NATIONAL LEAGUE WILDCARD GAME

San Francisco Giants Vs. St. Louis Cardinals

Tim Hudson vs. Adam Wainwright, Busch Stadium

4-RUN 8TH INNING RALLY PUSHES CARDS INTO NLDS

Giants Bullpen Collapse Wastes Hudson’s Brilliant Start

ST. LOUIS, Oct. 1 (AP) – The St. Louis Cardinals rallied for four runs in the bottom of the eighth inning and defeated the San Francisco Giants 4-3 in the National League Wildcard game at Busch Stadium.  The Cardinals advance to take on the Washington Nationals in a National League Divisional Series.  The Pittsburgh Pirates will face the Los Angeles Dodgers in the other NLDS.

The late St. Louis rally, which seemingly came out of nowhere, turned around a game that the Giants appeared to have firmly in hand.  San Francisco starter Tim Hudson tossed perhaps his best game of the year, but when the Giants bullpen collapsed in the eighth, it was all for naught.  Cardinals starter Adam Wainwright was effective—he struck out 10 in six innings of work—but made a couple of mistakes and was also hurt by an uncharacteristic St. Louis error.  But in the end, the Cardinals bats woke up just in time to allow the club to advance in the postseason.

The Giants touched Wainwright for a run in the second, to take the lead.  Hunter Pence led off with a single and, after Brandon Belt flied to left and Travis Ishikawa struck out, Brandon Crawford crushed a triple to right-center, scoring Pence, to put San Francisco on top 1-0.

With the score still 1-0 in the sixth, the Giants added some insurance.  Buster Posey singled with one out and Pablo Sandoval followed by lining a base hit to right.  Posey attempted to advance to third, and a good throw from Randal Grichuk would have cut the runner down, but the throw was errant.  Wainwright was in place to back up the play, but the throw was so bad that he couldn’t secure it, and while he was chasing the ball down, Posey got up and scored the game’s second run.  Sandoval ended up at second.  This was key because, after Wainwright struck out Hunter Pence, Belt dropped a two-out single into right, plating Sandoval with the third San Francisco run of the contest.  Ishikawa then fanned to end the inning.  Only one of the two runs in the sixth was officially recorded as unearned, but with good fundamental play by the Cardinals, neither run would have scored.  And yet, the Giants held a 3-0 advantage.

Hudson, meanwhile, was in complete control for San Francisco.  He retired the first 13 St. Louis batters he faced, fanning five of them.  The string was finally broken when Jhonny Peralta singled with one out in the fifth.  Yadier Molina followed that with a broken bat bloop base hit to left, advancing Peralta to second.  But Hudson induced Kolten Wong to ground to short, forcing Molina.  Wong was able to beat the relay to first and Peralta took third, but the runners were stranded when Grichuk lined to left.

Hudson pitched around a one-out walk to Matt Carpenter in the sixth and retired the Cardinals in order in the seventh, striking out two of the batters he faced.

Hudson was still on the mound in the eighth, but after a long battle, Wong led off with a base hit, just the third hit of the game for St. Louis.  Grichuk then flied to left for the first out.  At this point, Hudson’s pitch count had surpassed 90, and Giants manager Bruce Bochy made a fateful decision.  When left-handed swinging Oscar Taveras was announced as a pinch hitter, Bochy replaced Hudson with Jeremy Affeldt.  The Cardinals countered with Peter Bourjos, and the game turned on a dime.  On the first pitch from Affeldt, Bourjos grounded a single into right, with the speedy Wong advancing to third.  Carpenter came up representing the tying run and dropped a single into center, scoring Wong, to make it 3-1, with Bourjos holding at second.  Affeldt then uncorked a wild pitch, with the runners advancing to second and third.  A clearly flustered Affeldt went on to walk Jon Jay on four pitches to load the bases.  Bochy then called on Santiago Casilla, one of the most effective and reliable relievers in all of baseball during the regular season, to extract the Giants from the predicament in which they found themselves.  But Matt Holliday greeted Casilla by lining his first pitch into left-center field for a base hit, scoring Bourjos and Carpenter to tie the game, and advancing Jay to third.  Matt Adams also picked on the first pitch, and lifted a fly to center that was plenty deep enough to score Jay with the go-ahead run.  The previously passive sellout crowd at Busch Stadium was now so loud that the ballpark shook.  Casilla walked Peralta before finally ending the inning when Molina grounded out.

