About Last Night: Dispatches from NLDS Game 1
LOS ANGELES — It didn’t take long and it happened sooner than planned, but in the fourth inning of Game 1 of the National League Division Series the Los Angeles Dodgers got to flex their biggest strength: Their bullpen.
The Dodgers relievers, who combined for the best ERA in the National League during the regular season, pitched 5 1/3 innings in LA’s 5-3 victory at Dodger Stadium on Wednesday. After the Cardinals raked starter Randy Wolf for six hits, five walks and two bases-loaded situations, the Dodger ‘pen limited the Cardinals to five hits, no walks and one run when it was in charge. Five relievers combined to foil the Cardinals, striking out five. The lone run the Cardinals got off the bullpen came in the ninth on a double off closer Jonathan Broxton by Mark DeRosa.
“Their bullpen came in and inning, inning, inning, found a way to get it done,” DeRosa said. “We didn’t get the big hit when we needed to. Especially in the first inning we could have really put tem on the defensive by scoring two or three.”
The Dodgers have the deepest and arguably best bullpen of any team in the postseason, and the Cardinals got an eyeful Wednesday of the parade of relievers Joe Torre leans on to preserve a lead:
Middle Reliever Jeff Weaver — Escapes bases loaded in fourth inning, gets win, 1 1/3 scoreless innings. One hit allowed. One strikeout.
Fireman Ronald Belisario — A filthy righthander with late-inning stuff, Belisario shells a team with his power sinker. Pitched the first perfect inning of the game. Go figure.
Setup Hong-Chih Kuo — The lefty is among the most difficult relievers in the league to decipher. He pitched a scoreless inning, allowing two hits. He can bedevil hitters with a 94-mph fastball and then follow with 85-mph slider and an 85-mph changeup.
Closer 1A George Sherrill — The lefty was the closer in Baltimore before being traded to the Dodgers this past season. He’s a cagey setup reliever now, and he pitched a scored 2/3 innings, though he hit a batter. Has pitched a scoreless appearance in 29 of 31 appearances with LA.
Closer Broxton — He throws nocha cheese. That’s no typo. No-cha … as in no-chance. Broxton can cock, load and fire a 100-mph fastball, and this season he averaged a career 97.7 mph. He buzzed Rick Ankiel with a freeze-frame fastball for a called strikeout to end the game.
Consider this blog a spinoff of the daily 10@10. The goal is to offer a snapshot of the game past, while using the 10@10 to mostly focus on the game head. So, about last night:
1. Much of the coverage coming out of the Cardinals’ loss will focus on Chris Carpenter’s inability to execute on the mound. It was, put simply, one of his most difficult starts as a Cardinal and at one of the worst times. He seemed to be groping for both the command of his fastball as well as the consistency of his delivery. But his lack of execution — his description — wasn’t limited to the mound. At the plate, he whiffed, too. In the second inning, Carpenter had a chance to bunt DeRosa over to second for the second out of the inning. He failed on three attempts, and he struck out when he bunted the pitch foul. The next batter, leadoff hitter Skip Schumaker, then bounced a single to right field that likely would have scored DeRosa had he been moved over by Carpenter. That run would have tied the game, 2-2.
“Execution is little parts of the ballgame that you need to do,” Carpenter said. “I wasn’t able to do it. You saw what happened the second time I did it. We scored a run. You need to do those little things to help your ballclub and I wasn’t able to do it.”
2. Leadoff hitter Schumaker reached base four times in Game 3. Once he walked, twice he got a single and once he was hit by a pitch. But get this: All four times were against a lefthanded pitcher, from starter Randy Wolf to Sherrill.
3. The Dodgers couldn’t have been more obvious with their plans on how to handle Mr. MVP, Cardinals first baseman Albert Pujols. Torre repeated Wednesday what he said during the All-Star week in St. Louis: Pujols “scares the hell out of ” him. He walked him with two men on and no out in the first inning. It worked to minimize the damage. Torre intentionally walked Pujols in the fifth inning even though Pujols represented the go-ahead run. Said DeRosa:
“You know that’s coming. that’s not a shock. you know coming in,” La Russa said. “They’re not going to let him beat them. You can rest your head on a pillow at night if someone else beats you, but if someone else beats you, you fel terrible about it. He’ll probably go down as the best hitter of all time.”
Coming in a few hours:10@10 for your pre-game perusal.
