stone. Louis-Jean Segura’s career spanned 11 seasons and 1,328 games before he finally made the playoffs, the longest winning streak in the major leagues. On the morning of his first playoff game, the Philadelphia Phillies second baseman barely slept. He woke up at 7am “full of adrenaline”. Friday passed and the advantage never left.
“I’m mentally focused on every game, every pitch,” Segura said. “I was ready to play a game today and to be able to be here – I just thank God it’s all on my side.”
With the Phillies running, bases loaded, one in ninth and St. The St. Louis Cardinals scrambled to replace their injured nearfield, and Segura sneaked a ball on a slightly shrunk infield, two-pointers to put the Phillies in their best-of-three wild-card series An improbable 6-3 win in their opening game put them on the cusp of entering the National League Division Series.
The Cardinals went 2-0 into the final inning, backed by a terrific performance from Jose Quintana and a terrific homer from Juan Yepez, and There’s every reason to believe they’ll be heading towards a Game 1 victory. They were at home, the crowd at Busch Stadium sold out, and their lights-out Ryan Helsley was on the mound.
It was followed by gullibility.
Entering the ninth inning, the Cardinals led 93-0 in playoff history. Meanwhile, the Phillies are 0-54 in the regular season under the same circumstances. They ended up scoring six times — the most for a ninth-lowest team in playoff history. Neither of their runs had hard contact. Alec Bohm loaded the bases and Brandon Marsh hit a helicopter that bounced off Nolan Arenado’s glove , Kyle Schwarber made a sacrifice fly while Bryson Stott made a Paul Goldschmidt on his grounder A diving competition but came home late.
The biggest run came from Segura, who charged a low slider away from Andre Palant and hit a quad funnel on the right, sneaking through a massive Tommy Edman, soup Miedman is playing lightly to account for Segura’s speed. The Cardinals had an earth pitcher against an earth hitter and got an earth that could produce a game-ending double – but it was hit a little too far.
“That’s what an inning looks like,” Arenado said. “It’s not going our way.”
And it all seems to stem from Hurseley’s right middle finger, the one he got stuck in while concentrating on a defensive game in the penultimate game of the regular season. Hurseley threw some balls in Thursday’s practice, and while he admitted his fingers felt a little stiff, he told the Cardinals that he was ready to end the game in the playoffs.
Cardinals manager Oliver Mulmore turned to Hurseley, hitting one out in the eighth inning, watching him quickly deal with Marsh and Schwaber. However, shortly after the ninth inning, Mulmore said Hurseley “started to lose a little bit of a feel for his pitch.”
Hurseley, who has emerged as one of the most dominant finishers in the sport this season, started turnovers within the strike zone and ended up throwing just nine of his 23 pitches in the ninth quarter. . JT Realmuto contributed a one-run single, then Bryce Harper and Nick Castellanos went back-to-back, the latter on and off the court. At that point, the Cardinals had Parrant and Jack Flaherty warm up in the bullpen. Bohm will be Helsley’s last hitter — Helsley hit his left shoulder with a 101-mph fastball.
After throwing a warm-up ball outside, Hurseley backed out and left Busch Stadium to image his troublesome fingers.
He might get lost with this series.
“We have people stepping up throughout the year,” Malmore said. “If he goes down, someone else has to step up and do the job, so that’s part of it. No one’s going to feel bad for us, I’ll tell you.”
According to research by ESPN Stats & Information, Friday’s Game 9 was the only half-inning in baseball of the season in which a team allowed at least 6 runs on 3 or fewer hits and didn’t allow extra hits. There are now five games in playoff history in which a team lost by two or more points after the eighth inning — and the Cardinals were involved in three of them. It marked the first time the Phillies scored more than six points in any inning in the playoffs.
They chose the perfect time.
“It’s special,” said Zach Wheeler, who threw 6⅓ scoreless innings against the Cardinals, hitting three before Jose Alvarado gave up a two-run homer to Yepes famous hitter.
“It was probably the most exciting inning I’ve ever played,” Realmuto said of the top of the ninth inning. “And it didn’t even hit a big home run. Our momentum was there and a lot of guys stepped up when they needed to.”