The Cardinals bullpen was unable to maintain Erich Fedde’s quality start, allowing two late runs as the Pittsburgh Pirates denied St Louis a sweep with a 3-2 loss Thursday night at Busch Stadium.

Bryan De La Cruz opened the scoring for Pittsburgh with a sacrifice fly in the fourth. Brendan Donovan accounted for both Cardinals RBIs, singling in Paul Goldschmidt in the fourth and hitting a double in the sixth to give the Cardinals the lead. Andrew Kittredge was tagged with his seventh blown save of the year when he gave up a home run to Yasmani Grandal, while JoJo Romero took the loss after allowing an RBI single to Nick Gonzales in the eighth. Fedde had gone six innings in the no decision, allowing one run on four hits and one walk while striking out three.

The Cardinals sit at 77-76, eight games behind the Mets in the wild card race with nine games remaining. A Mets win against Philadelphia and Cardinals loss Friday would eliminate the Redbirds from the playoff picture The Cardinals prepare to host Cleveland for the final three-game home series of the season. First pitch is at 7:15.

The Kansas City Royals were off Thursday as they prepare for their final home stand of the regular season against San Francisco. The Royals (82-71) are now three games behind Baltimore and two games ahead of Detroit and Minnesota in the wild card standings, while 6.5 games behind Cleveland in the AL Central. First pitch for tonight’s game against the Giants is 7:10 p.m., with Michael Wacha projected to start for the Royals.