Cardinals outslug Mariners 11-6

SEATTLE – The St. Louis Cardinals had 17 hits. Thirteen of them went for extra bases.

Yet this was sort of a back-and-forth game before they found the nail to hammer into the Mariners’ coffin with one final lead change.

Seattle’s Franklin Gutierrez tied the game with a three-run home run in the bottom of the sixth inning.

The Cardinals then hit six home runs from the sixth inning on – including back-to-back home runs from Jedd Gyorko and Tommy Pham to lead off the seventh – as St. Louis avoided a three-game sweep at Safeco Field with the 11-6 win in front of 35,955, maybe half in Cardinals red, on Sunday.

“I think something that gets lost in this thing is we won the series,” Mariners catcher Chris Iannetta said. “We would love to sweep, obviously. That’s great. But we won two out of three and that’s what we’re trying to do from here on out is just win series.”

But you could see why that might get lost.

Pham and Matt Carpenter each hit two home runs among all those extra-base knocks (five doubles, two triples and six home runs), the Mariners called on six pitchers ahead of Monday’s day off before a two-game series against the Pittsburgh Pirates, some fans at one point were chanting “Let’s go Cardinals,” and Scott Servais was ejected for the first time since he was a player after arguing a called third strike against Shawn O’Malley in the sixth.

And the Mariners (38-38) fell back to .500 after halting what was a six-game losing skid with two wins to start this interleague series.

“We saw some pitches up,” Servais said. “I had a really good view sitting in my office. I got to see a little more from there. Ball was up and was jumping pretty good in this ballpark today. We just didn’t locate it.

“There could be different reasons for that. The guys have been logging a lot of innings. We get a day off (Monday) and we’ll get right back at it.”

The Mariners have had one starting pitcher last more than six innings in their past nine games. That was James Paxton in his last start when he went 7 2/3 innings in a 4-2 loss to the Tigers. He lasted five innings Sunday.

They are 2-7 in that stretch, which includes Thursday’s 5-4 loss to the Detroit Tigers in 10 innings in which starter Adrian Sampson was pulled for what would be a season-ending injury before he could throw an official pitch.

“Over the course of the season we have absorbed a lot of innings,” Iannetta said. “We’ve asked them to do a lot and they’ve all rose to the challenge.

“Just days like this happen.”

The Cardinals were the first on the scoreboard, scoring a run thanks back-to-back doubles from Carpenter and Aledmys Diaz, who finished with three doubles, to lead off the top of the first.

That should have been the first sign.

But Nelson Cruz tied it on an RBI ground out in the bottom half of the inning for his 50th RBI of the season, then crushed a solo home run in the third to tie Robinson Cano for a team-best 19 homers as the Mariners led 3-1.

Then it was back to the Cardinals.

Paxton’s day was never easy aside from a 1-2-3 fourth inning.

But it looked like Paxton had found a groove, retiring six straight. He locked in after Gutierrez’s stellar catch in the second inning when Gutierrez leaped to catch Carpenter’s fly off the top of the wall in right field.

Instead, the wheels came off.

Diaz, Matt Holliday and Stephen Piscotty hit back-to-back-to-back doubles and Brandon Moss followed with a triple for three runs to put St. Louis up 4-3. And all it took was seven Paxton pitches.

“I felt like I was battling all day,” Paxton said. “I didn’t have my ‘A’ stuff. The command really wasn’t there. But we were fighting. … They hit some good pitches that last inning.”

St. Louis added one more run on Seager’s error on a backhand attempt at third base.

Paxton got out of the inning, but that was the end of his day. He allowed eight hits, five runs and struck out seven as he labored through 101 pitches.

It was his shortest outing since his season debut – when San Diego scored eight (three earned) in 3 2/3 innings. He followed that with 27 strikeouts in 26 innings over his next four outings.

“I was missing up in the zone a little bit,” Paxton said. “I wasn’t able to drive it into the bottom of the zone like I had my last few outings.”