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Phillies stun Cardinals with wild 9th-inning rally to open wild card

Written by ABC AUDIO on October 8, 2022

ST. LOUIS — Jean Segura’s career spanned 11 seasons and 1,328 games before he finally reached the postseason, the longest active streak in the major leagues. On the morning of his first playoff game, the Philadelphia Phillies’ second baseman barely slept. He awoke at 7 a.m. “with adrenaline in my body.” Friday wore on, and that edge never left.

“I was mentally focused on every play, every pitch,” Segura said. “I came prepared today to play a game, and to be able to be here — I just thank God that everything was on my side.”

The Cardinals, backed by a stellar performance from Jose Quintana and an electrifying pinch-hit homer by Juan Yepez, held a 2-0 lead heading into the final inning and had every reason to believe they were headed toward a Game 1 victory. They were at home, with a sold-out Busch Stadium crowd in a frenzy, and their lights-out closer, Ryan Helsley, was on the mound.

What followed strained credulity.

The Cardinals were 93-0 in postseason history when leading by multiple runs entering the ninth inning. The Phillies, meanwhile, were 0-54 during the regular season in that same situation. They wound up scoring six times — the most by a team trailing entering the ninth in postseason history. None of their runs came on hard contact. Alec Bohm was plunked with the bases loaded, Brandon Marsh hit a chopper that bounced past the glove of Nolan Arenado, Kyle Schwarber produced a sacrifice fly and Bryson Stott brought in a run after Paul Goldschmidt made a diving play on his grounder but threw late to home.

The biggest runs came off the bat of Segura, who lunged toward a slider low and away from Andre Pallante and hit a four-hopper to the right side that snuck through a sprawling Tommy Edman, who was playing slightly in to account for Segura’s speed. The Cardinals had a ground ball pitcher against a ground ball hitter and got a grounder that could have produced a game-ending double play — but it was hit just a tad too far to the right.

“That’s just kind of how the inning went,” Arenado said. “It wasn’t going our way.”

And it all seemed to stem from Helsley’s right middle finger, the one he jammed while gathering himself on a fielding play in the penultimate game of the regular season. Helsley threw some pitches off the mound during Thursday’s workout, and though he admitted to his finger feeling slightly stiff, he informed the Cardinals that he would be ready to close out games in the postseason.

Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol turned to Helsley with one on and one out in the eighth and watched him make quick work of Marsh and Schwarber. Shortly after the ninth inning began, though, Marmol said Helsley “started to lose a little bit of feel for his pitches.”

Helsley, who emerged this season as one of the sport’s most dominant closers, began to miss well wide of the strike zone and ultimately threw only nine of his 23 pitches for strikes in the ninth. J.T. Realmuto contributed a one-out single, then Bryce Harper and Nick Castellanos drew back-to-back walks, the latter on pitches that were either way up and in or way low and outside. By that point, the Cardinals had Pallante and Jack Flaherty warming in the bullpen. Bohm would be Helsley’s last batter — and Helsley hit him on the left shoulder with a 101 mph fastball.

After throwing a warm-up pitch well outside, Helsley exited, then departed Busch Stadium to get imaging done on his troublesome finger.

He might be lost for the series.

“We’ve had guys step up all year,” Marmol said. “If he goes down, someone else has to step up and do that job, so it’s part of it. No one’s going to feel sorry for us, I’ll tell you that. “

Friday’s top of the ninth marked the only half-inning in baseball this season where a team allowed at least six earned runs on three hits or fewer, with no extra-base hits allowed, according to ESPN Stats & Information research. There have now been five games in postseason history in which a team that led by two or more runs after the eighth inning lost by two or more runs — and the Cardinals have been involved in three of those. It marked the first time the Phillies had scored six or more runs in any postseason inning.

They picked the perfect time.

“It was special,” said Zack Wheeler, who threw 6⅓ scoreless innings against the Cardinals, exiting three batters before Jose Alvarado gave up the two-run homer to Yepez.

