Jerad Eickhoff notches best career start as Phillies beat Cardinals, 5-0

ST. LOUIS -- The seeds of the best start of Jerad Eickhoff’s career were sewn amid the monotony of another game of catch on a sun-drenched Florida field.

It was last summer, and Eickhoff was away from the Phillies, trying everything to get over the tingling in his fingertips that would ultimately require surgery to relieve him of carpal tunnel syndrome. He spun a few fastballs, then a few breaking pitches. Finally, he uncorked the slider, typically his third-best pitch.

“I switched the grip up, and I just felt something different,” Eickhoff said Wednesday. “It had better shape. From then on, I just kind of took it and ran with it, and turns out it’s been a pretty good pitch for me.”

It was Eickhoff’s salvation against the Cardinals in the finale of the three-game series. Making his fourth start since getting called up from triple-A, he didn’t have a feel for his signature curveball early on. His slider, though, was perfectly effective. In fact, it was better than ever.

By the third inning, the curveball came back. And by the eighth inning, Eickhoff walked off the mound after dominating the Cardinals in a 5-0 victory at Busch Stadium, the Phillies’ ninth win in 13 games.

“He pitches with a fearlessness -- any pitch, any count, secondary pitches behind in the count,” manager Gabe Kapler said. “He’ll throw a slider outside of the zone when he’s confident he’s going to get a swing, and he’ll fill [the zone] up, too. He never looked out of control.”

Eickhoff’s performance was a respite on an otherwise somber day for the Phillies. Longtime team president David Montgomery, who served as the club’s chairman for the last four seasons, passed away after a five-year fight with jawbone cancer. Kapler and Rhys Hoskins spoke eloquently about Montgomery before the game, and the Phillies are expected to soon wear a patch with his initials -- DPM -- on their jerseys.

Eickhoff heard the news a few hours before the game. Like so many of his teammates, he didn’t join the Phillies until after Montgomery had stepped aside as team president. But Montgomery’s impact on the organization remains profound.

"It's special to be able to honor David Montgomery with this win," Kapler said. "I thought Eickhoff represented David beautifully. He carried our team today in the same way David Montgomery carried our organization for so many years."

After not generating much offense for four innings against Cardinals starter Jack Flaherty, the Phillies sent 10 batters to the plate in the fifth, took advantage of sloppy defense, and staked Eickhoff to a 4-0 lead, the big hit coming on Cesar Hernandez’s two-run double. Hernandez, batting leadoff as Andrew McCutchen got a day off, added a solo homer in the seventh inning.

Eickhoff did the rest. With a large contingent of family and friends making the three-hour drive from his hometown of Evansville, Ind., he allowed only three hits and three walks -- all without throwing any harder than 91 mph. He also worked at a brisk pace, as though the Phillies’ flight to Kansas City was going to leave without him.

In four starts this season, Eickhoff has allowed five runs in 30 innings for a 1.50 ERA, piled up 31 strikeouts, and cemented his spot in a starting rotation that quietly has posted a 2.42 ERA over the last 13 games.

Not bad for a pitcher who missed almost all of last year and began this season in triple-A.

“Did we expect him in early May to go through the Cardinals lineup three times here in St. Louis? I don’t know that anyone expected a performance like today,” Kapler said. “It was one of the best pitching performances we’ve seen on either side all year long.”

Kapler describes Eickhoff as a “throwback” because he doesn’t light up a radar gun and get a ton of swings and misses. But, he changes speeds on his three pitches and understands how to mix them based on what’s working best in a given start. And, unlike Vince Velasquez, who irritated J.T. Realmuto by shaking off breaking pitches to get to fastballs in Monday night’s loss, Eickhoff said he shook off the catcher only once in 106 pitches.

"There's not a lot of thought," Eickhoff said. "It's just, get the ball, get the sign, agree with the sign, and just execute the pitch. It's just really as simple as that."

Eickhoff threw 46 sliders, a career-high. His confidence in the pitch was evident in the first inning, when he threw two past slugger Paul Goldschmidt.

That’s the kind of day it was for Eickhoff. And it all came together in a game of catch in Florida.

"It was a summer day in Clearwater when something clicked," he said. "Something clicked last year, and I adjusted with it."

Some adjustment.