Springfield puts on show for TV viewers

With a Fox regional telecast airing the action, Cardinals pop three homers, cool off Wichita. 

Kary Booher
News-Leader 

By the time Robinson Cancel and Cody Haerther made their way to their lockers, someone already had cranked up the stereo in the clubhouse.

"We might as well put some music on," Cancel said. "We don't want it to be quiet in here."

Nope, not after eking out a much-needed win and especially not after doing so in front of their biggest audience yet.

With the eyes of Fox Sports Midwest on them and their starters having served up seven gopher balls the last two games, the Springfield Cardinals retaliated against the sizzling Wichita Wranglers on Thursday night with a three-homer assault and held on for a 6-4 victory in front of 7,745 at Hammons Field.

Going deep was Juan Diaz with a tying solo shot in third, but Cancel and Haerther made the most racket with two-run taters apiece, Cancel's sixth-inning blast putting the Cardinals back in front 4-3 and Haerther's providing much-needed insurance an inning later.

All in all, it was a breathtaking way to do showbiz. In ending a three-game losing streak and cooling off the Texas League East leaders in front of a regionally televised broadcast, the Cardinals forced Wichita to strand 14 runners and pushed Stuart Pomeranz (2-4) back to the win column on a night when he appeared headed for his fifth consecutive loss.

Surely, no one would have doubted if a few more gray hairs developed on the head of Springfield manager Chris Maloney, for the Cardinals blunted a jam in the sixth and escaped bases-loaded messes in the eighth and ninth.

"A win's a win," Maloney said. "I'll take the gray hairs."

What Cardinals fans likely watching from home saw was a snapshot of a pair of veteran minor leaguers and a glimpse of the organization's possible future.

There was Diaz, the big-bopper rescued from the scrap heap in May, blasting a solo shot off Thad Markray to interrupt the right-hander as he knifed through the lineup, in the middle of strkikng out five of the first seven Cardinals.

It was Diaz's 11th homer of the year, first since July 10.

When the Wranglers took a brief lead in the top of the sixth, Cancel responded with a two-run shot off Stephen Bray. It was the first home run for Cancel since June 15, a string of 78 at-bats.

And how big it was. It gave the Cardinals a 4-3 lead, and Haerther — among the organization's top 10 prospects — followed an inning later by hooking a two-run shot over the right-field wall for his fourth homer since joining the Cardinals in early June.

"We needed every one of them," Maloney said. "(Cancel) has been a good leader, and it's good to have a guy like that."

He's also encouraged by Haerther, bothered the past month due to a slightly jammed knee.

"He's pretty close to 100 percent," Maloney said.

But to Cancel, it didn't matter that Fox's cameras captured it all.

"People know what we're doing. On TV or not on TV, the front-office guys, they know what we're doing," Cancel said. And then he conceded, "But it's nice."

Wichita had won seven of its last eight coming in, but all the Wranglers had to look back on were the missed chances.

Such as in the sixth, when reliever Oscar Alvarez issued a walk and hit a batter, only to see Josh Axelson slam shut the Wranglers' brief window of opportunity by recording three outs.