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NEW YORK��— The Cardinals' constant churn of their outfield options continued as the scene shifted to the Bronx and once again turned their attention toward top prospect Jordan Walker.

At least a day after placing Tommy Pham on waivers to see if a contending team was interested in his right-handed bat for its outfield, the Cardinals took the abrupt move to designate the veteran outfield for assignment. That immediately removes him from both the active roster and the 40-man roster.

It is the second move in the past week where the Cardinals have dropped a player acquired at the trade deadline from their roster with intentions of removing him from the team.

To take Pham's place on the active roster, the Cardinals recalled Jordan Walker for the second time this month. The team will reveal Friday if it has a different plan for Walker this time beyond the platoon spot he played in previously.

He was previously in the outfield mix at the major-league level as an option against left-handed pitching. The starts were few. The at-bats were predictably limited. He went 1 for 11 in that brief stint with the Cardinals before the Cardinals returned the young outfielder to Class AAA Memphis. While there, he went 8 for 23 to storm back to the majors when the opportunity called.

Walker is starting in right field Friday against the New York Yankees, and manager Oliver Marmol said Walker will get "a run here" of starts.

The Cardinals acquired Pham from the White Sox at the trade deadline in a three-team trade that sent Tommy Edman to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

In the same deal, the Cardinals acquired starter Erick Fedde. They held up agreeing to deal during discussions in an attempt to add Pham to the mix, and then ultimately did so shortly before the deadline struck. The Cardinals saw Pham as the right handed-hitting outfielder they needed against lefty pitchers, and he quickly emerged as a starter following a pinch-hit grand slam.��

In 23 games back with the Cardinals, his original team, Pham hit .206 with a .653 OPS and a .368 slugging percentage.

He had two homers and 12 RBIs in his return to the Cardinals.

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Their playoff hopes hanging by a thread, the Cardinals open a road series Friday night in the Bronx against the Yankees. First pitch is set for 6:10 p.m.

New York has baseball's best record, but the Yankees have played .500 ball since the start of June and dropped two of three to Washington earlier this week.

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Before the game, the Cardinals designated Tommy Pham for assignment and recalled Jordan Walker.

Pham, acquired at the trade deadline, played in 23 games this year with ������Ƶ and batted .206.

Right-hander Erick Fedde (8-7, 3.31) will take the mound Friday for the Cardinals. His last start, his fifth as a Cardinal, was Fedde's first quality start with his new team.

Fedde is 1-3 with a 4.23 ERA with ������Ƶ.

The Yankees will counter with right-hander Marcus Stroman (9-6, 3.88).

The 33-year-old has seen his groundball rate fall to a career low this season, and he's giving up more homers than he ever has.

Since the start of July, Stroman sports a 5.40 ERA.

The Cardinals are 67-67, third in the NL Central and 10 1/2 games out of first. ������Ƶ is six games out of the final wild-card spot. The Cardinals have won six of nine.

The Yankees are 78-56, first in the AL East but just 1 1/2 games ahead of Baltimore.

New York boasts baseball's most-valuable and third-most-valuable player in Aaron Judge and Juan Soto.

Judge leads baseball with a 1.198 OPS and Soto is second at 1.011. In August, Judge is batting .415 with a 1.482 OPS and 12 homers.

This is the Cardinals' second-ever trip to the current iteration of Yankee Stadium. They were swept in a three-game set in 2017, which included a game in which Cardinals starter Carlos Martinez struck out 11 and walked eight.

The Yankees have been better on the road (42-27) than at home (36-29).

Lineups

CARDINALS

1. Masyn Winn, SS

2. Alec Burleson, DH

3. Nolan Arenado, 3B

4. Brendan Donovan, 2B

5. Paul Goldschmidt, 1B

6. Lars Nootbaar, LF

7. Jordan Walker, RF

8. Pedro Pagés, C

9. Victor Scott II, CF

P: Erick Fedde, RHP

YANKEES

1. Gleyber Torres, 2B

2. Juan Soto, RF

3. Aaron Judge, CF

4. Austin Wells, C

5. Giancarlo Stanton, DH

6. Jazz Chisholm Jr., 3B

7. Anthony Volpe, SS

8. Ben Rice, 1B

9. Alex Verdugo, LF

P: Marcus Stroman, RHP

Injury report

Willson Contreras (fractured finger):���ճ����catcher fractured the middle finger on his right hand when struck by a pitch Saturday night. He will have three weeks of no impact then he can begin a progression. There's not much wiggle room for a possible return. The injury could end his season.��Updated Aug. 27

