Cardinals Pitcher Credits Living ‘Prayer to Prayer’ For Win No. 200
By Movieguide® Contributor
St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Adam Wainwright secured his 200th career win in an emotional game against the Boston Brewers.
Sports Spectrum reported, “Over seven innings (the longest outing of his season), Wainwright allowed just four hits (the fewest of his season) and zero runs (his first scoreless outing since Aug. 18, 2022). He became the oldest Cardinals pitcher with an appearance of seven or more scoreless innings. His first strikeout on the night was the 2,200th of his career, and his last two strikeouts moved him to 65th on the MLB all-time list.”
The Cardinals beat the Brewers 1-0, marking Wainwright’s 200th win and landing him on a list of only five other active MLB pitchers to reach that status.
“I’m living prayer to prayer out there,” Wainwright stated in a press conference after the game. “Not even pitch to pitch, just prayer to prayer. And I know Goldy [teammate Paul Goldschmidt] has told me several times that he stays in prayer while I’m out there pitching, just praying for me trying to finish the job. I’ve just got such a great support staff.”
He also said in the press conference that he would not have made it this far without his family and support system.
“I am somewhat proud of the fact that it’s hard to keep this guy down,” Wainwright said. “I’m proud that every time I got knocked down, I got back up…But you know what I had? I had incredible family behind me. I had incredible teammates and coaching staff behind me.”
Oliver Marmol, the Cardinal’s manager, told ESPN of Wainwright, “That’s as good as we’ve seen. If you talked to him right before the game, and if he’s being really honest, he was being held up by duct tape before the game started, and for him to go out there and do what he did is highly impressive.”
Wainwright also told ESPN, “It’s been a duct-tape kind of year for me. I’ve had my arm taped a few times, tonight I had my back taped up…Having to work as hard as I had to work for it made me savor it that much more.”
The pitcher often uses his notoriety to give back to God.
In 2020, Wainwright led over 22,000 people through reading the Bible in a year. To accomplish that, he leaned on his wife for support.
“The first week of that, I remember saying, ‘I did not know what I was getting myself into.’ I said [to my wife], ‘Jenny, you’re going to have to help me through this because I feel like this might be the most important thing I’ve ever done,’” he told Sports Spectrum at the time.
“We are looked up to as leaders, and naturally we have an ‘in’ with the younger players simply because we have the knowledge and experience that they want to learn from,” he added. “When we can also speak into their lives on deeper matters — on things besides baseball — it provides a huge opportunity for us to share Christ’s love with those who are eager to hear what we have to say.”
