Cardinals defeat Rangers for 11th World Series title
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CBSSports.com wire reports
Oct. 28, 2011
ST. LOUIS -- Albert Pujols thrust both arms high in the air, even before he reached home plate.
It was only the first inning, and already it felt as if the St. Louis Cardinals were home free. Because after they had overcome so much just to get this far, what could stop them?
The Cardinals won a remarkable World Series they weren't even supposed to reach, beating the Texas Rangers 6-2 in Game 7 on Friday night with another key hit by hometown star David Freese and six gutty innings from Chris Carpenter.
Pushed to the brink, the Cardinals kept saving themselves. A frantic rush to reach the postseason on the final day. A nifty pair of comebacks in the playoffs. Two desperate rallies in Game 6.
"This whole ride, this team deserves this," said Freese, who added the Series MVP award to his trophy as the NL championship MVP.
A day after an epic game that saw them twice within one strike of elimination before winning 10-9 in 11 innings, the Cardinals captured their 11th World Series crown.
"It's hard to explain how this happened," Cardinals manager Tony La Russa said.
Following a whole fall on the edge, including a surge from 10½ games down in the wild-card race, La Russa's team didn't dare mess with Texas, or any more drama in baseball's first World Series Game 7 since the Angels beat the Giants in 2002.
Freese's two-run double tied it in the first, with Pujols celebrating as he scored. Good-luck charm Allen Craig hit a go-ahead homer in the third.
Given a chance to pitch by a Game 6 rainout and picked by La Russa earlier in the day to start on three days' rest, Carpenter and the tireless St. Louis bullpen closed it out.
No Rally Squirrel needed on this night, either. Fireworks and confetti rang out at Busch Stadium when Jason Motte retired David Murphy on a fly ball to end it.
"We just kept playing," Cardinals star Lance Berkman said.
Said La Russa: "If you watch the history of baseball, teams come back."
The Rangers, meanwhile, will spend the whole winter wondering how it all got away. Texas might dwell on it forever, in fact, or at least until Nolan Ryan & Co. can reverse a World Series slide that started with last year's five-game wipeout against San Francisco.
"We were close. Two times. Game 6. That's it," Texas pitcher Colby Lewis said.
Ryan left tightlipped. When a reporter tried to ask the Rangers president and part-owner a question, someone in his entourage said: "He's not talking."
Texas had not lost consecutive games since last August. These two defeats at Busch Stadium cost manager Ron Washington and the Rangers a chance to win their first title in the franchise's 51-year history.
Instead, Texas became the first team to lose the Series two straight years since Atlanta in 1991-92.
"Sometimes when opportunity is in your presence, you certainly can't let it get away because sometimes it takes a while before it comes back," Washington said. "If there's one thing that happened in this World Series that I'll look back on is being so close, just having one pitch to be made and one out to be gotten, and it could have been a different story."
Added Texas third baseman Adrian Beltre: "We tried to come back today, but the momentum just took them."
"It's not a nice feeling, you know, being one strike away twice. I guess it's probably easier to lose four games in a row in a World Series, but being a strike away it's something that will be hard to forget," he said.
This marked the ninth straight time the home team had won Game 7 in the World Series. The wild-card Cardinals held that advantage over the AL West champions because the NL won the All-Star Game -- Texas could blame that on their own pitcher, C.J. Wilson, who took the loss in July.
A year full of inspiring rallies and epic collapses was encapsulated in Game 6. Freese was the star, with a tying triple in the ninth and a winning home run in the 11th. His two RBI in the clincher gave him a postseason-record 21.
The Cardinals, second behind the Yankees (27) with their 11 titles, won their first championship since 2006, and gave La Russa his third World Series victory. They got there by beating Philadelphia in the first round of the NL playoffs, capped by Carpenter outdueling Roy Halladay 1-0 in the deciding Game 5, and then topping Milwaukee in the NL championship series.
"I think the last month of the season, that's where it started," Pujols said. "Different guys were coming huge, getting big hits, and we carried that into the postseason and here we are, world champions."
By the time Yadier Molina drew a bases-loaded walk from starter Matt Harrison and Rafael Furcal was hit by a pitch from Wilson in relief, the crowd began to sense a championship was near.