Michael Siani (oblique strain):��The outfielder progressed from front flips to coach-pitched batting practice to high-velocity machine work, and he faced Lynn in the live BP on Monday. Next, he'll start a rehab assignment with Springfield on Tuesday. He's expected to play five innings in center field, followed by seven innings the following game.��Updated Aug. 27

Lance Lynn (knee strain):��The right-hander threw a live BP session Monday at Busch Stadium and reported no ill effects while speaking with reporters after the session. He will go on a minor-league rehab assignment, and he's slated to pitch for Triple-A Memphis against the Chicago Cubs' affiliate on Sunday in Des Moines, Iowa. He's expected to throw up to 85 pitches in that outing.��Updated Aug. 26

Steven Matz (lower back stiffness):��The left-hander will make another rehab start for Memphis on Tuesday, but he'll be on a reduced pitch count compared to his previous outing. He'll throw approximately 65 pitches after he threw 85 in his previous start. The reduced pitch count is in order to allow for "flexibility" when it comes time to adding him back onto the roster, Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said.��Updated Aug. 26

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Once the Padres lineup found a way to get on base in the early innings of Thursday’s series finale against the Cardinals, ������Ƶ starter Sonny Gray kept his plan of attack and mindset clear while navigating through his outing.

“Just stay committed to filling up the zone,” Gray said. “We worked through a lot of stuff this week, and we had a really good plan going into it as far as what we wanted to do. It was continuing just to stay with that. It was a good week of preparation, for sure. I kind of went through all different scenarios throughout the week. Just trying to draw from that.”

Gray retired the first seven Padres batters he faced before catcher Kyle Higashioka reached base on a ground-rule double with one out in the third inning. Gray struck out Tyler Wade looking on a 3-2 sinker that caught the low, inside corner of the strike zone. The Cardinals’ headline free-agent signee from this past offseason followed that by inducing a flyout from Luis Arraez — a two-time batting champion and former teammate of Gray’s while with the Twins.

“(I) made some big pitches in some 3-2 counts,” Gray said. “One to Wade ... that was a really, really big pitch, if you’re being honest. (If you don’t) make that pitch, you end up putting him on. Now you’re first and second with (Arraez) coming up.”

Gray followed the scoreless third inning by working around a one-out double from Jake Cronenworth in the fourth to keep San Diego scoreless as he tossed six innings and allowed one run to help the Cardinals to a 4-1 win in front of an announced crowd of 26,553 at Busch Stadium. After Gray’s departure, relievers Ryan Fernandez, Matthew Liberatore and Ryan Helsley completed a scoreless inning of work each. Helsley’s efforts earned him his MLB-leading 41st save of the season.

������Ƶ received an RBI apiece from Paul Goldschmidt, Masyn Winn, Ivan Herrera and Luken Baker in Thursday’s win. Baker’s and Goldschmidt’s contributions came in the third inning and gave the Cardinals a 2-0 lead they never relinquished.

The win earned the Cardinals (67-67) a four-game series split after and got them back to .500 ahead of a six-game road trip that begins Friday and features three games each against the American League East-leading New York Yankees and the National League Central-leading Milwaukee Brewers.

“It was important to win these last two. We played them well at their place,” said Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol, whose club won two out of three in San Diego to begin April. “They played us extremely well here. Every game was tight, but losing the first two and staying locked in enough and present enough to take the last two games is good. We’ll focus on New York when we get there. It’s just one game at a time. No different.”

The win put the Cardinals at 6½ games behind the Atlanta Braves in the chase for the final wild-card spot in the NL with 28 games left in ������Ƶ’ regular-season schedule. The Braves had not completed their Thursday matchup against the Philadelphia Phillies by the time of this writing

The Brewers’ 6-0 win over the San Francisco Giants kept the Cardinals at 10½ games behind the Brewers for the division lead.

