Cards Erase Early Deficit, Beat Cliff Lee To Even Series With Phillies

The St. Louis Cardinals faced a difficult task on Sunday night, down a game in their NLDS matchup with the Philadelphia Phillies and facing Cliff Lee in Game 2. St. Louis was facing the very real possibility of heading back home down 0-2, but came up big after falling behind early by crawling back to take the second game of the series by a 5-4 margin.

While the Cardinals and Phillies were battling it out on the field, the Baseball Nation staff was hammering away at the live-blog, providing updates and tidbits throughout the game. Below are some of the highlights.

If the Phillies had beaten the Cardinals, a) the Series would - if history’s any guide - essentially be over, and b) we could spend a goodly chunk of this piece second-guessing a key decision made by Tony La Russa before the game.

But the Cardinals beat the Phillies, so we’ll save the second-guessing for another time.

Tony La Russa baseball, bitches.

And that meant Motte. Motte got ahead of Victorino with two swinging strikes, and Victorino popped the third pitch up to center for the final out.

Tonight, they care. Gifted with a 4-0 lead after three innings, Lee and the Phillies had to like their chances. Cliff Lee doesn’t often blow four-run leads, St. Louis starter Chris Carpenter was out of the game, and the Phils figured to do some damage against Tony La Russa’s bullpen.

Or not.

Managers looooooove head-to-head stats. If a hitter is 4-for-9 against a pitcher in his career, a manager can justify putting that hitter in the lineup the next time they meet. Who’s going to question that sort of science? A bunch of nerds yammering about sample size? Pfft. You know what sample sizes old-school managers care about? The ones at Costco, when they give you only one free coconut shrimp and trick you into buying a whole bag. What a bunch of crap.

So when Dick Stockton and Bob Brenly announced that Ryan Theriot was in the game because of his success against Cliff Lee, you were right to guffaw.

In the top of the sixth inning, they were at it again, and now we’re all tied up.

Lee worked out of the inning without any more damage, but he and the Phillies have given away a four-run advantage, and the Cardinals have new life. New life and a new pitcher, as Octavio Dotel is taking over for Fernando Salas in the bottom of the sixth. Salas worked a pair of perfect innings in relief of Chris Carpenter, who was bad.

Chris Carpenter had some problems throwing strikes tonight, and lasted only three innings.

The TBS crew spoke to La Russa after Carpenter’s stint, and the St. Louis manager is probably staring at a fine.

I hate home-plate collisions.

Hate is a strong word, I know. But I do hate them, because I don’t like seeing baseball players get hurt and it’s usually not even a particularly smart play.

So I suppose one could argue that was another missed opportunity for St. Louis. But in any case, it’s 4-3 now, and Lee has looked hittable. This game isn’t over by a long shot - and as I typed this, Fernando Salas set the Phillies down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the fourth after taking over for Carpenter.

Carpenter’s final line:

Is it possible for Cliff Lee to blow a substantial lead? Sure. He’s over 30% human after all. On July 3rd this year, the Phillies scored four runs in the second inning of a start against the Blue Jays. The Blue Jays came back, scoring single runs in the third, fifth, and sixth innings, and exploding for four runs off Lee in the eighth. So the Cardinals should follow this foolproof plan if they want to win this game:

1. Acquire Jose Bautista

2. Hope Cliff Lee gets tired

3. Make sure that Charlie Manuel doesn’t pull Lee after he gets tired

What would we expect them to score? We can consult this handy run expectancy matrix. Having a runner on third and nobody out leads to an average of 1.3 runs. Having a runner on second and nobody out leads to an average of 1.1 runs.

Those numbers, of course, are averages, and do not apply when facing a pitcher like Cliff Lee. Still, here’s the take-home message: the Cardinals should have at least one or two runs, but instead they have no runs, and so they’re already facing long odds. You can’t just give away run-scoring opportunities against Lee, because he doesn’t provide them very often.

Before Sunday night, Chris Carpenter had started 338 Major League Baseball games that counted: 329 during the regular season, and nine during the postseason tournament.

Out of those 338 starts, how many came after less than four days of rest?

So all the Cardinals needed to do was advance Furcal another 90 feet and they could take an early lead on the road. Simple, right?

Not so much. Because, you know, Cliff Lee.

It’s going to be tough regardless; Lee threw six shutouts during the regular season. One of them was this 4-0 blanking of the Cardinals in St. Louis on June 22; Lee allowed just six hits and a walk, striking out three. Albert Pujols was on the DL at the time; some of the names in that boxscore aren’t very recognizable.

Pitchers

Cardinals: Chris Carpenter (11-9, 3.45 ERA)

Phillies: Cliff Lee (17-8, 2.40 ERA)