A record-setting game. Longest nine inning game in NLDS history. With runners in scoring position: 3-for-13. 2-for-15. 14 LOB. 16 LOB.

That’s the Cards and Dodgers respectively. In honor of them, I will now tl;dr.

The big story’s going to be Carp, and I’m inclined to give him a pass. I would rather have the gift keep on giving than jump on him for one bad start. Except for two things: apparently he said he felt fine, which reminds me of someone….. and now his Game 4 availability is in question, which will be my first live postseason pissed-upon.

(Yadi and Boog I’ll pass too. I figured Boog would either flame out or have a great night, so two hits and no big defensive miscues — that I saw — was good enough for me. Esp. given how quickly they went to the dreaded forested bullpen. The Dodgers stuck to their game plan of “Don’t hit it to the mustachioed guy”, so they were likely trying to neutralize him too.
Yadi’s ouchie had taken him out of active duty — just when I thought he got his swing back! — so I figured he’d be rusty. In other words, they had to really screw up to disappoint me, and I thought they acquitted themselves well. Despite that Lugo moment, jebus, Yadier!)

I’ll give Carp a pass because he only allowed four runs. The Cardinals had that many in reach a few minutes into the game.

So. The LOBsters. Torre played a one-note gamble: take Albert out of the equation and make Holliday and Ludwick work for it.

Luddy came out of it with 2 singles, 2 ground outs, and a walk. Given that he’s been ice-cold lately, he was still involved in 2 of the 3 Cardinal runs. He got a single off Broxton. That’ll do, Luddy. That’ll do.

So that leaves Holliday. And Holliday choked. I mean, I’m sorry Lego Man, no pie for you. Throws weaker than Manny’s, not tagging up, not coming through in key situations. Torre removed one jenga tile, and Matt Holliday blinked. No, sorry, he didn’t blink — he threw a couple of Glausian fits. Yes, the ump effin’ deserved it. Effin’ ump. But Holliday signed on for a mercenary job and he. Did. Not. Do. It.

Besides, Ludwick made up for his lack of thunderwick with his stunning defense, holy cow those throws were awesome (Rick who?) I want Luddy to stay as long as he’s healthy, I mean, plant him in the ground or something, because that’s veteran presence you can’t buy and that’s defense that’s smart and good.

Skip? Hit the lefties. Albert turned out his usual ridiculous even-flat-on-my-back defense. DeRosa, despite a cubs-like brainfart, went 4-5 despite being mauled on the hand. Colby drew a walk and teleported to 2nd, smoooooth!

So oddly enough… all the stuff I was worried about didn’t come to pass. The new kids showed no nerves. All the little things that went wrong didn’t conspire to push it over the edge … except when the veterans messed up.

Yeah, I’ll go there. Carp made it possible for the Dodgers to win. But that game was lost because Holliday choked. And who played below their level? All the players with playoff experience.

Wainwright has emerged this season as the 1a to Carpenter’s 1 (when healthy). Tonight he gets to play the roll of stopper in the NLDS. The Cards still have a shot taking 1 out of the first 2 games in LA. That said, if the Cards loose tonight, the series is done because I don’t think the team can take 3 straight from the Dodgers.

Last night was a story of poor timely hitting and weak pitching. The Cards must reverse that story tonight if they are to have a shot when the series goes back to St. Louis.

not in panic mode yet, will be if the Cards offense will be anemic again with runners on, and Torre is gutless not to pitch to Pujols, i do believe Holliday will shake this and punish the ball today when Pujols gets the walk. But at the same time there is a reason why Torre has 4 rings

…but I’d like to point out Skip’s 2 fer 3 performance last night, with a walk, an RBI, and a run scored. He did pretty well, and the universe did not explode, as some would have it. That is all.