“We all know we need to win games, especially going to New York to play another good team,” said Winn, who went 2 for 4 with a solo home run. “... Sonny went out there and did his job. (Andre) Pallante did his job yesterday. It’s very comforting knowing our pitchers are going to help us out whenever you know our bats aren’t doing the best, especially against two great pitchers in the last two days.”

Entering Thursday’s start having allowed 13 runs in his previous three starts, Gray kept the Padres scoreless and limited them to three hits and no walks through four innings of work. The lone run Gray allowed came on a leadoff home run Padres rookie center fielder Jackson Merrill belted on the first pitch he saw from Gray to begin the fifth inning.

Gray followed the leadoff home run by retiring the next six batters he faced before handing the game to the bullpen.

“He’s our guy, and he’s going to continue to be on the attack,” Marmol said of Gray’s start. “He’s just so prepared, man. You watch him day to day, and you watch how he prepares for his start, and it’s impressive. He knows what’s on the line, and he’s going to give you his best shot every time.”

As Gray kept the Padres to the one run, the Cardinals filled up the base paths and worked up San Diego starter Michael King’s pitch count. King entered the afternoon with baseball’s fourth-best ERA (2.85) as a starter with at least 180 innings pitched since the start of the 2023 season and a 2.29 ERA in six starts since the All-Star break.

King, who threw 103 pitches in 4⅓ innings, stranded runners on second and third base to end both the first and second innings.

The Cardinals offense finally peeked through in the third inning when they once again had runners on second and third base after Alec Burleson led off the inning with a walk and Nolan Arenado reached second base on a ground ball that rolled into the left-center field gap after being misplayed by Wade.

Baker drove in Burleson on a groundout to third base, and Goldschmidt drove in Arenado two batters later when he doubled to left field.

“Getting out and scoring before they do always feels good, especially when you have that guy on the bump,” Baker said.

Winn’s home run in the sixth inning extended the Cardinals’ lead back to two after Merrill’s homer. An RBI single in the eighth inning from Herrera provided some insurance for a win that provides some “momentum” before the Cardinals head to New York and Milwaukee.

“Momentum is always good,” said rookie Victor Scott II, who went 2 for 4 with a double. “... We bring that excitement into the next game and see how it goes from there.”

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Masyn Winn came into the season with a robust reservoir of confidence in his abilities. Over the course of this season, the Cardinals rookie shortstop has given the club’s most-decorated veterans plenty of reasons to become believers as well.

Winn’s two-strike single in the ninth inning on Wednesday night started the two-out rally that led to Nolan Arenado’s walk-off RBI single against the San Diego Padres. Arenado, an eight-time All-Star and likely future Hall of Famer, lauded Winn’s clutch performance.

“Masyn, I think that’s the guy we want up to bat with the game on the line right now,” said Arenado, a five-time Silver Slugger Award winner. “I mean, he’s just so good at getting his swing off and trying to drive a pitch.

“Then, when he needs to shorten up, he does it. He’s just really good. I’ve been so impressed with him.”

Winn added a pair of hits, including a home run in Thursday’s series finale as the Cardinals earned a split against the Padres in Mike Shildt’s managerial return to Busch Stadium.

Winn entered Thursday’s series finale with the Padres leading all rookies in the majors in hits (135), and he has had the most hits by a Cardinals rookies since Dylan Carlson had 144 in 2021.

His now 137 hits (including two on Thursday) also lead the Cardinals, as do his 41 multi-hit games. His seven home runs since July 26 are also a team high.

“I think one thing that just doesn’t show up in the box score is just his baseball instincts. That’s probably impressed me more than anything,” Cardinals first baseman, seven-time All-Star and former National League MVP Paul Goldschmidt said on Wednesday night. “I mean there’s lots of guys with good swings or great arms and stuff like that, but he’s got such an idea of what he wants to do when he’s hitting, and he’s made some great plays on defense. But I think it’s not just a raw, physical talent.

“Obviously, there’s a mental side to that — working before the games, after and during the games. Just to hear him talk, you can tell he’s got a really smart baseball mind. That will serve him well for a long career.”