The Cardinals improved to 8-3 in Game 7s of the Series, more wins than any other club. Yet fans here know their history well, and were aware this game could go either way -- Dizzy Dean and the Gas House Gang won 11-0 in 1934, but Whitey Herzog and his Cardinals lost 11-0 in 1985.
On this evening, all the stars aligned for St. Louis.
Starting in place of injured Matt Holliday, Craig hit his third homer of the Series and made a leaping catch at the top of the left field wall. Molina made another strong throw to nail a stray runner. And Carpenter steeled himself to pitch into the seventh, every bit an ace.
"It was in our grasp and we didn't get it," Washington said, referring to Game 6. "Tonight we fought hard for it and the Cardinals got it."
Pujols went 0 for 2, walked and was hit by a pitch in what could have been his last game with the Cardinals. Many think the soon-to-be free agent will remain in St. Louis.
"You know what? I'm not even thinking about that. I'm thinking about, you know, we're the world champions and I'm going to celebrate and whenever that time comes, you know, then we'll deal with it," he said.
Pujols did plenty of damage. His three-homer job in Game 3 was the signature performance of his career and perhaps the greatest hitting show in postseason history.
Dismissed by some as a dull Series even before it began because it lacked the big-market glamour teams, it got better inning by inning. Plus, a postseason first: A bullpen telephone mixup played a prominent role.
"I told you it was going to be a great series, and it was," Texas slugger Josh Hamilton said.
"I don't care what other people remember. We fell a little bit short," he said. "Hats off to the Cards, they did a great job, especially last night. It was actually fun to watch and fun to see. You hate it but it happened."
Craig hit a solo home run in the third, an opposite field fly to right that carried into the Cardinals bullpen and got their relievers dancing. The super-sub put St. Louis ahead 3-2 with his third homer of the Series. He was in the lineup only because Holliday sprained his right wrist on a pickoff play a night earlier and was replaced on the roster.
By then, the largest crowd at 6-year-old Busch Stadium was buzzing. The fans seemed a bit drained much earlier, maybe worn out from the previous night.
They grew hush in the first when Hamilton and Michael Young hit consecutive RBI doubles. Texas might have gotten more, but Ian Kinsler strayed too far off first base and was trapped by Molina's rocket throw.
Freese changed the mood in a hurry as St. Louis tied it in the bottom half. Pujols and Lance Berkman drew two-out walks and pitching coach Mike Maddux trotted to the mound while Freese stepped in to a standing ovation.
Freese rewarded his family and a ballpark full of new friends by lining a full-count floater to the wall in left center for a two-run double. Harrison was in trouble, and Wilson began warming up after only 23 pitches.
Carpenter wasn't sharp at the outset, either. All over the strike zone, he started seven of the first 10 batters with balls. Pitching coach Dave Duncan made a visit in the second to check on the tall righty, lingering for a few extra words.
"I was hoping to have an opportunity to go ahead and pitch in that game and fortunately it worked out," Carpenter said. "It started off a little rough in the first. But I was able to collect myself, make some pitches and our guys did an awesome job to battle back. And I mean, it's just amazing."
Notes
Texas set a Series record by walking 41 batters, one more than Florida in 1997. Of the 34 runs the Cardinals scored, 11 reached on walks and two more on hit batters. The crowd was 47,399. The Cardinals will play the first game of the 2012 season in North America, opening the Miami Marlins' new ballpark on April 4.
Wolf holds off Cardinals; Brewers rally to tie NLCS
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CBSSports.com wire reports
Oct. 13, 2011
ST. LOUIS -- Power pitching often dominates in the postseason. Soft tosses by Randy Wolf got the Milwaukee Brewers back to even in the NL Championship Series.
The 35-year-old lefty outfoxed the St. Louis Cardinals for seven innings to earn his first postseason win and the Brewers got two more hits from Ryan Braun in a 4-2 victory Thursday night that evened the NL Championship Series at 2.
"It was a big feeling just to be back out there again after my last start," said Wolf, hit hard by Arizona to force a deciding Game 5 in the first round of the playoffs. "Just to be able to get another opportunity to pitch again was important.
"You know, I'll be honest with you, the day after the Diamondbacks start, I didn't eat or shower that day," he said."
Flipping some pitches in the mid-60s mph, Wolf allowed two runs and six hits, striking out six with one walk.
Matt Holliday and Allen Craig homered for the Cardinals, representing their only runs in the last 16 innings.
