Pauly Geez leads Cards to 9-5 victory with three dingers
Whoa.
What. A. Freakin’. Game.
Like I don’t even know where to begin, did you all see that? Am I dreaming? Okay I’ll stop.
There really isn’t much to recap here, I know we were all excited for Jack Flaherty, but Goldy stole the damn show.
And he got it started from the jump.
Freddy Peralta would oppose the Cards this evening, walking the leadoff guy himself, Matt Carpenter before facing Goldy. Goldy would work a beautiful ten-pitch at bat (seeing 9 fastballs), sending a Peralta fastball to LF for his first HR in a Cards uniform to make it 2-0.
Yadi is would later make it a 3-0 Cards lead after Pauly Deez got HBP and Swags Ozuna grounded into a 1-4 fielder’s choice.
Peralta escaped further damage after walking Dex, getting KoWo and Harry to strikeout to end the frame.
Flaherty was zooming thru 2.2 innings today before surrendering any damage. Jack would get his first strikeout to end the 2nd inning, getting Grandal to swing and miss at a filthy slider in under the hands after a high heater.
After setting the first two down in the bottom of the 3rd, Flaherty would give up an infield single to the leadoff man, LoCain. Yelich then worked a rather easy walk, bringing in the man we all despise, Ryan Braun. Braun would unload on Flaherty, tying the game at 3-3, sending a 3-run HR to LF.
Flaherty escaped the inning with his 3rd k, getting Shaw on a slide piece.
The Cards got one back in the 4th, to regain the lead 4-3.
Flaherty opened the inning with a two strike single into RF to bring in Carp daddy.
Carp singled to RF too, forcing Counsell to go to his pen with Matt Albers or Jonathan Broxton, I really don’t know.
Albers would face Goldy upon entering, getting him to line out sharply to CF, bringing in Pauly Deez who would drop a bloop RBI single in front of Yelich in RF to make it 4-3 Cardinals.
Aguilar and Moustakas would begin the bottom half of the 4th with base hits, a single and double to put runners in scoring position for Grandal, who drove in Aguilar with a sac-fly to Ozuna. Flaherty escaped further trouble, getting Arcia to lineout to Carp and Thames (pinch-hitting) to strikeout on a slider (Thames not happy).
Flaherty would get ran back out for the 5th inning, a questionable decision, but we gonna trust that sexy dude Shildt.
Cain greeted Flaherty with a leadoff single before getting thrown out by the goat, Yadi, caught stealing second.
Yelich then proceeded to single to LF, ending the evening for Jack. Johnny G-Spot would get the job of relieving Flaherty, working 1.2 scoreless innings, his second appearance in as many days.
The G-Spot would strikeout the first two he faced to escape the 5th, getting Braun on a 2-seamer and Shaw on a slide piece.
Taylor Williams would pitch the 6th for the Crew, and he prolly wishes he wouldn’t, as he was greeted with a Goldy bomb to LF (his 2nd of the game and he wasn’t done) to make it 5-4 Cards.
Goldy even kept the hot game going in the field, as he was a huge part of an inning ending double play the next half inning off a Grandal ground ball to first base. Goldy would dive to his right stopping a base hit to RF, throwing over to DeJong covering second, who then returned the throw to Goldy, who would dive off the bag, holding his right foot on the bag for the insane double play.
And the guy just kept freaking rolling. KoWo singled to leadoff the top of the 7th off Barnes. Carp would come to the dish after two quick outs, singling to RF, beating the shift and tallying hit #1000 in his career.
Then guess what?
Yup.
You got it.
Goldy uncorked his third bomb of the game to LF. I am not kidding. I think cried. This made it 8-4 Cards.
Yelich would HR off Andrew Miller to leadoff the bottom of the 8th, inside outing a fastball the opposite way, but Miller would bounce back. Aguilar would ground into an inning ending double play, 6-4-3 to pass things onto the 9th in Jordan Hicks.
Hicks did typical Hicks things, expect to see this version of him all season long. Hicks struck out Moustakas and Grandal to begin the inning and he did so on absolutely filthy sliders, like they were not fair folks.
Hicks then finished the game getting Arcia to fly out to Bader for the 9-5 Cards win.
Top 3 plays
3.) Pauly Geez/Pauly Deez 3-6-3 inning ending double play on Grandal in the bottom of the 6th.
2.) Hicks strikeouts vs Moustakas and Grandal in the 9th
1.) Goldy 3 bombs, because of course
Dakota Hudson will make his first major league start tomorrow night, as he will face off against Brandon Woodruff. First pitch from Miller Park is at 6:10pm c/t.
Cheers, Stew