“That was probably the most exciting inning I’ve ever been a part of,” Realmuto said of the top of the ninth. “And it didn’t even take a big home run. The momentum was there for us and multiple guys stepped up when they needed to.”

Jose Ramirez’s 2-run homer sends Guardians past Rays in AL opener

CLEVELAND — When the Cleveland Guardians needed a response, after Tampa Bay took a 1-0 lead in Game 1 of their AL Wild Card Series on Friday, it came as no surprise that All-Star third baseman Jose Ramirez would be the guy to come through. He’s done it all year.

“He’s inevitable,” winning pitcher Shane Bieber said after the Guardians’ 2-1 win. “To do it right away, that was huge. I know for me personally, any pitcher, will tell you that.”

“Yeah, that [responding] came through my mind, but we have a really good team, so I knew we were capable to come back,” Ramirez said through the team interpreter. “When it came off the bat I felt it was a homer, but with this weather you never know, and when I saw the center fielder trying to get to the wall, I was kind of concerned and I kind of sped up a little bit my pace [on the bases].”

“I know he was [sitting] on 29 [in the regular season], and everybody was wanting it — and I understand why they want him to get 30,” Terry Francona said. “But he hit the double the other way. He had a bunch of hits that were staying through the ball. Balls will go out just because he’s a really good hitter.”

McClanahan left the pitch up after getting Ramirez out on changeups his first two times at the plate.

“That was my plan, just look for that changeup,” he said. “He got me twice with the same pitch. Because it’s a really good pitch. It really resembles a fastball. So I was just sitting on that pitch and I was just trying not to do too much, just put it on the opposing side of the field, and I was able to get a good contact on that.”

The home run backed Bieber’s stellar outing as he lasted 7⅔ innings, giving up just three hits while striking out eight. He wouldn’t commit to it being his best outing of the year but it would be hard to find one better, considering what’s at stake. The Guardians can win the best-of-three series with a victory Saturday.

Bieber said the crowd gave him some needed adrenaline.

“It was just a lot of fun out there,” he said. “I wasn’t blind to the fact that there were a lot of people there pulling for us, pulling for us to come out of there with a victory. So we won’t take that for granted and that’s what we do it for.”

The game lasted just two hours, 17 minutes on a chilly and cloudy day in Cleveland. It was decided by home runs — by two teams not known for hitting them.

“Two home runs, theirs and ours,” Francona said. “Or we might still be playing because both pitchers were [good], I mean, their guy was really good.”

Mets include Starling Marte, Francisco Alvarez on postseason roster

NEW YORK — When the Mets kick off their playoff run against the San Diego Padres on Friday night, Starling Marte and Francisco Alvarez will be on the roster.

Marte has not played for the past month and has been working his way back from a fractured middle finger. Mets manager Buck Showalter expressed hesitation in recent days about Marte’s injury progress, saying the outfielder struggled to grip a bat and baseball. Despite that, the team seems to believe he can contribute to the team in the NL Wild Card Series.

While Marte normally bats second in the Mets lineup, Showalter placed him as the sixth hitter in the wild-card series opener.

“There’s some unknown,” Showalter said. “Who’s 100 percent this time of year? We’ll see. I think it’s evidence by where he’s hitting in the order a little bit. I’m hoping that things go well and we move him back up tomorrow.”

Marte would not answer if he felt 100%, but added he would make adjustments if the inflammation in his right middle finger flares up. The Mets medical staff tried a variety of tape and splint combinations on Marte’s finger before landing on wrap-around padding.

“In a situation like this, you kind of have to suck up the pain because it’s a significant situation,” Marte said. “You kind of have to fight through it.”

Alvarez makes the postseason roster after the Mets called him up in the final weeks of the season. The 20-year-old slugger, ranked as the top prospect in the Mets’ farm system, hit his first major league home run on Tuesday.

