ST. LOUIS -- Harrison Bader doubled leading off the ninth inning for his first major league hit and slid across the plate to score the winning run of his debut on Jedd Gyorko's short sacrifice fly, lifting the St. Louis Cardinals over the Colorado Rockies 3-2 on Tuesday night.
Taken on the third round of the 2015 amateur draft, Bader was brought up before the game when Dexter Fowler was placed on the disabled list with a strained left wrist.
Bader started in center field and hit seventh, and he grounded out, struck out and flied out in his first three at-bats.
With his mother and sister arriving during the game following a flight from New York to join his father in the stands, Bader doubled down the left-field line against lefty Jake McGee (0-1) leading off the ninth. Bader was batting .403 (29 for 72) with 10 homers against lefties at Triple-A Memphis this year.
Greg Garcia sacrificed as Bader took third, and Gyorko hit a fly near the right-field line that Carlos Gonzalez caught 248 feet from the plate. The speedy Bader slid across jubilantly as Gonzalez's one-hop throw went slightly up the third-base line.
Trevor Rosenthal (3-4) pitched two scoreless innings.
Major League Baseball experimented with 1-minute, 45-second breaks between innings rather than the usual 2:05 for locally televised games, and the game lasted 3:11 -- 6 minutes longer than this year's big league average for nine-inning games.
A 23-year-old from Bronxville, New York, Bader was the 100th overall pick in 2015 and was hitting .297 with 19 home runs and 48 RBI in 97 games for Memphis this season.
He became only the second player from Horace Mann School in New York to make it to the major leagues after Pedro Alvarez, a third baseman who played for Pittsburgh from 2010-15 and was selected an All-Star in 2013. Converted to first base, Alvarez spent last year with Baltimore and has been with the Orioles' Triple-A team at Norfolk, Virginia, this season.
Lance Lynn, who may be traded before Monday's deadline, allowed one run and three hits over six innings. The 30-year-old right-hander is eligible for free agency after this season.
Rockies starter Jon Gray gave up two runs and eight hits in five innings.
Cardinals rookie Paul DeJong hit a two-run homer in the first, his 13th of the season and seventh in July.
Gerardo Parra had a sacrifice fly in the seventh off Kevin Siegrist, and Trevor Story tied the score in the eighth against Matt Bowman with his 14th homer.
TRAINER'S ROOM
Rockies: RHP Carlos Estevez was recalled from Albuquerque and RHP Jairo Diaz was optioned to the Triple-A farm team. Estevez is 4-0 with an 8.10 ERA in 18 appearances with Colorado. . 1B Ian Desmond (calf) left the game in the fourth inning.
