Well......
Well.........
Well...........
It’s late (west coast baseball is amazing) and I have to be up in roughly 4-5 hours. So we are gonna breeze through this one, who wants to read about a loss anyway?
The Mariners would throw an opener, Matt Carasiti and follow him up with soft tossing lefty, Wade LeBlanc. This normally sounds like a recipe for disaster for any Cardinals team, even if Flaherty didn’t have his best stuff.
Flaherty was struggling with deep counts and running his pitch count up early, throwing 62 pitches the first two innings, handing back an early one run advantage, 2-1.
The Cardinals found themselves on the board first courtesy of a Cafecíto tater, sending his 6th HR of the year over the wall in left center field.
Flaherty would manage to pitch into the 5th, but he wouldn’t make it out of the inning before surrendering up two more runs. Vogelbach (the lone Mariners rep in the ASG) worked a leadoff walk to bring up Omar Narváez, who sent a deep two-run shot to RF to make it 4-1 Mariners.
The Cards clawed their way back into the game, scoring 3 runs over the course of the 6th and 7th to even things up at 4-4. Café would cut the lead in half in the 6th, sending his second HR of the game over the wall in RCF (400 feet, 103 exit velo).
In the 7th inning with two outs, facing Anthony Bass, Yairo Muñoz sent a deep two-run blast, his 1st of the year, to LF to make it a 4-4 game. KoWo scored on the play after slapping a two out double into LF.
Then Austin Adams happened. The Mariners reliever would strikeout the only four batters he’d face, throwing 90mph sliders that looked like frisbees.
Tim Beckham would leadoff the bottom of the 8th vs Gallegos, pinch-hitting for Mac Williamson. And did the move ever pay off, as Beckham sent an absolute no doubter to LF to break the tie and make it 5-4 Mariners.
Roenis Elías would come in for his 11th save, shuttling the possible Cards comeback down in the 9th.
Dex would keep the game alive with a one out double into LF, but Edman and KoWo couldn’t cash in. Edman would strikeout swinging and KoWo would groundout to J.P. Crawford to end the game.
Uncle Charlie (5-7, 4.35) looks to get the Cardinals back to the (.500) mark tonight, facing off against former Redbird, Mike Leake (7-7, 4.63). First pitch 9:10pm c/t.
Cheers, Stew.