If the Dodgers manage to come all the way back in this National League Championship Series, the turning point will have been two at-bats today by Yadier Molina, the Cardinals catcher and a darkhorse N.L. Most Valuable Player candidate, who was anything but valuable to his club at the plate today.
With the Cardinals hungry to put this thing away and threatening to do so right off the bat against an uncharacteristically shaky Zack Greinke (who later admitted to being nervous), Molina came to the plate in the top of the first inning with the bases loaded and one out and promptly grounded into a third-to-first double play, siphoning off the threat and igniting a crowd of 53,183.
And then, with the Dodgers having taken a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the second and the Cardinals having bounced right back to tie it with two in the top of the third and threatening to get more, Molina stepped into the box with runners on the corners and one out. And promptly hit a doubleplay grounder right back to Greinke, siphoning off that threat and reigniting a crowd that never really quieted thereafter.
The Dodgers jumped back in front on the first of Adrian Gonzalez‘s two homers in the bottom of that inning, and the second of Molina’s two GIDPs began a run of 13 consecutive batters retired by Greinke until he finally was lifted after the top of the seventh. Eight of those 13 outs came on ground balls.
Molina, by the way, struck out in his other two at-bats. He is 3-for-17 in the series.
By the way, the Dodgers’ four home runs tied their all-time, single-season club record for an NLCS game. Their previous four-homer NLCS game was Game 1 of the 1978 NLCS at old Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. In that game, Steve Garvey hit two while Davey Lopes and Steve Yeager hit one apiece.
By the way II, if the Dodgers do come back to win this series, Greinke has staked his own claim for series Most Valuable Player. In two starts, he has given up four runs on 10 hits over 15 innings, with 14 strikeouts and only two walks. For the sabermetricians out there, that is a 0.8 WHIP.
By the way III, the Dodger Stadium press box is the same one that was built when the ballpark itself was built in 1962, and it never really has been upgraded in 52 years. It’s small and cramped, and if you’re claustrophobic like I am, it is especially uncomfortable when it gets crowded, as it is for the postseason, and when it’s hot outside, as it was for all three of these games.
So in a classic veteran move, I gave my assigned seat to colleague Pedro Moura of the Orange County Register and set up shop in the media workroom — which is really the media dining room, but they converted it into a workroom for the postseason — and watched the game on TV. As luck would have it, I have had the pleasure of sitting around a table for the past three days with good friends Tracy Ringolsby, Adam McCalvy, Alyson Footer and Steve Gilbert, all of MLB.com, and Michael Martinez of FoxSportsWest.com, and we had a blast. We laughed incessantly, mocked each other mercilessly and ate way too many snacks, and yet we somehow managed to get all our work done.
Now, it’s on to St. Louis, where seven-year-old Busch Stadium has a big, spacious, comfortable press box. Doesn’t sound like nearly as much fun.