Game 10 Recap vs Brewers
Miles Mikolas and Greg Holland would make their Busch Stadium debuts tonight.
One would go well, the other not so much.
Mikolas worked multiple quick innings tonight and showed excellent command on the mound.
Mikolas would hold the Brewers one through three hitters (Cain, Thames, & Braun) to an (0-9, 4 strikeout) night. Unfortunately, the Brewers four through eight hitters would go (7-14, w/ 4 RBI’s) off Mikolas before his night would come to an end.
I do want to note, Mikolas repertoire is a thing of beauty and when he has all pitches working and in command, he’s *very* tough on the opposition.
The Cardinals bats came out of the gates swinging tonight. They would get leadoff hits from Fowler & Ozuna to start the 1st and 2nd inning, only to see them thrown out trying to take an extra base.
Fowler tried stretching a single to LCF into a double and Lorenzo Cain had different plans. Ozuna would smack a double into the LF corner to start the 2nd inning and test the arm of LF, Ryan Braun. Two bad base running blunders to start a game is never a good momentum boost.
The Cardinals would get to Brewers SP, Chacín, in the 3rd inning.
An inning in which Chacín would walk three (Wong, Pham, & Carpenter) batters and give the lead back to the Cardinals 3-2. Wong started it off with a walk and was sacrificed over to second on a Mikolas bunt. Fowler would drive Wong in on a 3-0 fastball up in the zone to his liking, taking it to RF.
Pham and Carpenter would both walk in back-to-back at bats to load the bases for Ozuna.
Ozuna drilled a 2-RBI single up the middle scoring Fowler and Pham.
From that point, the bats were fairly silent, totaling one hit the next 5 innings.
Paul DeJong got that one hit, a double to LF, breaking out of his little slump since the team returned home.
The Brewers bullpen would dominate the rest of the way. The pen would account for 9 of the 10 Cardinals strikeouts on the night, working 5.1 innings.
The Cardinals would strikeout 6 times in a row in the 7th and 8th inning going against Hader and Barnes.
Then the 9th inning brought us slim hope, as the Cardinals racked up three hits with nobody out against reliever, Matt Albers.
Molina started the late-inning rally with a single to RF. DeJong would follow that with an infield single off Albers glove. Kolten Wong would lay down an absolutely perfect bunt in no-man’s land down the third base line to load the bases.
Pinch-hitter, Greg Garcia, was next as he hit a shallow fly ball to CF, not deep enough to advance runners.
Dexter Fowler hit a deep ball to LCF for a sac fly that would simultaneously tie the game at 4. Tommy Pham had the opportunity to end the game, only to ground out to second base to send the game to extras.
Extras:
This is where things get really painful. Newest Cardinal, Greg Holland, would get his first taste of the 2018 season. The closer looked like a guy who didn’t pitch at all in spring training and was rushed to the major league roster, which is true.
Holland was throwing pitch after pitch in the dirt and just couldn’t find his command.
Holland would walk Shaw and Santana to start the 10th and Sogard would move both over on a sacrifice bunt. Mike Matheny elected to intentionally walk Manny Piña to load the bases for Arcia. Need I remind you, Holland just walked two batters. Loading the bases for him with only one out, isn’t ideal. But don’t tell Mike that.
You all know what happens next, right?
Yeah, Holland walked Arcia to bring home the leading run, which would ultimately be the game-winning run.
This forced Matheny to use a rested Bud Norris, who by the way, got a save the other day. Norris would strikeout Phillips and get Pérez to fly out, stranding the bases loaded.
It’s only April, let’s not jump off the bridge yet.
Thanks for reading and cheers!!
Stew
