Rockies vs. Cardinals Today: How to Watch Everson Pereira’s Cardinals Debut

ST. LOUIS — Ozzie Guillén’s No. 13 goes up in Chicago tonight, the first manager in White Sox history to be honored that way. Three hundred miles south, the Cardinals play beneath a wall that already carries their own managers — plus a shortstop who did backflips, Ozzie Smith, whose No. 1 went up in 1996.

One franchise just got its first manager on the wall. The other has had three for decades: Red Schoendienst (1965-76), Whitey Herzog (1980-90) and Tony La Russa (1996-2011). Its most famous Ozzie never managed anything.

 

Friday night added another layer. Joe Buck sat in the Cardinals booth alongside Chip Caray and Mark Sweeney and threw out the first ceremonial pitch of his life, in a ballpark where his father’s name hangs on that same wall.

How to watch Rockies at Cardinals

• Matchup: Colorado Rockies (45-71) at St. Louis Cardinals (58-58)
• First pitch: 6:15 p.m. CT / 7:15 p.m. ET, Saturday, Aug. 8
• Venue: Busch Stadium, St. Louis
• Cardinals TV: Cardinals.TV
• Rockies TV: Rockies.TV
• Radio: KMOX 1120 AM / 104.1 FM
• Probables: Kyle Freeland, LHP (3-10, 6.81) vs. Matthew Liberatore, LHP (5-8, 4.97)

Cardinals lineup: JJ Wetherholt 2B, Jordan Walker RF, Iván Herrera C, Alec Burleson 1B, José Fermín DH, Masyn Winn SS, Blaze Jordan 3B, Nathan Church CF, Everson Pereira LF. Matthew Liberatore starts.

Rockies lineup: Jake McCarthy LF, Kyle Karros 3B, Cole Carrigg CF, Hunter Goodman C, TJ Rumfield 1B, Willi Castro 2B, Jordan Beck RF, Tyler Freeman DH, Ezequiel Tovar SS. Kyle Freeland starts.

Jordan Walker returned last night in the Redbirds 3-2 win after missing two games with knee inflammation. Dress for it — August in St. Louis is doing what August in St. Louis does.

Cardenales to Cardinals

Everson Pereira starts in left field and bats ninth in his first game for St. Louis. Nelson Velázquez was designated for assignment to make room.

The route here has been absurd. Pereira signed with the Yankees out of Venezuela in 2017 for $1.5 million. He debuted for New York in 2023, went to Tampa Bay in the José Caballero trade at last year’s deadline, then to the White Sox that November with Tanner Murray for Yoendrys Gómez and Steven Wilson.

Chicago designated him for assignment on Aug. 3 to make room for Joey Bart. St. Louis claimed him off waivers on Aug. 6.

And in the Venezuelan winter league, he plays for Cardenales de Lara.

Cardenales to Yankees to Rays to White Sox to the injured list to the Cardinals. He has been wearing the name the whole time.

Who he is

Baseball America ranked Pereira a top-100 prospect in 2023 and 2024. The bat has never made it to the majors.

Through 264 big league plate appearances he is hitting .172/.246/.290 with a 37.1 percent strikeout rate. Across 738 Triple-A plate appearances he has 43 home runs, a .269/.360/.520 line and a 126 wRC+. He hit for the cycle at Scranton last July with five hits, two homers and six RBI.

He also had 18 games with Cardenales de Lara last winter — .269 with four doubles, a triple, two home runs and nine RBI in 78 at-bats.

What he actually brings tonight

The glove.

Pereira replaces Velázquez, who is Puerto Rican and hit a memorable home run against the Cubs this season but does not fit the long-term picture or the immediate need in left. St. Louis needs someone who can cover ground next to Nathan Church and Jordan Walker.

He plays like that. He also plays like this, which is part of why he only got into 27 games for Chicago.

He caught it. Then he came off the field with help.

Season-ending UCL surgery in 2024. A left ankle sprain last April, a pectoral strain that month, a concussion in June. He is out of options, so he can be designated again at any point. If it clicks, the Cardinals control him for five more seasons.

The Joshua Báez timeline

Cardinals fans wanted Báez in that spot. The reason they are getting Pereira is a date.

St. Louis first recalled César Prieto as a stopgap after the Nootbaar trade. As Redbird Rants reported, the most likely explanation is rookie eligibility — Aug. 15 is the earliest Báez can be called up, stay all season, and hold rookie status for 2027. Using Prieto as a placeholder avoided phantom promotions.

There is a baseball argument too. Báez has three home runs in the last week, but his strikeout rate over the last 15 days is above 34 percent against a nine percent walk rate.

Familiar play here. Masyn Winn got a 37-game look in 2023 before a full runway. Jimmy Crooks got 15 games last season.