Heading into this weekend’s series in New York, Winn has a team-high .287 batting average to go along with a .335 on-base percentage and a .424 slugging percentage, 12 home runs and 10 stolen bases in 125 games.

According to Baseball Reference, Winn’s batting average increases in higher-leverage situations.

Winn had batted .265 in low-leverage at-bats, .293 in medium leverage and .313 in high leverage entering Thursday. That would support Arenado’s claim that Winn is the player the Cardinals want at the plate with the game on the line.

In the four-game series against the Padres, Winn went 9 for 17 at the plate. His at-bat in the ninth inning on Wednesday came against Padres All-Star closer Robert Suarez, who didn’t throw a pitch slower than 100 mph in that at-bat.

“It feels good,” Winn said of the praise from his veteran teammates. “I’m confident in myself, and I know that they’re confident in me as well. Having their confidence in me just makes me feel a little bit better and give me a lot more confidence at the plate. Especially against a good guy like Suarez, you have to (almost) swing with your eyes closed. I mean, he’s pretty good. But it’s super special that they think that of me.”

Defensively, Sports Info Solutions credited Winn with the sixth-most total runs saved in the majors this season and the most by a shortstop. He’s also uncorked the seventh-fastest throw by a position player in the majors (101.2 mph).

Winn has turned 86 double plays this season, the second-most among major league shortstops. He has also made a habit of getting to ground balls in the outfield grass and still having enough arm and a quick enough release to throw out runners on plays where a hit seemed assured.

He did so in the eighth inning on Wednesday when he made a sliding stop on a ball swatted back up the middle by Mason McCoy, sprung to his feet and rifled a throw over to Goldschmidt in time to get McCoy by a full step.

“Masyn Winn has been incredible,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said. “The at-bats have been really good. The defense, I mean, he continues to do things other shortstops can’t do. The play up the middle — how quickly he bounces to his feet and then the arm behind it to finish that play — he made it look easy. It’s a pretty near-impossible play that he makes look routine.

“We have a really good player on our hands. He’s going to help us win for a long time.”

Cardinals keeping roster plans close to vest

Major League Baseball team rosters expand from 26 players to 28 players on Sept. 1, which is this coming Sunday. Though Marmol has declined to give any indication of how the Cardinals will approach their roster decisions.

The Cardinals currently have two pitchers on the injured list on whom they will have to make decisions in coming days, Steven Matz and Lance Lynn.

Matz began his current minor league rehab assignment on Aug. 1. Rehab assignments come with a 30-day limit for pitchers. Matz has been on the injured list with a lower back injury since May 1. He has been on the 60-day injured list, which means the Cardinals will have to add him back to their 40-man roster when he’s activated.

Lynn is also on the injured list, and he’s set to begin a minor league rehab assignment Sunday. He has been sidelined since July 31. He has thrown a pair of live batting practice sessions at Busch Stadium.

The Cardinals could also consider bringing up top hitting prospects from the minors for major league experience and evaluation, but they could also consider bringing young sluggers with big league experience such as Nolan Gorman or Jordan Walker back to the majors for the final weeks of the season.

“We’re not ready to share that yet or give thoughts on it for several reasons,” Marmol said.

Reports: Pham placed on waivers

Cardinals outfielder Tommy Pham could find himself on a third team in just over a month’s span by the end of the weekend, which would mark an end to his brief return to the organization that drafted him and with which he made his major league debut.

Pham, a right-handed-hitting veteran, became one of several players across Major League Baseball placed on waivers Thursday, according to multiple reports, including one by ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel.

The timing of the move is important in that it leaves open the possibility that another team could claim Pham and add him to its roster in time to make him eligible for postseason play.

In order for a player to be eligible for postseason play, he must have been on the club’s 40-man roster by 11:59 p.m. eastern time on Aug. 31. Placing Pham on waivers allows a team to claim him and add him to its roster in time to play in the postseason.

Pham has not been released by the club, and he remains on the active roster for the time being. He was in uniform and on the bench for Thursday’s game.

The Cardinals, who selected Pham in the 16th round of the 2006 MLB draft, reacquired him as part of a three-team trade with the Chicago White Sox on July 29.

