Jun. 24—DETROIT — Manager Mike Shildt didn’t pull out all the stops, but he pulled out some of them Wednesday when he pushed up by about two innings appearances by some of his late-inning relievers — Ryan Helsley, Genesis Cabrera and Giovanny Gallegos — all of whom pitched by the sixth inning and had been little used lately. Closer Alex Reyes appeared in the eighth with the Cardinals trailing by three.

“It was pretty much out of necessity,” said Shildt. “Alex and Gio hadn’t pitched in a week — for fairly obvious reasons. (Cabrera) had had two days off and Helsley had had two days off. They’ve got to pitch at some point and Johnny (Gant) wasn’t as consistent as he or we would have liked. You want to keep it as close as possible. Obviously, you can’t do (it) every night.”

Starter Gant extended his major league lead in bases on balls issued by walking four men in three official innings and allowing a home run as one of the two hits he gave up.

The Shildt bullpen analytics, as they were, were not enough to prevent the Cardinals from losing a seventh consecutive interleague series at Comerica Park — they have played only seven. The Detroit Tigers beat the Cardinals for the 16th time in 20 regularseason meetings here since 2000. And Justin Verlander won only three of those games.

Detroit’s 6-2 triumph dropped the Cardinals two games under .500 for the first time since April 21.

More significantly, the Cardinals’ meager two-run output marked the ninth time in their past 11 games that they had scored two or fewer. It was their 12th such occurrence in the month and 30th of the season, tying Pittsburgh for the major league high — or low.

The Pirates will be the next opponent Thursday night at Busch Stadium. There are seven games remaining in June but the Cardinals already have established their fate for the month. They are 6-14 in June with four games against Pittsburgh and three against Arizona.

The Cardinals are a collective 8-1 against those two teams. But, as we’ve learned, there is nothing guaranteed about the Cardinals lately, most immediately their poor performance in being outscored 14-4 by the lowly Tigers in two games here.

“What happened today? Too many free passes,” said Shildt. “We were in our bullpen by the fourth inning.

“What happened today? We scored two and were unable to add on. The story last night was we made a mistake (a Johan Oviedo throwing error) and gave up a crooked number (six runs in the fourth) and some walks were involved with that, too.”

Nolan Arenado ripped his 14th homer of the season and 249th of his career to give the Cardinals a lead in the second.

Then, rookie Lars Nootbaar cracked a triple for his first major league hit with one out in the third. Tommy Edman jammed a single through the drawn-in infield and it was 2-0.

The most recent Cardinal to get a triple in his first major league at-bat was pitcher Daniel Ponce de Leon in 2018. Nootbaar had only one hit this spring for the Cardinals, also a triple.

Gant survived walking the first two hitters he faced in the second when he induced three infield outs. But that didn’t work in the third.

After passing No. 9 hitter Jake Rogers and Akil Baddoo, Jonathan Schoop, whose three-run homer the night before sank the Cardinals, doubled to right center to tie the score.

“He walks a tightrope and sometimes you fall,” said Shildt, “Now you’re facing a different animal, a different guy in Schoop.”

Gant threw only 31 strikes out of 66 pitches through three innings and on a rare occasion when he did get ahead, he served up a 407-foot homer to Daz Cameron on a 1-2 mistake to open the Tigers’ fourth. It was the final pitch of the 70 Gant threw.

Since Gant beat the Chicago White Sox on May 26, he is 0-3 and has walked 17 men in 20 innings, in addition to giving up 18 earned runs and five of his six homers.

“I’ve just got to pitch deeper into games — give the team a better chance to win,” Gant said. “I didn’t give the team a great chance to win with my outing out there today.

“It’s never good to be giving free passes. Too many base runners who didn’t earn it.”

Helsley got through the fourth but couldn’t get past Schoop, who bashed his 10th homer of the month and 15th of the season in the fifth to give the Tigers a two-run lead.

Rookie Matt Manning, who gained his first major league win in his second start, left with two out in the sixth, having given up two runs. When he pitched for the Tigers’ Toledo team three weeks ago against a middling Cardinals affiliate in Memphis, Manning allowed nine hits and seven runs in 3 2/3 innings.

Matt Carpenter, nothing for four against lefthanded pitching this season, was allowed to hit in the sixth with two on and two against lefthander Gregory Soto — and struck out. Shildt pondered a righthanded batter but noted that Carpenter had hit lefthanders well in the past and that he often walked against them, too, with Shildt also citing the fact that Soto has had some control issues, especially against lefthanded hitters.

“And Carp’s swinging the bat as well as anybody we have right now,” said Shildt.

The Tigers stretched their lead to 5-2 in the sixth when Baddoo singled home a run off Cabrera although strongarmed rookie Nootbaar, who had 16 assists in the minors in 2019, threw out Isaac Paredes at the plate.

Reyes, who like Gallegos, hadn’t pitched since a week ago Tuesday, allowed a key stolen base in the eighth which cost him a run but the game ostensibly had been decided.

Meanwhile, a Detroit bullpen not particularly known for its efficiency, blanked the Cardinals for 7 2/3 innings. “They were effective,” said Shildt. “They were able to throw up zeroes.”

Zero isn’t quite the number to describe the Cardinals’ accomplishments lately but they did lose five out of six games on this trip.

“We have a lot of guys that know how to win. We just aren’t winning right now,” Shildt said.