Prieto is still looking for his first major league hit. He bunted his way on Friday and it was scored an error.

Marmol is protecting Kyle Leahy

The Cardinals pulled Leahy after five innings Friday and he got the win anyway.

Justin Bruihl, Caleb Ferguson, Ryne Stanek and Riley O’Brien threw four scoreless behind him, leaning heavily on sweepers. The early hook was deliberate — Leahy was a bullpen arm as recently as last season, and the club is managing his innings.

The White Sox called up two prospects today because their bullpen had nothing left. The Cardinals pull starters early because theirs does.

Three managers on one wall

Only the Yankees have retired more numbers than the Cardinals.

Fourteen deep: Ozzie Smith (1), Red Schoendienst (2), Stan Musial (6), Enos Slaughter (9), Tony La Russa (10), Ken Boyer (14), Dizzy Dean (17), Lou Brock (20), Whitey Herzog (24), Bruce Sutter (42), Bob Gibson (45), Jackie Robinson’s 42 league-wide, August Busch Jr.’s 85 and Jack Buck.

Three of them managed this team: La Russa, Herzog and Schoendienst.

Roughly 21 managers in the entire history of Major League Baseball have had a number retired. St. Louis has three of them. Chicago got its first tonight. The other 28 franchises combined have the remaining 17.

That is the entire history of the sport, and it produces a group smaller than one 26-man roster. Numbers get retired for statistics, and nobody hits 500 home runs from the top step of the dugout.

“Nobody retires for being nice,” Guillén said this week on Foul Territory. “When they retire your number and you’re not a Hall of Famer and you’re not in the 400, 500 home run club, 3,000 hits — you’re not even close to being part of that.”

What gets a manager on a wall is a championship in a city that waited. Herzog broke a 15-year drought in 1982. La Russa won in 2006 and 2011. Schoendienst won in 1967 after playing 15 seasons here first. Guillén ended 88 years of it in 2005.

There is a direct line, too. La Russa managed the White Sox from 1979 to 1986 before he came to St. Louis. Guillén’s 678 wins in Chicago tie him with La Russa for third all-time in that franchise.

Baseball without borders

Eleven players on the Cardinals’ 40-man roster and injured lists were born outside the United States.

Iván Herrera, catching and hitting third, was born in Panama City and played for Panama at the 2026 World Baseball Classic. Catcher Leo Bernal is also Panamanian. José Fermín, batting fifth, and pitcher George Soriano are Dominican. Pedro Pagés joins Pereira from Venezuela. Nelson Velázquez and Bryan Torres are Puerto Rican. César Prieto is Cuban. Luis Gastelum, who debuted July 8, and Ramón Urías are Mexican.

Colorado brings 11 of its own. Ezequiel Tovar, batting ninth, was born in La Sabana, Venezuela, joined by pitcher Eiberson Castellano. Willi Castro is Puerto Rican. Adael Amador, Juan Mejía, Blas Castaño and Welinton Herrera are Dominican. Tomoyuki Sugano is Japanese. José Quintana is Colombian. Jordan Romano and Edouard Julien are Canadian.

Pereira’s corner of Venezuela is worth noting. He is from Cabudare, in Lara state, part of the Barquisimeto metro — away from the coastal Caracas corridor that produces most of the country’s major leaguers. Locally he is known as “El de Cabudare.”

Joe Buck came home

Joe Buck joined the Cardinals broadcast Friday alongside Chip Caray and Mark Sweeney, and threw out a ceremonial first pitch.

It was the first one he had ever thrown.

Cubs-Cardinals on TBS: Who’s Calling, and Who Once Did

He warmed up beforehand. He had his kids throw the ball too. He talked about his father — Jack Buck, whose name hangs on that same left field wall — and called him his best friend. He reflected on Cooperstown, where Jack received the Ford C. Frick Award in 1987.

Two broadcast lineages in one booth. Caray is the third generation of his family to call major league games, after Harry and Skip. Buck is the second.

Watch: Joe Buck joins the Cardinals broadcast booth

Kyle Freeland has the hardest job in baseball

Freeland is 3-10 with a 6.81 ERA and has carried some version of that line for most of a decade. He is 33, a Denver native, drafted eighth overall by his hometown club in 2014, and has never pitched anywhere else.

Kyle Karros, batting second at third base, is the son of Eric Karros — the 1992 National League Rookie of the Year who played 14 seasons, mostly for the Dodgers, and now broadcasts. His brother Jared pitches professionally. Kyle played at UCLA before Colorado drafted him, which produces some unusual family television whenever the Rockies play Los Angeles and his father is on the call.

Liberatore counters at 4.97 for a Cardinals club that has been exactly .500 all summer and just traded three major leaguers.