Trevor Rosenthal came on for the Cardinals in the ninth and dispatched the Giants quickly, fanning Crawford and pinch hitter Adam Duvall before retiring Gregor Blanco on a soft fly to center to end the game.

In all, St. Louis pitchers fanned 15 batters in the game.  There was a total of 14 hits between the two teams, but the only extra base hit was Crawford’s second inning triple.  Prior to the eighth, the Cardinals had managed only two hits—the back-to-back singles by Peralta and Molina in the fifth—and three total baserunners.  In the eighth, St. Louis managed four hits and two walks and flipped the game on its head.  The Cardinals’ reward is a trip to the NLDS.

10/1/2014, SF14-StL14, Busch Stadium

                       1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9     R  H  E   LOB DP

2014 Giants            0  1  0  0  0  2  0  0  0     3  8  0     7  0

2014 Cardinals         0  0  0  0  0  0  0  4  x     4  6  1     5  0

Giants               AB  R  H BI   AVG    Cardinals            AB  R  H BI   AVG

Blanco,G          cf  4  0  0  0  .000    Carpenter,M       3b  3  1  1  1  .333

Panik             2b  4  0  1  0  .250    Jay               cf  3  1  0  0  .000

Posey             c   4  1  2  0  .500    Holliday          lf  4  0  1  2  .250

Sandoval          3b  4  1  2  0  .500     Rosenthal        p   0  0  0  0  .000

Pence             rf  4  1  1  0  .250    Adams,Ma          1b  3  0  0  1  .000

Belt              1b  4  0  1  1  .250    Peralta,Jh        ss  3  0  1  0  .333

Ishikawa          lf  4  0  0  0  .000    Molina,Y          c   4  0  1  0  .250

 Perez,J          lf  0  0  0  0  .000    Wong              2b  3  1  1  0  .333

Crawford,B        ss  4  0  1  1  .250    Grichuk           rf  3  0  0  0  .000

Hudson,T          p   2  0  0  0  .000    Wainwright        p   1  0  0  0  .000

 Affeldt          p   0  0  0  0  .000     Descalso         ph  1  0  0  0  .000

 Casilla,S        p   0  0  0  0  .000     Choate           p   0  0  0  0  .000

 Duvall           ph  1  0  0  0  .000     Neshek           p   0  0  0  0  .000

                     35  3  8  2           Taveras          ph  0  0  0  0  .000

                                           Bourjos          ph  1  1  1  0 1.000

                                                               29  4  6  4

Giants                           INN  H  R ER BB  K PCH STR   ERA

Hudson,T                         7.1  3  1  1  1  9  91  61  1.23

Affeldt          L 0-1           0.0  2  3  3  1  0   8   3 99.00

Casilla,S        BS 1            0.2  1  0  0  1  0   9   5  0.00

                                 8.0  6  4  4  3  9 108  69

Cardinals                        INN  H  R ER BB  K PCH STR   ERA

Wainwright                       6.0  7  3  2  0 10  86  62  3.00

Choate                           0.2  0  0  0  1  1  16   7  0.00

Neshek           W 1-0           1.1  1  0  0  0  2  11  10  0.00

Rosenthal        S 1             1.0  0  0  0  0  2  11   7  0.00

                                 9.0  8  3  2  1 15 124  86

SF : Perez,J inserted at lf in the 8th

     Duvall batted for Casilla,S in the 9th

StL: Descalso batted for Wainwright in the 6th

     Taveras batted for Neshek in the 8th

     Bourjos batted for Taveras in the 8th

     Jay moved to lf in the 9th

     Bourjos moved to cf in the 9th

E-Grichuk. 3B-Crawford,B(1). RBI-Belt(1), Crawford,B(1), Carpenter,M(1),

Holliday 2(2), Adams,Ma(1). K-Blanco,G 2, Panik, Sandoval, Pence 2, Belt,

Ishikawa 3, Crawford,B 2, Hudson,T 2, Duvall, Carpenter,M, Jay 2, Holliday,

Peralta,Jh, Molina,Y, Wong, Grichuk, Descalso. BB-Hudson,T, Carpenter,M, Jay,

Peralta,Jh. SF-Adams,Ma. HBP-Blanco,G. HB-Choate. WP-Affeldt.

GWRBI: Adams,Ma

Temperature: 58, Sky: clear, Wind: right to left at 8 MPH.

Attendance: 43,781

Game Time: 2:50