"I think it's classic because playing each other so many times, we're dead even," manager Tony La Russa said. "It comes down to that day, who makes the pitch."
Francisco Rodriguez allowed a hit in the eighth and John Axford finished for his second save of the series and third this postseason.
The Brewers ended an eight-game road losing streak in the postseason dating to the 1982 World Series opener at St. Louis. And Wolf ended a lengthy drought of his own -- before Thursday, his 342 starts without a postseason victory were the most among active pitchers.
Game 4 losing pitcher Kyle Lohse moves to second on the list at 298 starts, trailing only Ted Lilly's 318.
Jaime Garcia will face Zack Greinke for the second time in the series in Game 5 on Friday night. Either way, the NLCS will be decided back at Miller Park.
"We're pretty much the only team that's played pretty well in Milwaukee. Flip the page and hopefully come back to tomorrow. It's a great series. Nobody is going to run away," Cardinals star Albert Pujols said.
Jerry Hairston Jr. doubled twice with an RBI and Wolf hit one of the Brewers' five doubles. Braun is batting .471 (16 for 34) in the postseason with two home runs and nine RBI.
The Cardinals needed more heavy duty from their bullpen, too, after Lohse, pitching on 12 days' rest, failed to make it out of the fifth.
"I'm not going to blame it on the layoff," Lohse said. "We're professionals and we've got get the job done. Tonight, we didn't do it."
Pujols was a quiet 1 for 4 for St. Louis, which was 0 for 8 with runners in scoring position and is 0 for 15 after the first inning of Game 3.
"They have good pitching, but we have good pitching, too," Hairston said. "They've been good for us all year long."
Wolf kept the Cardinals off-balance with soft tosses and retired 13 of his last 15 hitters in his fourth career postseason start. It was a huge improvement from Game 4 of the NL Division Series at Arizona in which he surrendered seven runs in three innings.
Wolf also struggled in his last two regular-season starts, allowing 10 runs in 11 2/3 innings.
"Regardless of how the game went, I was satisfied with the fact that I was going to have that opportunity," Wolf said. "It's kind of a weird word, but it's redemption to go back out there."
For the fourth consecutive game, the Cardinals had to lean heavily on their relievers. Lohse sailed through three innings and then allowed three doubles and three runs to his last eight hitters, and was charged with three runs in 4 1/3 innings.
St. Louis relievers have worked 17 1/3 innings in the series.
Two of La Russa's moves paid off. Bumped down one spot to fifth, Holliday hit his first postseason home run and doubled.
Craig started in place of Lance Berkman, who was 3 for 32 lifetime against Wolf and had a minor right thigh bruise from getting hit by a pitch in Game 3. Craig hit his first career postseason homer made it 2-0 in the third.
The Brewers tied it in the fourth with their first runs since the third inning of Game 3 on doubles by Prince Fielder and Jerry Hairston Jr. and an RBI single by Yuniesky Betancourt.
Lohse was pulled after Nyjer Morgan doubled to start the fifth and advanced on a groundout, the heart of the order coming up. Braun's single off Mitchell Boggs put the Brewers in front although second baseman Ryan Theriot's sprawling stop transformed Fielder's smash into an inning-ending double play.
Rickie Weeks singled and Hairston doubled again to open the sixth, and the Brewers soon had a two-run cushion. George Kottaras hit a grounder against a drawn-in infield off Arthur Rhodes, and Theriot bobbled the ball on a short hop for an error.
The Cardinals' streak of scoring in the first inning ended at five games when they went down in order against Wolf, but they hurt the left-hander with opposite-field power the next two innings. Wolf fell behind the count to six of the first 14 hitters and the Cardinals were 4 for 5 with two home runs, a double, single and walk.
Notes
Injured Cardinals pitcher Adam Wainwright caught the ceremonial first ball for the second successive game, this time from former Cardinals CF Jim Edmonds, accompanied by a young son who also made a throw. Home plate umpire Mike Everitt got stung in the upper right arm area by a foul ball off the bat of Rafael Furcal but stayed in the game. Mark Kotsay started in RF in place of Corey Hart, 2 for 17 against Lohse. The longest of Wolf's three previous preseason starts was 5 1/3 innings with the Dodgers on Oct. 19, 2009, at Philadelphia.
