The Season Ends Well

And the Cardinals make the playoffs. Credit to the Phillies, who made more of a game effort than they really had to. I suppose the franchise record for wins in a single season was at stake, and perhaps the Phillies would much rather face the Cards than the Diamondbacks. It would make sense, the D'Backs do have a better record, though I'm not sure how much difference there is between 90 and 94 win teams, when they're playing a 102 win team in a best of five series. At any rate, the Phils went all out, and they prevailed.

It at least assured the Cardinals of a chance for a play-in game against Atlanta, but the offense jumped on Brett Myers for five runs in the first. Not that Carpenter needed more than one. The part about that I love the most is Carpenter told Mike Shannon and John Rooney, the radio crew, that it didn't matter how much the bullpen had been used the first two games in Houston (12 and two-thirds innings). They wouldn't be needed Wednesday night. Sure enough, 9 innings, 2 hits, 1 walk, 11 strikeouts, no runs, on 105 pitches. Aces, Carp.

I'm still a little surprised the Cardinals rebounded from that loss to the Mets as well as they did. It seemed like such a perfect cap to their season, a loss brought about by a bullpen failure, aided by poor defense. The Cards lost five games because of the 'pen in April alone, and they made their feelings about the importance of defense pretty clear in the off-season. Putting Berkman in right, keeping Skip at second, replacing Brendan Ryan with Theriot at short (the move that worked so well, the Cardinals had to trade for another shortstop mid-season!). But it didn't happen, with a little help from Carlos Marmol's spotty control.

When September started, I was looking forward to seeing some of the younger players get a chance. More Chambers and Greene, less Patterson and Theriot. Maybe Matt Carpenter could get some play at third, perhaps alternate with Freese. That didn't happen, and I was annoyed. I didn't believe they were in contention, even after they swept Atlanta, because they followed that up with a loss to Pittsburgh. That seemed like the Cardinals: good one moment, a disaster the next.

By the time the Mets came to town, I had to admit they were in contention, but I still wasn't sure they had a chance. It was more Atlanta still had a 2.5 game lead. If the Cards went 6-3 (which is what they wound up doing), the Braves couldn't go any better than 4-4 over their last 8 games for the Cards to have a chance for that 163rd game. I kept figuring the Braves were too good, that they'd pull out of the tailspin in time. 5 of their final 8 games were against Florida and Washington, not exactly Milwaukee and San Francisco. But they weren't able to go .500. They went 3-5 instead, and that was just poor enough a showing for the Cardinals to get in clean. No risky extra game needed.

As for the postseason, I have no idea what's going to happen. The Cardinals have the best offense in the league, while the Phillies are middle of the road. But the gap between the Cards and Phillies runs allowed is larger than the runs scored gap. The Cards bullpen is stronger than it was at times in the season, with no Franklin, Batista, Miller, or Tallet around, but it's hardly a lockdown group. And the Phils have a huge edge in starting pitching. Lohse, Jackson, and Garcia are all capable of good to great starts. Heck, Lohse out-pitched Halladay just a few weeks ago. But they're all also capable of laying total stink bombs. Garcia had one in the opener of the Astro series. Carpenter's the only on I'd trust, and he won't be able to go more than once in 5 games. Given the choice, I'd use him in Game 3 if the Cards were able to either sweep, or else were trying to avoid being swept. If the series is even when it reaches St. Louis, I'd save Carp for Game 4, when he can again either close things out or extend them.

I am a little worried about Matt Holliday and Rafael Furcal. Holliday left after one at-bat Tuesday, and didn't play Wednesday, Furcal's been out since partway through Monday's game with a hamstring issue. Will either be ready to go? No clue. If Furcal can't go, hopefully Punto plays SS. Craig should replace Holliday in left, if needed, but one can never tell with LaRussa.