DENVER • His flight to Denver arrived around the start of the second inning Sunday. His taxi arrived at the ballpark about midway through the game, right as the Cardinals were flexing a rally.
But Paul DeJong arrived, officially, in the ninth.
On the first swing of his first at-bat in the majors, the Cardinals rookie connected for a 388-foot home run. It could have been the kind of jolting hit the Cardinals had been seeking the entire road trip. Should have been. Decisions made defensively in the eighth meant DeJong’s debut merely tidied up a score instead of upending it as the Cardinals lost to Colorado 8-4 in front of a sellout crowd at Coors Field.