Darin Ruf joins the team on the postseason roster after struggling since coming over to the Mets at the trade deadline.

Left off the roster are Tyler Naquin, Mark Vientos and pitchers Carlos Carrasco, Taijuan Walker and Trevor Williams, indicating the Mets are placing more emphasis on relievers over innings eaters in the wild-card round.

The Mets will carry 12 pitchers and 14 position players.

Texas Rangers give interim manager Tony Beasley 1st interview

ARLINGTON, Texas — Interim manager Tony Beasley was the first candidate interviewed in the Texas Rangers’ managerial search that general manager Chris Young hopes to wrap up in three to four weeks.

Young said Friday that Beasley would be the only internal candidate for the job, but didn’t say who else or how many other people would be interviewed in the process.

“We started with a large master list, and we’re narrowing that as we speak,” Young said, without elaborating two days after the Rangers finished their sixth consecutive losing season.

Young declined to comment when asked specifically if the search could proceed without knowing if three-time World Series champion manager Bruce Bochy had interest in the job or not.

Bochy, 67, hasn’t managed since 2019, when he stepped away after 13 seasons and those titles with the San Francisco Giants. Young played for Bochy with San Diego in 2006.

Young had acknowledged earlier in his media availability that he loved playing for Bochy.

“We had a winning season together. I learned a lot from him, just a calm, steady presence,” Young said. “I have the utmost respect for him. It’s no surprise that he went on to win three world championships with the Giants, and he’s a tremendous person and manager.”

The Rangers fired fourth-year manager Chris Woodward on Aug. 15, two days before president of baseball operations and former GM Jon Daniels was also let go. Texas went on to finish 68-94, eight wins more than 2021 but what Young said “was about half of our internal expectations.”

Texas was 17-31 under Beasley, the longtime Rangers third base coach who was once Young’s manager in the minor leagues. Several young players got extended looks during that span, and Young said back in August that Beasley wouldn’t be judged solely on win-loss record or how the team played.

“We knew that we had a young group coming in, that they were going to have to get exposure at the big league level,” Young said Friday. “In terms of what we were looking for with our culture, the management of the staff, those types of things, I thought he did a tremendous job.”

The departure of Daniels, who had led the club for 17 years as GM and then team president, put Young in charge of baseball operations for the team he pitched for to start his career after rooting for as a kid. He played for five teams over 13 big league seasons and was working in the Major League Baseball office before he joined the Rangers as GM in December 2020.

“The goal is that when we start to win, we win for a long time. And that’s important to get right on the front end here,” Young said. “This offseason is big to make sure we take the next step.”

Along with finding a new manager, Young said the Rangers will be in pursuit of top-line starting pitchers, in free agency or through trades.

Minor league baseball draws 30.9M fans, down from 41.5M in ’19

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Minor league baseball teams combined to draw 30.9 million fans this year, down from 41.5 million in 2019, the last season before COVID-19 and before Major League Baseball cutting affiliates.

Teams averaged 3,910 this season for 7,908 games, down from an average of 4,044 for 10,262 games in 2019, MLB said Friday.

In 2021, when many areas had coronavirus-related restrictions on capacity, teams drew 22.1 million for 6,828 games, an average of 3,235.

MLB cut guaranteed affliations from 160 to 120 ahead of the 2021 season, down from 176 teams in 2019. The 2020 minor league season was canceled because of the pandemic, and the new structure began in 2021.

Angels GM says star Shohei Ohtani’s $30M deal ‘step one’

Los Angeles Angels star Shohei Ohtani has already agreed to a $30 million contract for 2023, his final campaign before free agency, and the club believes it has a shot to keep the two-way talent long term.

“I think it’s step one,” general manager Perry Minasian said of Ohtani’s new deal. “Hopefully, there’s more steps down the road. … We love the player, and nothing would make me more happy than bringing him back for a long time.”

