Cardinals Pitching Dominates Dodgers Again in NLCS Game Two

By TheNaturalMevs on October 13, 2013

Alright, so I didn’t see this game – I was playing the best 18 holes of my life – so it’s hard to analyze it too much. The Dodgers find themselves in an 0-2 hole. I saw that Yasiel Puig struck out four more times.

The Dodgers, my playoff horse that I’ve strapped my oxcart to; are now facing a game three in Los Angeles against Adam Wainwright that basically keeps their hopes alive. They counter with Hyun Jin-Ryu. And the thing rigth now is; there’s just not much an opportunity to score runs off anyone. No one in the St. Louis bullpen gives up any runs (9.2 innings of scoreless baseball so far in the NLCS) and it’s not like the St. Louis rotation is going to allow anything substantial. So how the Hell do you score off these guys? How the Hell did the Pirates beat these pesky bastards twice?

The Cardinals aren’t exactly knocking the cover off the ball themselves. Clayton Kershaw was pretty strong today and the game’s lone run was scored on a sacrifice fly and was unearned.

The Dodgers are definitely up against it now. They’re making my bold and brash predictions about them rolling the Cardinals seem foolish and unfounded. It looks like everything is going their way. Hanley Ramirez didn’t play today. Andre Ethier was out of the lineup hurt (though I saw that he struck out to end the game). Yet still, I want to make it clear that I believe this Los Angeles team is made of enough gusto to scrape themselves off the canvas and answer the bell for the next round.

The Dodgers are going to beat Adam Wainwright in game three, and it’s going to swing the series. They’re going to do it at home in that magical, bright ballpark with the palm trees. They’re going to do it because Wainwright – while he’s a horse – that game give against the Pirates took more out of him then anyone realizes. It’s a lot to ask a guy to come back and be that sharp again after that kind of high workload. Wainwright has a lot of miles on his arm and we’ve already seen a decent offensive team in Cincinnati get to him in the not so recent past.

Los Angeles is desperate, and they’ll need something more out of Puig and Adrian Gonzalez among others; but if they win game three, the Cardinals don’t have a set answer for game four as far as a starter. Shelby Miller is going to be phenomenal, but the Dodgers can get to him. If the Dodgers can even this series at two; and I believe they will, there will be no turning back for them. Reaching way down deep within themselves and finding a way to win game three is the biggest domino that needs to fall at this point.

Hopefully now that Puig had a sombrero to wear on his plane ride back to SoCal, the Dodgers have had a chance to clear their minds as a team. Getting back to Los Angeles will help. The Cardinals are all the talk right now for having flawless pitching performances, and if they continue to get them there just isn’t much that can be done. But what are the chances that the Dodgers could actually get another one of these gems from their entire pitching staff? Someone has to slip, and the Dodgers will be waiting in the weeds.

And what the Hell is this with the entire series being on TBS? Is this hockey, Selig? I’ve defended you in the past you dopey, Donald-Duck dweebosaurus; but put the damn national LCS games all on FOX or a network that we all know the channel number on. Get your head out of your ass!