:=8/

I hate to rag on Holliday, but not taking the bat off your shoulder with the bases loaded and no outs is stunningly inexcusable; I also do not agree with his half-way stance when he was on second base on that deep fly ball to right field.
Alas, my pre-game prediction (that Glaus would strike out looking, and bitching about it, and that AnKiel would K with a wild swing) “sorta” came true.
At least Glaus had healthy cuts; but Ricky, after two fairly good swings at strikes on the outside corner, whiffs by watching one right over the heart of the plate.
DeRo’s airball; Carp unable to lay down a bunt the first time; Yadi muffing their sac bunt attempt: I didn’t find much to be happy about.

getting some hits and a run off Broxton was good to see, even if it took some defensive indifference/incompetence. I’m not looking forward to that bullpen any time soon. Let’s hope we can squeak a few runs out of Kershaw and Adam can hold it down.

the ball ludwick hit down the line with the bases loaded was fair and was a missed call by the umpire

i haven’t seen any replays though, so i can’t confirm it (not that it really matters)

I said something like “he’s gonna have to be MVP of the World Series for this trade to be worth it”. Not looking good so far.

mean it wasn’t the right decision. Couldn’t you analogize it to a poker player who has calculated the odds and determined the statistically prudent decision would be to lay down his hand. In most cases he will and it will be the right decision, but every so often he’ll recognize something in his opponent that alerts his instincts and prompts and him to call. In other words, the human element must be accounted because the game is not played in a vacuum where numbers always unequivocally predominate. This team is playing weak right now, everyone can see it and Torre no doubt recognizes it. (Now of course this is a little off-base because I’m sure Torre hasn’t “calculated the odds,” but I think the analogy still somewhat stands)

Colby PAs against the lefty, Wolf, and Weaver, I thought, were great PAs. In his first PA, he saw 7 pitches and struck a well-hit liner right to Casey Blake. In his second PA, he saw six pitches and walked. Both of those were against Wolf. In his third PA, he scalded a double down the line off of Weaver. It was enough to make me bemoan TLR’s PHing for Colby (even though Kuo is a particularly nasty lefty) with Glaus, who has seemed rusty (and understandably so) since returning. A healthy Glaus does not miss that belt high fastball over the plate which Kuo threw on the fifth pitch of the PA, and the rusty Glaus just missed it. This was but one of countless excruciating moments, but with two on, in the later innings, it sticks out to me.

is a little embarrassing; he reminded me or the surly, monosyllabic Bill Belichick.

Pretty awesome stuff. Part one here. I had never heard of him before, but he sounds like an interesting character in early baseball analysis. Plus: Part two features this picture:

A lot of ink/pixels have been made of the Cardinals being able to “flip the switch” back to the on position. Last night I saw the Cardinal team that limped into the post-season.: Mistake-laden (error, hit batsman, average fielding, poor PA’s at very important parts of the game) baseball. Honestly, I wasn’t all that impressed with LA. Their starter was out early, Torre burned through their bullpen, their LOBsters were pretty much a mirror image of our home team’s. It was a fairly maddening game to watch all around. Hopefully our Cy Young-In-Waiting throws nasty strikes tonight and the Cardinals actually hit the ball out of the infield with RISP.

I have to say… it’s nice to have when the free internet feeds of dubious legality all dry up at the same time.
However, it’s a pain in the ass to use. Browsing the help and faq forums, it seems like every single person who has used it absolutely hates it. It’s almost admirable the way they’ve managed to create something that seems like such a good idea, but that so instantly and universally arouses peoples’ utter hate.
You basically have to “produce” your own baseball broadcast by choosing between different camera views. And the cameras really really like to show you over and over again which awesome celebrities are watching at Dodgers Stadium. Yay!
You will never get the videos in sync with each other. Don’t even try. Also, the audio matches the video you have selected, so if you so much as click on a different video box, the audio jumps to match that video. If you click on a blank box that you haven’t set up yet, you lose the audio until you can load a camera view to that video box.
The stupid pop up thingies keep coming. And coming. You can’t make them stop, you can only close them when they appear. Sometimes they cover up half the picture, depending on how many cameras you’re using.
I have yet to get the four-way view to actually work without freezing up, and I have a decent computer with a decent internet connection. The best I could get was three views and a blank screen in the other quadrant.
I can’t wait to watch a game on an actual TV with cable (i.e. not at my apartment).

What if’s aside, there’s plenty of blame to go around: The Redbirds just flat out shit the bed, in every way imaginable, from Carp on down, against a team that wasn’t at all overpowering or even solid.

Frustrating and painful.

That said, it’s time to rally and get Waino on track, beat the Damn Didgers today, and get back in this series.

He was at the plate 155 times this year with a man on 1st….maybe I’m wrong in this assumption but I’d say 2/3rds of those have been with 1 or 0 outs, so that’s 103 ABs in a GIDP situation. 27 DPs is 26%. That’s just absurd. His approach has to change in these situations.