Almost forgot to do this already. The last few hours have been slightly crazy. I’ve also gone crazy; I think about making a lot of trips I never actually make, but I’ve talked myself into driving to St. Luis for (proper) Game 2 of this series. I got no one to ride with, I got a 4.5 hour drive, I got an eTicket from a company I didn’t know existed a half hour ago, and I got plenty of things to occupy my time if I opted to stay home. But, you got to take your chances – and I don’t take enough of ’em – because you don’t really know when you’re going to have another. I’m not getting into Wrigley unless my name comes up in a lottery. New York and Los Angeles seem a fair big longer drives. There may be other years, but there might not. For them or for me.
The Cubs couldn’t take their chances tonight because there weren’t really many of them. I was shocked when the Cardinals took Lackey out of the game, because he was over matching the Cubs and seemed to show no sign of weakness. It’s a one run game and it’s understandable to be cautious, but he was pitching better than Arrieta on Wednesday. This, in a lot of ways, was like being the Pirates on Wednesday – the score was close but the Cubs never felt particularly close to being in it, you had to keep reminding yourself that one hit could tie it up. That hit wasn’t really coming. They made it fun in the ninth, but they never got a run across.
Saturday’s game strangely doesn’t seem like must win. It’d be really great to win, but they have Arrieta on Monday and that seems so certain to get it to 2-1. Lester losing means one of the Other Guys is going to have to win a start, but it’s more about hitters on the team doing a little better. It was only the two guys who hit Cole, and it was not even two guys who hit Lackey on Friday. Hendricks should be okay. I’m more concerned about the bats. Garcia’s not going to be easy.
They did dump Berry, which I was wrong about. They’re going with the conservative route on the rotation, which I was wrong about. Hope I’m not wrong about this trip.