ST. LOUIS — The offense had to do its part to rally for a lead and the bullpen had to do its part to hold the lead through some eighth-inning turbulence, but by the end of the ninth there it was – a parting gift if that’s what Tuesday night’s start was for Lance Lynn.

He would leave Busch Stadium a second time as a winner.

In his 100th appearance at Busch Stadium, the first big-league ballpark he called home, Lynn pitched six solid innings and got a timely solo homer from Jordan Walker that lifted the Cardinals and their veteran right-hander toward a 3-1 victory against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Lynn’s turn in the rotation could come up again for the regular-season finale at home Sunday, though there’s no guarantee as the team goes game-to-game with his appearances. The Cardinals have yet to announce a starter for that game, though they did remove prospect Michael McGreevy from his scheduled start Tuesday for Class AAA Memphis.

Lynn, 37, signed a one-year deal to return to the Cardinals this season, and Tuesday was his second start back from six weeks on the injured list.

He stifled the Pirates, holding them to only a solo homer and gave the offense time to stir and the bullpen a lead to hold. Matthew Liberatore walked a tightrope in the eighth to deliver the lead to Ryan Helsley for his 45th save of the season after a scoreless ninth. Walker’s homer broke a tie created by Luken Baker’s triple, and Nolan Arenado added a sacrifice fly to widen the lead that improved Lynn’s record to 7-4.

Lynn leaves lasting impression

As he walked off the Busch mound for what could be his final time as a Cardinal, Lynn did so with the lead and a hold on his 46th win in his 90th start at the ballpark.

With the size of the crowd it would have been possible to hear if he cursed, too.

In his 13-year career that began as a Cardinal in 2011, Lynn has pitched his most innings for the Cardinals and made his most appearances at Busch. The Cardinals hold an $11-million option for the right-hander for 2025, but he’s coming off a year interrupted by a knee injury and sidetracked by the standings that are going to prompt changes. The Cardinals sought to bring back Lynn this past winter in hopes that his presence – and his past with the team – would help the clubhouse reconnect with expectations that come with the jersey.

Behind his gruff, grumbly personality on TV interviews, Lynn has always shown mentor material, and the Cardinals had several contributions they wanted the veteran to make. They’re not always out in the open, but several of his younger peers this season have noted the nudge they got from Lynn or the example he offered them.

“He nailed every one of them,” manager Oliver Marmol said of the team’s requests from him away from the mound. The manager added that Lynn is a lot more than “a big, burly dude who is always angry and yells bad words at times.”

Like he did third inning, for example.

At the start of his first quality start since returning from the IL and his first six-inning outing since July 13, Lynn retired the side on six pitches in the first inning.

Bryan De La Cruz drilled a solo homer for a brief lead in the second inning, and Lynn started doing Lynn things. He struck out Jared Triolo to end the second, and after a one-out double in the third he struck out leadoff hitter Nick Gonzales to regain a grip on that inning, too. That strike prompted a euphoric, colorful exclamation from Lynn that fans could hear a few decks up.

Wouldn’t be a Lynn start without one.

Libby defuses the eighth

In a compelling assignment that got more interesting the deeper he pitched into the inning, Liberatore inherited the one-run lead for the tricky eighth.

The Pirates had the top of their order coming up and former MVP Andrew McCutchen, a right-handed batter, looming at cleanup if they got that far. Liberatore’s high-leverage appearances have been increasing in recent weeks, but this was one of the few times he’s taken the mound in a classic setup role, ala teammate JoJo Romero – with challenges lurking.

A leadoff double and a followup single put runners at the corner against Liberatore with no outs. A fly-ball to left purchased him an out without having to exchange a run, but the Cardinals did give up 90 feet to put both Bucs in scoring position.

A ground-ball gets through, and the lead and Lynn’s win vanishes.

McCutchen approached the plate.

There would be no call to the bullpen.

The many-time All-Star and longtime Pirate has flipped splits this season. He’s hit only .209 against lefties and slugged .391 vs. .248 and .439, respectively, against right-handers. Liberatore had a license to challenge. And he did. McCutchen saw five pitches, four of them strikes, and all of them between 90.1 mph and 98.1 mph until Liberatore snapped the curve. McCutchen swung over an 80-mph for the strikeout, and Liberatore cruised from there to stranded both runners and leave the lead intact.

Baker steamrolls to game-tying triple

When the Pittsburgh infield scrunched in for a closer throw to the plate, the Cardinals were already 0 for 6 with runners in scoring position, and due to a double play they had produced seven outs in those six spots.

Two runners on in the first inning before an out did not produce a run.

A leadoff double in the second failed to generate one, too.

All of that change with the unlikeliest of triples.

Baker, starting at DH against the lefty Falter, turned on an 85-mph off-speed pitch and lofted it deep to left field. Bryan Reynolds made a play on the ball, even appeared to get a glove on it, but somewhere around the wall it came loose and dropped to his feet. He looked to his glove as the ball rolled in the opposite direction – and that was Baker’s chance. Michael Siani had already scored from third, and Baker had the chance to replace him there.

Since high school, Baker had two triples, according to Baseball-Reference. He mixed one hit among his 51 hits for TCU in 2017. Two years later, in 2019, he tripled for the Cardinals’ Class-A affiliate in Palm Beach. And in his 1,880 plate appearances since as a pro, his visits to third base on a hit have been only when passing it on the way home for any of his 116 homers.

As Reynolds recovered and threw from the base of the left-field wall, Baker bulldozed to third, sliding in ahead of the tag and around it for good measure. He brought his back leg to the base to assure he was safe even as another tag was attempted.

Through five innings, Baker’s triple was the Cardinals’ lone hit in eight at-bats with runners in scoring position. That would sink to 1 for 10 through six innings.

Walker catapults to go-ahead homer

Facing a full-count pitch from a lefty who had only tested him strikes two innings earlier, Walker had already seen four fastballs from Falter when the lefty tried a sixth.

At about the same place, Walker had swung and missed earlier in the at-bat, Falter left a 93-mph fastball up and over the plate.

Walker did not miss this one.

The second-year outfielder drilled the pitch for his fourth home run of the season and the one-run lead Lynn would take out of his start. The ball left Walker’s bat at 108 mph, which was the swiftest of any ball hit to that point in the game. Walker’s bolt ricocheted off the back wall of the visitors’ bullpen – an estimated 425 feet away from home plate. It was also his first against a lefty in the majors this season.

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