NLCS – All to play for place in World Series

The San Francisco Giants are still alive having staved off elimination and adversity all season long.

Last night, the Giants beat the St. Louis Cardinals 6-1 to set up a deciding NLCS game 7, after which the winner will face the Detroit Tigers in the World Series.

The Giants have won five straight elimination games and thanks to starter Ryan Vogelsong’s career high nine strikeouts in seven innings of work last night, they have won the most important one to date.

But this is no surprise to the Giants clubhouse that they have pulled yet another trick out of the bag. First they lost Brian Wilson, and the doubts began to creep in. What seems like a long time ago now, Melky Cabrera was suspended 50 games for a positive drug test; the doubts swirled bigger.

After that, their NL West rival Dodgers pulled off a huge blockbuster trade, and even though the Giants were in first place, suddenly Los Angeles were favourites.

In this postseason, the Giants were in a 0-2 hole against the Cincinnati Reds but won three straight in Cincinnati. Several days ago they were flying home from Busch Stadium behind three games to one, but have fought back to set up what will be the biggest night at AT&T Park since the championship year in 2010.

The towels will be waving on Monday night for the winner-takes-all finale, and before we look at the match-ups for that game, last night was if not predictable then at least unlucky for the losing road team.

Before the game manager Mike Matheny scratched Matt Holliday – St. Louis’ regular-season leader in hits, RBIs and OPS – from game six because of tightness in his lower back. The news was most certainly unwelcome for them.
Cardinals starter Chris Carpenter can usually bring a competitive start when it matters most, but yesterday his fastball just wasn’t working and his secondary pitches caused no harm to the Giants.

San Francisco had a four-run second and Carpenter was out of the game after four innings with his team in a 5-0 hole. What’s more, Giants foul balls were flying into the front row seats while the Cards were popping theirs into Giants gloves for outs.

Gregor Blanco struck a routine grounder to first baseman Matt Carpenter in the fifth, and instead of an easy out the ball somehow hopped over Carpenter’s head. In the eighth second baseman Daniel Descalso suffered a worse fate, with the one-hopper hitting him squarely in the face.

Vogelsong, who struck out nine including the entire side in the first inning, has spent time in Japan during a sometimes gruelling career which has seen him, perhaps timely, prepare him for this moment. He is now 2-0 this post season  posting a 1.42 ERA and a .162 batting average against.

In the midst of a rotation that poses the likes of Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum, Vogelsong has been the Giants most consistent pitcher in the play-offs.

The aforementioned Cain takes the ball for the Giants in game seven, and he will be squaring up against Kyle Lohse.
Cain threw a perfect game this season and picked up the win in the All-Star game in Kansas. His team have won five straight elimination games. To counter that? The Cardinals are the best team in baseball when it comes to fighting back until the last out is made, and just to ease their doubts Lohse has won six straight elimination games for St. Louis.

That’s 6-5 in favour of the Cardinals in elimination terms, but game 7 can provide only one winner. While the Tigers sit back and watch both these teams knock the life out of each other, make no mistake that San Francisco and St. Louis will have all the energy needed for a magical final game.