Saturday’s Game Report: Cardinals 2, Dodgers 1
By Rob Rains
After the Dodgers tied the game in the top of the ninth inning on Saturday, Cardinals manager Oli Marmol turned to Nolan Arenado and asked him a question.
“I asked him if he wanted to end the game,” Marmol said.
The manager got the answer – and the result – that he expected.
Arenado, getting a planned day off, delivered a pinch-hit single in the bottom of the ninth that gave the Cardinals the pulsating victory, their second in a row in the series against the Dodgers at Busch Stadium.
It was a wild last two innings to the game, which was scoreless until Masyn Winn made a mad dash from second to score on a comebacker to the mound, followed by an errant throw, in the eighth.
Shohei Ohtani singled off the second base bag with one out in the top of the ninth, and after going to third on a single by Mookie Betts, scored the trying run on Ryan Helsley’s wild pitch.
Nolan Gorman, getting the start at third base in place of Arenado, led off with the ninth with a ground rule double. With Jose Barrero pinch-running, Pedro Pages got the sacrifice bunt down and he was safe at first on a throwing error.
With Victor Scott II due up, Marmol turned to Arenado and the Dodgers brought in their left fielder and deployed a five-man infield to try to cut down the winning run at the plate.
Instead, Arenado lofted a fly ball down the left field line to set off a celebration.
The Cardinals got a 5-0 shut out in the opening game of the series on Friday night and extended that shutout streak to 17 innings before the LA run in the top of the ninth.
The Dodgers were 0-of-12 with a runner in scoring position on Saturday and are just 1-of-25 with a runner on second or third in the first two games of the series.
Here is how Saturday’s game broke down:
At the plate: The Cardinals had just four hits, all singles, in six innings off Dodgers starter Yoshinobo Yamamoto, who struck out nine and walked two. They left runners on second and third in the first inning and left the bases loaded in the second and had just one more hit until the eighth inning … Winn singled with one out and advanced to second on Brendan Donovan’s single before scoring when Alec Burleson’s shot back up the middle deflected off pitcher Ben Casparius, who retrieved the ball but threw high and wide to first base … Winn and Gorman each had two of the team’s total of nine hits.
On the mound: Erick Fedde pitched around four hits and four walks in 5 1/3 shutout innings … Steven Matz inherited runners on first and second with one out in the sixth but retired the next two batters. Matz also got Freddie Freeman to ground into an inning-ending double play in the seventh … Kyle Leahy pitched around a walk and a single in the eighth before Helsley suffered the blown save in the ninth, but he was able to strand the go-ahead run on second base by striking out Freeman and Will Smith.
Key stat: The pinch hit was only the third for Arenado in his career in 14 at-bats and was his first since he had a pinch-hit RBI single for the Rockies on May 21, 2015. He had been 0-of-10 as a pinch-hitter since that game.
Worth noting: The Cardinals came two outs away from doing something they have not done since 1978, shutting out the Dodgers on consecutive days. The last time it happened was April 29 and 30, 1978 when John Urrea and Eric Rasmussen beat Burt Hooten and Don Sutton 1-0 and 4-0 … The pinch-hit single was the 13th walk-off hit of Arenado’s career, his second of the season and fifth as a Cardinal.
Up next: The Cardinals officially said that Michael McGreevy will be promoted from Memphis and get the start on Sunday as they try to complete a sweep of the three-game series. A roster move to activate McGreevy will be made before the 1:15 p.m. game.
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