Game 56: Cardinals 8 Pirates 4

Another Snell start, another game in which it seems like his pitching was the reason we lost. This is really getting ugly fast. He kept his walks down today, but the Cards dinged him for eight hits, including back to back bases loaded singles by Adam Kennedy and Braden Looper. His ERA is spiraling upwards towards six and I'm at a complete loss to explain his struggles, other than to guess that he must be completely losing faith in his slider (or that his slider just isn't working). John Russell, however, was actually somehow encouraged:

"I thought if you take away the five-run inning, he pitched OK," Russell said. "His fastball had a lot of zip on it, his slider was working. I mean, they got five runs in the inning and they never got the ball past the outfield. I thought it was a better game as far as his stuff, I just thought it was unfortunate they found some holes, but other than that I thought he threw the ball very well, he just has to avoid the big inning."

I know it's impolite to toss your players under the bus, but can he possibly believe one word of that crap? I sure hope not.