Cards can’t defeat Red Sox or ump in 5-4 extra-inning loss

Well shit. This is probably among the worst losses of the year. It was an odd game. It turned into a terrible game. It happened rather suddenly. It’s late so I won’t go into too much detail about the game. The game began as if it would be a blowout except the Cards forgot the part where they are supposed to keep scoring runs.

Dexter Fowler began the game with a leadoff home run. Always a good way to begin a game. Rick Porcello did not pitch a very good game. I won’t go as far as to say he was lucky to have only given up four runs, but let’s just say that it’s not very hard to imagine him giving up a lot more.

In the 2nd the Cards added on. Yadier Molina hit the first pitch for a double and Aledmys Diaz bunted his way on thanks to some hesitation on Mitch Moreland’s part (I have no idea what Moreland was trying to do on the play but somehow his first instinct was throw out Yadi at 3rd and that didn’t happen). With 1st and 3rd, Magneuris Sierra hit his trademark single, followed by a double by Kolten Wong. The Cardinals added another from a groundout RBI from Tommy Pham, but stranded the bases loaded leaving the score at 4-0. That was all the runs they’d score for the day.

In the 4th, the Cardinals got ridiculously, annoyingly shitty luck that would have changed the game. With 1st and 2nd and nobody out, Pham hit a line drive to Boagerts, who dropped the line drive and then threw out the guys at 2nd and 3rd because everyone thought he caught it. We’re talking crushed line drive too.

Meanwhile, Mike Leake pitched great. Red Sox hitters looked legitimately baffled at what he was throwing. They took bad swings constantly and it looked like another 2017 Leake start. Leake ended up striking out 5 and walking none with seven hits allowed.

After six though he had 95 pitches and his spot in the order came up so he was forced to leave the game. Except no. With a man on first and one out, Leake batted for himself. He got into a double play. Then he gave up a single (on an almost great play by Aledmys Diaz, who threw it wild unfortunately, but it was rightfully called a single) and a home run to the first two batters. So as you can see by the final score, would have been nice to not have pitched Leake here and maybe not given up those two runs.

Trevor Rosenthal came in for the 8th and got absolutely screwed over. The umpire for tonight’s game, Jeff Kellog, was terrible. He was bad for both teams. Unfortunately it cost the Cards more it seems. He struck out Mookie Betts easily. He got to 0-2 on Pedroia. On 2-2, he threw another strike....that was called a ball. He ended up walking him. Xander Bogaerts then hit a line drive to right center. Fowler took a while to get there and threw it weakly to the cutoff man. So he probably shouldn’t have been playing center. I’m not sure Bogaerts gets a triple on that if someone has a healthy shoulder. A sacrifice fly and the Red Sox had tied it.

As an example of how terrible the ump was, this is how the Cardinals ended the 8th inning.

Never at any point a strike. Also this exact same pitch in the exact same location produced two different calls somehow.

He was incredibly inconsistent. In the 13th, the Red Sox hit two pop flies that dropped for a hit somehow and they won. Cards play weekend series against Giants. Michael Wacha against Matt Moore. Fuck the Red Sox. Good night.