Paul DeJong hit two of the Cardinals' five homers, including a grand slam, Tommy Edman and Paul Goldschmidt went deep back-to-back and St. Louis offered Jack Flaherty his usual strong run support in a 12-5 victory Monday night over Ross and the Nationals.

Five days after Ross befuddled the Cardinals with a steady set of sinkers and sliders in Washington's 6-0 win, St. Louis figured it needed to try something different.

DeJong got the offense going by clanging a solo shot off the left-field foul pole in the second inning on a 95 mph sinker for the first run allowed by Ross (1-1) in three games this season after he sat out 2020 because of COVID-19 concerns.

DeJong ended Ross' evening with another drive to left, this one off a high fastball after Dylan Carlson was walked intentionally to load the bases, making it 10-2 in the fifth.

Edman, who hit a 3-0 pitch, and Goldschmidt homered in the third off Ross, whose season ERA went from 0.00 to 5.87 after he gave up 10 runs in 4 1/3 innings. Justin Williams added a shot off Ross' replacement, Kyle Finnegan.

Matt Carpenter, who came in batting .069 and was dropped to seventh in the order, provided an RBI single in the fourth as the Cardinals built a 6-0 lead with the help of Flaherty's sacrifice bunt.

Flaherty (3-0) is used to that sort of cushion. The Cardinals are averaging 11 runs in his four starts this season - and 3.25 runs in the 12 games started by other pitchers.

He is now 14-0 when St. Louis scores at least five runs in one of his starts.

Nationals lefty Patrick Corbin (0-2, 21.32 ERA) and Cardinals righty Adam Wainwright (0-2, 7.11) have been struggling heading into their pitching matchup Tuesday night.