At this point, the only thing that might slow down rapidly blossoming Kyle Leahy is the career high innings workload that the Cardinals’ right-hander continues to pile up while thriving as a first-time MLB starter.

The Cardinals pulled their 6-foot-5, 225-pound pitcher after just five innings on Friday night to try and curb his workload somewhat. Still, Leahy used his seven-pitch mix beautifully as he limited the Rockies to just two earned runs and lifted the Cardinals to a 3-2 victory at Busch Stadium.

Leahy, 29, made a career-most 62 appearances out of the bullpen in 2025, but he has successfully made the transition to the starting rotation. Leahy, a native of Boulder, Colo., whose family had Rockies season tickets near the Colorado dugout while growing up as a child, completed an eighth straight start of giving up two or fewer earned runs.

For good measure, Leahy struck out eight Rockies, tying for the second-most punchouts he’s had in his career. He has strikeouts with five different pitches -- three of them coming on his sweeper. Leahy's work on Friday pushed his innings total to 112 1/3 for the season – well beyond the career-most 88 innings he toiled in a breakout 2025 season.

Over his last eight outings, Leahy is 3-0 with a stellar 1.49 ERA. He improved to 8-4 and lowered his ERA for the 2026 season to 3.45.

"He's able to lock in and not make the moment any bigger than it needs to be to execute his pitches," Cardinals' manager Oliver Marmol said of Leahy. "When (the game) was on the line, he was at his best. From an innings standpoint, we have to start to limit him as far as how deep he goes into games. But he probably could have given us another (inning), but he did a really nice jot through five (innings)."    

Friday’s win was the second straight for a Cardinals club that enjoyed a day off on Thursday following a stretch where they played 20 games in 20 days following the MLB All-Star Game. A fourth victory in the past five games allowed the Cardinals (58-58) to jump the Marlins (58-59) in the standings and edge closer to the final National League Wild Card slot currently shared by the Dbacks (61-55) and Padres (60-56).

The Cardinals were outhit by the Rockies 10-4, but they made the most of their baserunners and timing. After a leadoff single by Jimmy Crooks and a double by Masyn Winn, the Cardinals got back-to-back sacrifice flies from Nathan Church and Bryan Torres to take a 2-1 lead.

In the third inning, Ivan Herrera gave the Cardinals the slugging that they have been missing since the return to play after the MLB All-Star Game. Herrera hit his 13th home run – and his first since July 26 – by crushing a hanging curveball 379 feet. It was Herrera’s 51st hit of the season with two strikes – the most among any St. Louis player and the ninth most in the National League.

Winn had a hit, a walk, two stolen bases and a couple of more spectacular defensive plays. He made a diving stop of a 107.2 mph grounder and bounced up to throw out Hunter Goodman in the seventh inning.

"I get really fired up for defense, when anybody is on the mound, but especially you have a guy out there like (Ryne Stanek). To make a play for him and seeing him get fired up (in the seventh inning), that got everybody going."  

Herrera’s swat proved to be the game-winner after the Rockies closed within 3-2 in the fourth inning on an infield ground out by Troy Johnston.

With Leahy out of the game after five innings, that left a Cardinals bullpen that was without key set-up man George Soriano to cover four innings. They did that by getting scoreless innings of work from left-handers Justin Bruihl and Caleb Ferguson and right-handers Ryne Stanek and Riley O’Brien.

The All-Star closer closed out the ninth for his career-best 28th save of the season. O'Brien surrendered a walk to Ezequiel Tovar to lead off the ninth, but he got Kyle Karros to ground into a double play. O'Brien has closed out his last seven save opportunities without a hiccup.