The Angels announced the one-year deal with Ohtani last week, avoiding a potentially complicated arbitration case with the 2021 AL MVP.

Ohtani’s deal is fully guaranteed, with no other provisions. The deal is the largest one-year contract ever given to an arbitration-eligible player, surpassing the $27 million given to Mookie Betts by the Boston Red Sox in January 2020, a month before he was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Ohtani batted .273 with 34 home runs and 95 RBIs this season. On the mound, he was 15-9 with a 2.33 ERA and 219 strikeouts. Ohtani is the first player since Jack Stivetts in 1890 to finish top-five in a league in home runs and pitching strikeouts in a season, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.

Owner Arte Moreno put a “For Sale” sign on his franchise six weeks ago, saying he is strongly thinking about giving up after nearly two decades of mostly underwhelming stewardship. Until Moreno decides whether to move on, nobody who works for the Angels knows exactly what’s looming in the team’s future, which hasn’t felt bright for years despite Ohtani and teammate Mike Trout.

Although Minasian declined to say Thursday whether he knows what his budget will be next season with well over $120 million already committed to just seven returning players and no clear idea who will be writing those checks, he remains indefatigably optimistic about this beleaguered ballclub.

“For me, it’s business as usual,” Minasian said. “Nothing changes. I know ownership still wants to put a good team on the field, and I expect us to improve significantly. Nobody is happy with how this year went, where we ended up in the standings. But for me at least, my day-to-day is the same. It’s obsessing about how we make this club better.”

The Angels are mired in the majors’ longest playoff drought (eight years, shared with Detroit) and the longest streak of losing seasons (seven) after going 73-89 and finishing third in the AL West, 13 games out of a playoff spot. The Halos were 24-13 in mid-May, but soon entered a franchise-record 14-game losing streak during which Minasian fired manager Joe Maddon.

After that, the Angels spent another summer failing to capitalize on the transcendent talents of Ohtani and Trout, who have won two AL MVP awards and no postseason games during their five years together.

“We’ve got two of the greatest players ever to put on uniforms, but we need more,” Minasian said. “It’s not a 2-on-2 game. If it was, I would love our chances.”

Minasian knows it’s his responsibility to surround Ohtani and Trout with the supporting cast to succeed. He is determined to do it right this winter, even if he can’t say exactly how he’ll do that with an owner who’s thinking about leaving, and a newly permanent manager — Phil Nevin — who’s on a one-year contract in a nod to the Angels’ unsettled future.

“I’m very confident we’ll be able to make this team better,” Minasian said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

St. Louis Cardinals’ Albert Pujols says he almost retired after struggles in June

St. Louis Cardinals slugger Albert Pujols said he almost called it quits this summer before going on a tear that helped him become just the fourth player in major league history to reach 700 career home runs.

Pujols told MLB.com in a story published Thursday night that he contemplated an early retirement in June after another rough start to the season. The future Hall of Famer was slashing .198/.294/.336 and had hit just four homers with 17 to go to hit 700.

But after tweaking how he was holding the bat in early July, something clicked. Pujols went on to slash .314/.377/.681, becoming one of the best hitters in baseball to close the season while mashing 20 homers in just over three months.

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“When you have good people around you and they are encouraging you and you realize that God has opened so many doors for you, man, it puts things back into perspective,” Pujols told MLB.com. “I decided, ‘I’m going to stick with it!’ I knew sooner or later it was going to come and turn around for me, because it can’t be like it was all year long.”

Pujols returned to the Cardinals this offseason with the intention to retire after the season, a plan he says he will stick to despite the stellar year. Cardinals president of baseball operations John Mozeliak said he was happy Pujols’ retirement didn’t happen earlier.

“We were aware that there were some difficult times, but we are so glad that he was able to marshal through it,” Mozeliak told MLB.com.

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Phillies stun Cardinals with wild 9th-inning rally to open wild card

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