Cardinals' Miles Mikolas looks to forget subpar outings, conquer Nats

St. Louis Cardinals starting pitcher Miles Mikolas will seek to get his season back on track before the All-Star break next week.

His final chance to do that will come Thursday night when the Cardinals host the Washington Nationals in the finale of a three-game series.

The Cardinals won 4-2 on Tuesday, and the Nationals answered with an 8-2 victory Wednesday night to snap their four-game losing streak.

In his past two starts, Mikolas (4-6, 5.26 ERA) has allowed 14 runs on 17 hits in 10 innings. He is coming off a disastrous performance Friday against the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field: eight runs on 10 hits -- six homers -- in six innings of an 11-3 loss.

"It's really disappointing," Mikolas said. "Fourth of July. Chicago. I was really excited for this start. Really pumped up. And I wanted it to go well, and it didn't. I've got to live with that."

The right-hander made no excuses after the defeat.

"I threw a lot of really hittable pitches," Mikolas said. "I don't think they had any cheap ones today."

Mikolas is 5-3 with a 3.26 ERA in 11 career outings (10 starts) against the Nationals. He earned a 6-1 victory over them on May 11 by holding them to one run on four hits while striking out five and walking one in 5 1/3 innings.

The entire team could use a quick reset.

The Cardinals have lost six of their past eight games while getting outscored 51-17. Overall, St. Louis pitchers have the third-fewest strikeouts (670) in the majors, along with the No. 20 team ERA (4.10).

"When you look at our pitching department, our hitting department, I really do feel like we have the best on both sides of that in the league, and they are going to get the most out of the guys we have," Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said. "I feel like we've done that. But you're going to have to live with certain games that look like this (8-2 loss) based on probability of ball in play."

The Nationals are 1-1 since Miguel Cairo became interim manager, replacing Dave Martinez after the team started the season 37-53.

"We have two hitting coaches, two pitching coaches, good bench coach, a good group of coaches, I told them we need to get these players better," Cairo said. "We need to keep working. They are hungry to work, and we need to keep doing that."

Player development will be the top priority for the Nationals for the rest of this season.

"That's been extremely encouraging to see several young players playing on an All-Star-caliber level," interim Nationals general manager Mike DeBartolo said. "I think we need to build and bolster the support around them and improve the consistency of play.

"They're learning, and they're growing together. Every single day, the emphasis is going to be building their skill set, getting them better."

The Nationals on Thursday will start right-hander Michael Soroka (3-6, 5.40 ERA), who allowed seven runs on nine hits in four innings during an 11-2 loss to the Boston Red Sox on Friday. He struck out six and walked two.

Soroka is 1-1 with a 3.38 ERA in three career starts against the Cardinals.

--Field Level Media