Cardinals Crush Brewers In Game 6, Advance To World Series

And there was no way that he was going to win the NLCS MVP Award.

Not a bad finish for a player who missed a couple of months with a broken hand. It took an amazing series to top Pujols’ six-game run. Freese’s did just that.

The Milwaukee Brewers’ season is over following a 12-6 loss to the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 6 of the NLCS. Heading into the offseason, the Brewers face the strong possibility of losing Prince Fielder, one of their biggest stars, in free agency. And If one were to judge the reaction of the crowd to Prince Fielder’s last at-bat, a groundout, it’s but a foregone conclusion Sunday marked his final game in a Milwaukee uniform.

Reading between the lines, it sure sounds like this was goodbye for Fielder. Following the game, his comments resembled more “thanks for the memories” than “I’ll be back.”

That’s Hairston committing a pair of errors on one play in the top of the fifth, on which a run scored. Another unearned run would score two batters later, and the Cardinals were in front 11-5. Though it was only halfway done, the game was basically over.

So it’s the Cardinals and the Rangers, with the World Series set to begin Wednesday night in St. Louis. Neither team has gotten this far by riding its starting rotation, but then, each team is strong enough that it hasn’t had to. This should be a hell of a good, long series.

But there was a sad moment in the bottom of the seventh, when Ryan Braun struck out on three pitches against Octavio Dotel. Braun had a fantastic season and played brilliantly in the postseason before this last game. But Dotel’s got his number, and that last out in the seventh marked Braun’s ninth strikeout against Dotel in 11 career at-bats.

There was another sad moment in the bottom of the eighth, when Prince Fielder led off and grounded out weakly to second base. Fielder isn’t gone yet and it’s not crazy to suggest the Brewers might find the money to sign Fielder to a big contract this winter. It seems unlikely, though. Fielder’s going to want a lot of money the Brewers probably don’t have, and a lot of years that GM Doug Melvin probably doesn’t want to give him.

It has to be Freese. But then read Pujols’ video game numbers again and realize that they probably weren’t going to be good enough to be the best on his team.

Will a pitcher named “Eyechart” be the big hero in Game 6?

No. Probably not. But Mark Rzepczynski might well be the winning pitcher in Game 6, having now thrown two shutout innings in a game that looked, for a while, like nobody would ever throw any shutout innings.

Pujols writhed in pain, clutching his right wrist. It was an awful scene, but it looks like everything’s okay. Pujols stayed in the game, and took an at-bat in the top half of the sixth. He looks like he’s fine.

^{*As determined by a national taste test.}

Absurd. We’ve played nine half-innings. Seven of them have featured at least one run. Four of them have featured multiple runs.

If I heard the broadcast right, the Brewers have set an NLCS record for errors. They’ve made a ton of errors. They’ve looked godawful in the field. What’s crazy is that, during the regular season, all the metrics liked the Brewers’ team defense. They had a positive UZR. They had a positive DRS. They had an above-average BABIP allowed. But this series has been a nightmare.

The starting pitchers in Game 6 of the NLCS went a combined three innings, allowing eight earned runs. That leaves fifteen innings that both bullpens will need to pick up. So far, it looks like the bullpens are going to give up a bunch of runs too.

Yep. Just past the halfway point in the game. Fourteen runs. Two hours. Good gravy. This is a lawwng game.

The TBS crew talked to Tony La Russa in the middle of the fourth inning...

As one might figure from the 9-4 score, this has been something of a slugfest. There were runs scored in each of the first five half-innings. But that 9-4 score has remained 9-4 now through a full inning of play, which seems worthy of note.

So it was 9-4 after two and a half, and it’s 9-4 after three and a half. It’s good to have a little sanity.

I don’t remember Bud Selig’s announcement that there would be an NLCS game played on the moon. You’d think that would have been a bigger news story.

Pujols’ homer is the kind of home run they’ll engrave on the wall of a space shuttle to let alien civilizations know what a home run is. It might have been the hardest hit ball of the season, a line drive that was almost still ascending when it went over the fence. That guy is going to make a million dollars this offseason, easy. Maybe two.

In case you haven’t been paying close attention, here are six baseball players:

Aside from being baseball players, what do they have in common?

Edwin Jackson had allowed two homers total in his previous nine starts combined. He’s already allowed three today, and we’ve got a long, long way to go.

To the top of the third. I hope you didn’t make big Sunday plans.

And it sure looks like both managers will have plenty of chances to test their bullpens.

Stick around, folks. The Cardinals are ahead 5-2, but it’s still really really early.

All four runs were earned, so Marcum’s current postseason line reads:

9⅔ innings

16 runs (all earned)

5 walks

5 strikeouts

3 homers

That was all the Brewers would do, as the next three batters made outs, but that’s how quickly runs can get scored. As thrilled as the Cardinals must be with their early effort, odds are they’re going to need to score more.

Woke up at 7:00 a.m. today. Typed out that headline. Went for a walk. It was the most efficient way to use my time.

Edit: And as I was writing this, Corey Hart hit the sixth pitch of the game out for a homer. Cards 4, Brewers 1

All of this augurs well for Marcum in tonight’s game and perhaps beyond.

One big difference, though: When Derek Lowe pitched against the Yankees in Game 4, he was exceptionally well-rested. Between his last regular-season start on 3 October and Game 4 on the 17th, he’d thrown just one inning. And because he’d been pitching so poorly late in the season and been knocked out of so many starts early, he’d pitched only 11⅓ innings in the previous month.

Here is Tony La Russa’s Game 6 lineup, with right-hander Shaun Marcum pitching for the Milwaukee Brewers:

I got the lineup from RotoInfo.com, and someone over there suffered quite the amusing Freudian slip:

And because I’m a weak, weak man, here are the microsplits that don’t mean anything. Still can’t help but look at them.

Whoa. Betancourt doesn’t hit Jackson well. Looks like their playoff slugger has been neutralized. Dig those Corey Hart splits. Man, those at-bats would be interesting if we knew which microsplits to pay attention to.

Game Date/Time: October 16, 8:05 p.m. EDT

Stadium: Miller Park, Milwaukee, Wisconsin