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Derrick Goold said he was going to Mizzou for capital-J journalism, but after growing up in the Time Zone Baseball Forgot he was really drawn to MU sitting between two major-league cities. Goold joined the Post-Dispatch in 2001 after working for The Times-Picayune and Rocky Mountain News, covering sports from LSU to NHL and every level of baseball in between. 
One of the most difficult/frustrating Cards games I’ve ever watched in my life (Cards Fanatic since ‘82)…Still waiting on Holliday to take his bat off is shoulder in the 1st Inning…Still waiting on any Redbird to get a clutch hit…
That Dodger bullpen is scarey good. The Cards may have more solid starting pitching, although you couldn’t tell that last night, but who cares? It’s almost like Torre just uses his starters to set the table for his pen. The Cardinal bullpen last night was no where near the caliber of the Dodgers. That’s a big concern, as far as I’m concerned, for the rest of the series
4 mistakes I noticed during the game
1. Carp failing to bunt the runner over and with the hit by Schumaker, it would easily score another run
2. Glaus pinch hitting for Rasmus and looked terrible in the at-bat
3. D Reyes coming in and failing to get an out…again
4. Ending the game with Ankiel pinch-hitting and strike out looking…i mean cmon rick you gotta know he is throwing the heat
Bat Pujols 4th ,…thats all I’m gonna say.
Even if that fastball to Ankiel had been 89/90 mph he would have still stood there. Same thing he’s being doing all year!!!
Rich
Pujols 4th? That may not be a bad idea. The men were on base, but as with the past month, the wrong person came up at the wrong time to try to drive them in. Maybe a major lineup philosophy needs to occur. Holiday in front of Pujols might not be a bad idea at this time. Molina looks tired at and behind the plate. Anywhere other than 8th place (or 9th)hitting may be a mistake. Rasmus was hitting Wolf (lefty) pretty well, so pinch hitting for him with Glaus at that moment didn’t seem such a good idea to me. I’d bat Rasmus in the 6 hole; at least he has speed and won’t get doubled up as easily.
To put it in the nicest way I can, they looked awful. It seems there was no sense of urgency the entire game. When you have bases loaded with no outs, 1st inning, you have to bring in some runs especially in a NLDS. No one can tell me the way they played the past three weeks wasn’t a carry over to last nights game. Congratulations Cards, you have given the Dodgers confidence they can beat you. If we don’t win today, I think LaRussa needs to rethink his future as Cards manager. Oh, by the way. Why in the world would you bat Molina sixth ahead of DeRosa? Molina hits into double plays all the time and is a slow runner. You need someone who can bat behind Ludwick with a chance of hitting a HR. Molina only had six HR’s this year. I don’t understand the logic to what LaRussa is trying to do here. Better get it fixed soon cause going down two will send the birds home for the winter.
Too many pitchers and not enough hitters…why 12 pitchers in a short series? Shouldn’t complain too much since our pitching got us here. Fact is, with the exception of the huge month of August, we couldn’t hit our way out of a paper bag most of the year and now it is haunting us in the playoffs. I could go on and on about all the failed chances and questionable moves, but bottom line is the Dodgers came through when they had to and we didn’t…and that holds true for the whole team. No one came through when it would have been big. Hopefully Wainwright can give us a split in LA and we go from there. By the way…who starts if we are down 1 game to 2 on Sunday? Carpenter or Wainwright????
One last comment. I totally agree with Todd and Gjjjjt about Molina and where he bats. Eighth Tony, eighth and no phony comments or excuses. Yadi is a fantastic catcher but a Punch and Judy hitter and always will be. Doesn’t get extra base hits and hits into way too many double plays (27 this year, not counting last night, which is 2nd in the Bigs). Sorry Yadi but we’ll take Benji’s bat every game over your’s.
Hitters looked inept with men on base, bottom line. Cards took advantage of poor pitchers much of the year, not so with good ones. Another example here. Stockton/Brenley comments to the contrary, home ump was extremely inconcsistent on ball/strike calls. Corners and low pitches varied all night. Carp hurt by it, but he hasn’t thrown that many balls down the middle all year. Key, though, were the two called strikes on Holliday in the 1st. He was dead on with complaining, but after the 1st gets called, you have to swing with 2 strikes on the 2nd. Still want to see the replay on Ludwick’s drive down the left field line. Technical problems and TBS avoidance of controversy apparently don’t allow it.