World Series 2013: Wacha the one to watch

Michael Wacha said before Game One of the World Series that he is becoming more noticeable in St. Louis thanks to his recent postseason heroics.

He mentioned a milkshake, termed the ‘Wacha-Wacha’, and said it included crackerjacks to add to the baseball flavour.

Wacha, himself, seems to be flavour of the month, winning his fourth post-season game last night to even the World Series at one game apiece, and he did it with unbelievable calm and aggressiveness against a Red Sox team that were still high off their 8-1 victory in Game One.

During spring training this year, catcher Yadier Molina oversaw Wacha throw in his first professional spring training and said, almost unashamedly: “This kid can pitch in the big leagues right now.”

Always a perfectionist when it comes to evaluating talent, the veteran catcher looks to be right as Wacha continues to have one of the greatest post-seasons ever, let alone from a rookie standpoint.

Six stellar innings and a Cardinals rally in the seventh inning helped the Red Birds to a 4-2 victory, taking the Series back to St. Louis for three games with the series knotted up 1-1.

David Ortiz hit a two-run home run to give Boston a 2-1 lead in the sixth, but Molina – seemingly the greatest future-teller in major league history – said to Wacha in the dugout that he needn’t worry about the long ball: “Yadi came up and was like, ‘Don’t worry. Just hold them here. We’re going to score in the top of the 7th.’ Sure enough we put up a big three spot.”

Wacha was relieved to see the runs come in. Starter John Lackey remained in the game early in the seventh but was pulled after giving up a walk and a single to John Jay. Pete Kozma, who was taken out of the starting lineup after his Game One fielding errors, was brought in as a pinch runner and instantly made up for his previous gaffes by stealing two bases on Craig Breslow, a man who’d allowed only four steals to third base in his career.

A walk, a sacrifice fly, two errors and a Carlos Beltran RBI single followed and suddenly Wacha was staring at another victory with two innings to play.

Last year, the 22-year-old was pitching in college at Texas A&M. He now stands at 4-0 with a 1.00 ERA in the post-season and World Series.

The predictions and comparisons were made by his team-mates in Jupiter, Florida this spring, and now he is dominating the biggest stage of all.

Greatness comes like a roar not a whisper, and Michael Wacha is as lion-hearted as they come. He is set to pitch in Game Six if this Series stretches that far, which could be either a potential clincher or elimination game for the Cardinals.

St. Louis’ future is locked up – so is this compelling Fall Classic – and Wacha is establishing one of the greatest young pitching performances in post-season history.