"I didn't do my job," St. Louis Cardinals closer Jason Motte said after the game, taking the blame for the Texas Rangers' 2-1 comeback win in Game 2 of the 2011 World Series. Once again, the Cardinals and Rangers played in a tight game, but this time around the St. Louis bullpen was less than perfect as it struggled to close out the game.
2011 World Series, Game 2: Jason Motte Laments One That Got Away
Motte felt he got a bit unlucky, but also threw a poor pitch later as Ian Kinsler and Elvis Andrus opened the ninth inning with back-to-back singles.
“It stinks. It’s one of those things,” Motte said. “I went out there and made a good pitch to Kinsler, and he did a good piece of hitting and got enough on it to get it out of the reach of Furcal. The next one, I threw another cutter, and it just wasn’t a good pitch. It moved, came back, just stayed middle and spun up there.”
Motte found himself back on the bench with runners on second and third and nobody out in the top of the ninth. Manager Tony La Russa made the decision to go with Arthur Rhodes after Motte struggled right out of the gate, and it came back to bite the Cardinals.
Josh Hamilton hit a sacrifice fly to knot the game at one and after La Russa went to Lance Lynn, Michael Young drove in the go-ahead run with another sacrifice fly. Both runs were charged to Motte.
The Cardinals and Rangers are off on Friday as the series moves to Texas for Game 3.
For more on the game, check out the rest of the Baseball Nation live-blog and Grant Brisbee’s recap.
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