the Braves 2-1 on Friday night despite a two-hour, 43-minute rain delay, and they outplayed the NL East leaders again on Saturday to rebound from a difficult stretch in which they dropped four of five to their rival Brewers.
The victory also secured another series win and kept the season series favorable, with the Cardinals taking four of five meetings against Atlanta in 2026. “Just the consistency of not letting the previous game leak into the next,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said about his club’s resilience after being beaten by Milwaukee. “You have that Milwaukee series, which was a tough one. Not letting one day bleed into the next, we’ve done a really nice job of that. That’s been part of our identity from the beginning. The fact that we’re staying with it—good or bad we’re moving on to what’s next and what’s in front of us. They’ve done that, and this Braves series is an example of it.”
Liberatore, who fanned nine Braves in their Atlanta matchup on June 30, added six more strikeouts and issued only one walk on Saturday night. Riley O’Brien managed a clean ninth inning for his 24th save in 28 opportunities, overcoming a broken bat in the final frame before getting Joey Bart to look to seal the win. O’Brien, an All-Star who will be in Philadelphia on Tuesday night, delivered his usual late-inning drama, closing out Atlanta after a tense finish.
The Cardinals wasted no time setting the table in the first inning with run-scoring singles from two All-Stars, Ivan Herrera and Jordan Walker, giving Liberatore early support. The Braves countered with starter Reynaldo López, who came into the game having yielded only three earned runs over his previous three starts. But López left a 1-2 curveball right down the middle, and Nootbaar did not miss it. He sent the ball over the right-field wall for a 435-foot homer, exiting the bat at 108.8 mph, padding the Cardinals’ lead and providing the margin they would need for the night.
Nootbaar’s blast, combined with Liberatore’s steady chain of zeroes, allowed St. Louis to secure the win and move the team closer to the .500 mark in a season that has shown flashes of potential even as it has faced some significant turbulence. The victory underscored the Cardinals’ resolve to rebound quickly from rough stretches and to maintain a steady approach—focusing on the next game and not letting yesterday’s results dictate today’s performance.