Just when you think you have all of the answers, the 2014 MLB postseason changes the questions.
In a battle between two of the game's best aces, offense was the story as the St. Louis Cardinals jumped out to a 1-0 lead over the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League Division Series following a 10-9 win in Dodger Stadium on Friday night.
Before the game, Cardinals third baseman Matt Carpenter mentioned that he felt the team had a lot to prove despite winning the National League Central.
"We never really, as a group, found our stride," he said, per Tyler Kepner of The New York Times. "We found a way to win games and win our division, but I think this offense hasn’t played up to its potential. We all believe our best baseball is still to come."
His words proved prophetic.
On the strength of an eight-run seventh inning, the Cardinals overcame a five-run deficit and a poor outing from Adam Wainwright to walk away with one of the more improbable victories of the playoffs so far.
St. Louis entered the top of the seventh down 6-2. Clayton Kershaw was rolling, having given up only two hits in the game—both of which were solo home runs. Historically, when the Dodgers score a lot of runs, Kershaw doesn't give up the lead, per MLB.com's Paul Casella:
In keeping with the general unpredictability of this postseason already, everything completely unraveled for the likely NL Cy Young Award winner.
After singles from Matt Holliday, Jhonny Peralta and Yadier Molina, the Cardinals loaded the bases with nobody out. Kershaw faced a bases loaded situation only three times during the regular season, per ESPN Stats and Info:
Matt Adams wasted little time, singling to center and scoring Holliday. Kershaw allowed a little breathing room for himself after striking out Pete Kozma. His reprieve was short-lived, however, as John Jay delivered another run-scoring single to cut Los Angeles' lead to 6-4.
Carpenter, who homered in the top of the sixth inning, stepped to the plate. He quickly got down 0-2 to Kershaw but fouled off three pitches and watched another two land outside of the zone for balls. On the eighth pitch of the at-bat, Carpenter drove the ball to right center for a double, scoring all three baserunners and giving the Cardinals a 7-6 lead.
MLB.com's Jenifer Langosch noted that that wasn't the first time Carpenter had gotten to Kershaw in the playoffs:
Kershaw's night was through after that, and his final line is something to behold. He went 6.2 innings, giving up eight earned runs on eight hits, walking and striking out 10. Nobody in the playoffs has done that before:
The Cardinals offense wasn't done, either. After Pedro Baez walked Randal Grichuk, Holliday capped off the comeback with a three-run blast over the wall in left field, making it a 10-6 game. Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times captured the feeling inside Dodger Stadium after L.A. watched a five-run lead evaporate in the blink of an eye:
Adrian Gonzalez's two-run home run in the bottom of the eighth breathed some life into the home crowd. The Dodgers added another run in the bottom of the ninth and had a runner on third with two outs and Yasiel Puig at the plate. Trevor Rosenthal struck out the All-Star outfielder to end the game.
Kershaw's cataclysmic breakdown will overshadow the fact that his opposite number pitched even worse on the night.
Wainwright never looked himself and was eventually yanked after giving up six earned runs on 11 hits over 4.1 innings. Langosch and Kepner pointed out how much of an outlier his off-kilter performance was:
Oddly enough, the Cardinals had previously won both times Wainwright allowed six runs in the postseason, per Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:
The Dodgers will rue a missed opportunity, while St. Louis will be ecstatic that it stole Game 1 and beat Los Angeles' best pitcher in the process.
The Cardinals couldn't have envisioned a better start to the night. After Carpenter struck out to begin the top of the first, Grichuk stepped to the plate. In 116 plate appearances during the regular season, he hit three home runs.
So naturally he took the best pitcher on the planet yard on an 0-2 pitch. Grichuk gave St. Louis an early 1-0 lead after his homer in the top of the first.
Only twice in the last two years has Kershaw surrendered a home run up 0-2 in the count, per ESPN Stats and Info:
It was also the second time in all of 2014 that he allowed a home run in the first inning:
Kershaw quickly regained his composure, getting Holliday to line out and retiring Peralta to end the the top half of the first.
After knocking on the door in the first and second innings, the Dodgers broke through in the bottom of the third.
Wainwright plunked Puig to begin the frame. That, in turn, set off a few tempers in both dugouts. Molina and Adrian Gonzalez had some words, and the benches cleared. All of the posturing came to nothing. Tensions eased after Wainwright and Puig talked the situation over, per Mark Saxon of ESPNLosAngeles.com:
Puig moved to second on a fielder's choice, and Matt Kemp flied out for the second out third. For the third consecutive inning, it looked like the Dodgers would strand a runner in scoring position, but Hanley Ramirez delivered a single to right that scored Puig and tied the game.
Ramirez then stole second without a throw, which was a bit surprising given Molina was behind the plate. ESPN's Buster Olney alluded to the idea that Molina's defensive effectiveness has been somewhat limited since having thumb surgery earlier in the year:
That stolen base proved pivotal as Carl Crawford hit a ground-rule double down the right-field line, putting the Dodgers on top 2-1. Crawford advanced to third on a wild pitch but was left there after Juan Uribe flied out to end the inning.
Los Angeles was far from through offensively. After leading off the bottom of the fourth with a single, A.J. Ellis scored on a single from Puig, who himself later came around to score and give the Dodgers a 4-1 lead on a single by Matt Kemp.
Wainwright's struggles continued into the fifth after he surrendered a two-run homer to Ellis, which put the Cardinals in a five-run hole, 6-1. To that point in the game, the 33-year-old catcher was 3-for-3, which Sports Illustrated's Jay Jaffe read as the strongest indicator as possible that Wainwright didn't have it on Friday:
While all of this happened, Kershaw was rolling, retiring St. Louis batters in order in the second, third, fourth and fifth innings. Six of the 12 Cardinals hitters who stepped to the plate during that span went down on strikes.
Carpenter broke up the dominance in the bottom of the sixth with a solo home run to right, which was only the beginning of St. Louis' offensive outburst.
Losing the first game of a five-game series is obviously concerning for the Dodgers, but they're in even more trouble if they can't count on their ace in a big game. Kershaw had problems against St. Louis in the National League Championship Series last year, and the last thing Los Angeles needs is for him to revert to that form again.
First pitch for Game 2 is scheduled for 9:37 p.m. ET Saturday. Lance Lynn is scheduled to start for the Cardinals, with Zack Greinke taking the hill for the Dodgers.
Greinke made two starts against St. Louis in 2014, going 1-1 with a 3.55 ERA. Lynn has appeared twice against Los Angeles. He was 1-1 with a 9.00 ERA.
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