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Photos: Record low crowd beats the heat for a 4-1 Cardinals victory over San Diego

As the Cardinals welcomed the playoff-contending Padres, one of baseball's hottest teams, attendance at Busch Stadium this week has continued to plummet.

The sight of a mostly empty Busch Stadium for a non-pandemic game was something never seen before by many, including Padres television and radio announcers. It became a big topic of conversation on the team's broadcasts of the games this week.

UPDATE:��Thursday's announced attendance of��26,553 set the record for the smallest crowd to watch a ������Ƶ Cardinals��game in their current stadium.

Photos: Record low crowd beats the heat for a 4-1 Cardinals victory over San Diego

It started Monday night with the first at-bat of the series, when Padres television broadcasters Don Orsillo and Mark Grant started the game talking about the dearth of fans.

"I wanted to get this right out of the way.��… This is not the Busch Stadium I am used to," Grant said. "Late August, early September, usually it's packed, the Redbirds are in the race. It is a different vibe here."

"It's shocking," Orsillo added.

"It is shocking," agreed Grant.

"Not used to this, ever," Orsillo said.

In the first two games of the series, the announced attendance numbers were the smallest (27,224 on Tuesday) and third-smallest (28,697 on Monday) non-pandemic announced crowds in the history of Busch Stadium III, which dates to 2006.

But the number of fans in seats was far below those numbers, reportedly reaching a turnstile count of fewer than 13,000 Tuesday, according to a Post-Dispatch report from baseball writer Lynn Worthy.

Those swaths of empty seats were a big point of conversation on Padres broadcasts.

"This used to be one (a hostile environment)," Orsillo said Monday. "This was a tough place to play ... not the case right now. Not sure why that is. The Cardinals are not out of it."

The Padres radio crew was equally stunned by the scene at the start of the series.

"Looking around Busch Stadium right now, remarkable at how few people are in the building," play-by-play man Jesse Agler said on the broadcast. "The Cardinals not on their greatest run ever. Throw in the weather, and I don't know that any of us who have ever been around the Padres have seen this few people in this ballpark."

"Really is jarring to see the amount of empty seats in the stadium," analyst Tony Gwynn Jr. concurred. "Those of us who've been in this ballpark for many years, you've never seen anything like it. At least we've never seen anything like it."

Later in the game, Agler noted that although the crowd had filled in a bit, it was "still a remarkably small crowd here in ������Ƶ."

The ������Ƶ region has been under a heat advisory this week, but the record-low crowds began a week ago, when weather here was well below average and what many would consider ideal August temperatures.

Again Tuesday, Agler and Gwynn commented on the sparse crowd early in the broadcast.

"As was the case yesterday, not a lot of people in the seats," Agler said early on. "Stunningly, shockingly empty for a team that is, theoretically at least, in the playoff conversation."

Later, Agler revisited the topic.

"Whether it is because of the corn sweat or the sub-.500 baseball, a stunningly empty Busch Stadium," Agler said. "This was once a baseball oasis, and it certainly can and will be again. Right now, not the case."

"Tough times, for sure," Gwynn concurred.

After Tuesday's announced record-low crowd, Orsillo and Grant on Padres television.

"Another low in stadium history. Again the heat factor has been a big deal here, perhaps... no roof," Orsillo said.

"Or bad Cardinal baseball," Grant chimed in.

"Could be that, too," Orsillo replied.

Heat or not, two games against Milwaukee last week with among the smallest crowds in stadium history each began with temperatures in the 70s, about as perfect as August weather in ������Ƶ can be.

Through Tuesday's games, the Cardinals have seen the biggest decline in baseball, with 4,061 fewer tickets sold per game.

Last year's full-season average attendance at Busch Stadium was 40,013, while this year it's 35,952.

The team's five smallest announced crowds have all come in the latter half of August. As a result, attendance at Busch, as measured using a five-game rolling average, is far lower than it's ever been outside of the pandemic.

The five-game average is 28,831 through Tuesday's game, about 4,500 fewer fans than at any time before 2024.

Before Wednesday's game, the ticket resale site StubHub displayed numerous tickets with a listed price of $0, though a pair came out to $8 total with fees.