RMJ 59 April 14

MONDAY, APRIL 14 ● St. Louis, vs Cardinals

Last night I tried to read myself to sleep. Trouble is, The Last Picture Show is bumping-and- grinding to a lustful conclusion. Instead of making me drowsy, it got me all stirred up.

I awoke at 8:00, having slept five-and-a-half hours. I felt great.

We need a victory in the worst way, and The Enigma is on this hill this afternoon. Sometimes he can get in a pretty good groove, and he seems to be in one right now.

That was not evident when he started out by walking the leadoff hitter, Royce Clayton. Willie McGee came up hitting lefthanded, and Biggio moved over to close off the hole. Kile got ahead in the count, and McGee hit a hot ground ball to the right of Biggio, sending Clayton to third. In Biggio’s preferred position, he would have made a double play. He looked into the dugout, and I just threw my palms up and grinned.

He seemed to be amused too; I thought he might get mad. It doesn’t take much get to his flash point during the game.

In the second frame, Kile had a man on first and the pitcher hitting with two outs. I knew La Russa didn’t want to attempt a steal, because if he failed, the pitcher would have to lead off the next inning, so I motioned for Bagwell to play behind the runner. Kile didn’t notice, and he turned to pick the guy off base. When he didn’t see Bagwell there, he held the ball and was charged with a balk The pitcher, Matt Morris, promptly singled and the Cards went up 2-0.

Morris pitched a strong game, and so did Kile. In fact, Darryl was so enigmatic that I let him face Willie McGee with two outs and men on second-and-third in the eighth. McGee is a .550 lifetime hitter against Kile, but this round went to D.K. 

When Tony Fossas took over, we were down by a run, and down to the short strokes. We managed to get the game tied, but Dennis Eckersley came in and stopped it right there. Billy Wagner came in and pitched a scoreless ninth, striking out the side.

Derek Bell led off with a double to start the tenth. Virdon asked me if I wanted to bunt, but I let Luis González hit instead, figuring he could pull the ball. Eck got two quick strikes, but Gonzo fought off a couple of pitches and finally was hit with one.

That brought Tony Eusebio to the plate. Tony is a good clutch hitter, but also a candidate for a double play. He cannot bunt. I could have hit for him, using Ausmus or even one of the starting pitchers to bunt; instead, I decided to just let him hit, which surely raised some eyebrows.

The count went to 3-2, and I turned the runners loose, risking a strikeout-throw-out double play, but avoiding the typical twin-killing.

As the runners broke, Tony hit a fly ball to right. By the time Bell could get back to second, it was too late to tag up.

At this point, I pinch-hit Bill Spiers, and he came through with a two-run double into the rightfield corner. Now if we could just hold them! John Hudek came on and made sure of that, retiring the Redbirds 1-2-3.

 

It was a great victory, and it allowed us to split the series. We went 3-4 on the trip, and we are now 8-5 overall. If you had asked me on Opening Day, I would have settled for 7-6 or even 6-7 during this stretch, but it doesn’t get any easier: we play two at home with the Expos and then head for the West Coast.

On the plane, I talked with Bidge some more about the double-play configuration. We decided to meet at the Dome at 3:30 to walk out on the infield and get a fix on it.