The 2019 St. Louis Cardinals season was the 138th for the St. Louis Cardinals of Major League Baseball (MLB), a franchise in St. Louis, Missouri. It was the 128th season for the Cardinals in the National League (NL), and their 14th at Busch Stadium III. On September 22, 2019, the Cardinals defeated the Chicago Cubs 3-2 to clinch their first playoff berth since 2015. On September 29, the Cardinals clinched the National League Central for the first time since 2015, and defeated the Atlanta Braves in the Division Series on October 9. They went on to play the Washington Nationals in the NLCS, but were swept in four games. Season standings National League Central National League playoff standings Record vs. opponents Season summary On Opening Day, versus the Milwaukee Brewers, catcher Yadier Molina extended his team-record for Opening Day starts with 15. However, the Cardinals would lose the game 5-4. The following game, newly-acquired first baseman Paul Goldschmidt homered three times in a 9−5 win over the Brewers, making him the fastest player to hit a three-home run game with a new team. He also drove in five runs. This would be the only game the Cardinals would win in the 4 game series. April would start out strong for the Cardinals with them winning 7 out of their 9 first games of the month, including a sweep of the Los Angeles Dodgers. The following series would be more rough, with them splitting a 2 game series against the Cincinnati Reds and going 1-2 in a series against the Milwaukee Brewers (where right fielder Tyler O'Neil and pitcher Mike Mikolas would both be injured) and causing them to lose their first place position and fall to third. After another loss against the New York Mets on April 19, they would go back on a winning streak winning 9 of their last 10 games. However, center fielder Harrison Bader would be injured on April 17 and just 2 days later pitcher Michael Wacha would be injured, but he would be reactivated 10 days later. At the end of the month the Cardinals would have a 19-10 record with a .655 winning percentage, the best in the league. The first two games of May were finishing up a 4-game series against the Washington Nationals, which the Cardinals took 3 of the 4 games. The Cardinals were 3 games ahead of the second