NL wild-card game: Six ways Cardinals vs. Dodgers could play out
By Jake Mintz
FOX Sports MLB Writer
On paper, it’s a mismatch.
If you go by regular-season record, the St. Louis Cardinals are the biggest underdogs in wild-card game history. While the Yankees and Red Sox finished with identical records, the Dodgers finished a whopping 16 games up on the Cardinals. That gap is far and away the largest we’ve ever had between two wild-card teams, smashing the previous mark of six games, which happened in 2012 (Braves/Cards) and 2017 (Yankees/Twins).
The defending champs, winners of 106 baseball games, the best team ever to not win its division, are here only because the San Francisco Giants put together one of the most impressive seasons in recent memory. Los Angeles recorded the second-most wins in baseball, and the reward is a one-game playoff that could end its season in a blink. The Dodgers, with this record, would have won the AL Central by 13 games and the NL East by 18.
If you, like Billie Joe Armstrong, slept through all of September, you’re probably shocked the Cardinals are even here. On the first of last month, St. Louis sat 2.5 games out of a wild-card spot, tied with the Phillies and behind both San Diego and Cincinnati. Then the Cards rattled off one of the greatest months ever, winning 17 consecutive games and securing the second wild card by seven games.
On the mound Wednesday, we’ll have a showdown of ageless wonders: Max Scherzer vs. Adam Wainwright. The two have spent a combined 77 years on this earth and a combined 30 years pitching in the major leagues. Both are wild-card game records. Scherzer is a Cy Young candidate this season, but Wainwright has more postseason experience than the actual Cy Young.
The Cardinals' bullpen might be the biggest question in this game. The Dodgers can afford a shaky Scherzer start by running Tony Gonsolin, Julio Urías or David Price out there in the middle innings.
As for offense, St. Louis struggled mightily this season in two games against Scherzer, failing to score in 14 innings against the heterochromatic hurler. But the Cardinals' offense has improved as the season has progressed. Tyler O’Neill and Paul Goldschmidt will get MVP votes, Nolan Arenado is Nolan Arenado, Harrison Bader has gotten hot. They don’t have 804 All-Stars like the Dodgers' lineup, with Mookie Betts, Corey Seager and the Turners, Justin and Trea, but there’s some real juice here.
A Dodgers loss Wednesday night would be a baseball disaster, a blatantly unfair end to a spectacular season. Because of those parameters, the fog of pressure awaits Dave Roberts & Co. in the home dugout. They’ve been in big games before but never in the wild-card game. The Cardinals are playing with house money; the Dodgers are playing with the better baseball team.
Let’s take a look at some potential scenarios for how the National League wild-card game could play out.
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1. The obvious outcome
Wainwright is fine, but struggles through four or five arduous innings while giving up four or five runs. The Cardinals’ middle relievers can’t hold down the fort as the Dodgers add a few runs in the middle innings. St. Louis gets a few guys on in the eighth but can’t cash in, and L.A. wins 7-2 or 6-1.
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2. Wainwright throws a game for the ages
Waino turns back the clock and delivers an iconic performance to push the Cards into the NLDS. He stymies the Max Muncy-less Dodgers all night, looping lollipop curve after lollipop curve past a frustrated L.A. lineup. The Cardinals hit a few solo shots early, and the Dodgers cave under the pressure of their 106-win season ending so prematurely. Wainwright goes 7.2 strong before handing the ball to Giovanny Gallegos or the ghost of Jason Isringhausen for the ninth.
3. Wainwright hangs with Scherzer; bullpen can’t hold it
The two geriatric pitchers match each other pitch for pitch, and both exit with the game tied or the Cardinals ahead by a run or two. Then left-handed St. Louis reliever Genesis Cabrera comes in for the seventh, and the Dodgers counter with Albert Pujols, who promptly hits a grand slam out of Dodger Stadium. L.A. ends up scoring six runs in the inning to break it open, and then Joe Kelly, Phil Bickford and Kenley Jansen shut it down.
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4. Scherzer continues his rough stretch
In his final two starts of the regular season, Scherzer was not particularly good and might have lost the Cy Young in the process. He went just five innings in each start, allowing five runs in Colorado on Sept. 23 and six against the Padres on Sept. 29. The postseason pitcher hot hand is very much a real thing, so it’s not inconceivable that the Cardinals get to Mad Max.
That’s what happened in the 2019 NL wild-card game, when Scherzer allowed a pair of homers in the early going, was outpitched by Milwaukee's Brandon Woodruff and got bailed out by the Juan Soto single. This scenario would look like a first-inning Goldschmidt solo shot, a fourth-inning O’Neill two-run double, a good start from Waino and maybe a sac fly at some point.
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5. The Dodgers erupt
Have you seen this offense!? Even without the recently injured Muncy, L.A.’s lineup is laughably good and laughably deep. Wainwright is solid for a 40-year-old pitcher, sure, but he and his 89-mph fastball could get their doors unceremoniously blown off in an instant. Mookie hits a homer or two, Trea Turner wreaks havoc on the bases, and some random Dodger such as Matt Beaty cracks a long ball, too. Waino is out of the game by the third inning, and you finally get around to starting "Squid Game" by 10 p.m. ET.
6. Cardinals Devil Magic
If you’re new to this phenomenon, Cardinals Devil Magic is essentially whenever something inexplicably good happens to the St. Louis Cardinals in the postseason. It is Pete Kozma in the 2012 NLDS, it’s Nelson Cruz in the 2011 World Series, it’s the 2012 wild-card game infield fly disaster, it’s everything David Eckstein ever did.
A Cardinals Devil Magic win in Wednesday’s game would probably involve three scoreless relief innings from Jon Lester, a Matt Carpenter pinch-hit homer and a go-ahead Lars Nootbaar infield bunt triple.
You won’t be laughing when it actually happens.
Jake Mintz is the louder half of @CespedesBBQ and a baseball analyst for FOX Sports. He’s an Orioles fan living in New York City, and thus, he leads a lonely existence most Octobers. If he’s not watching baseball, he’s almost certainly riding his bike. You can follow him on Twitter @Jake_Mintz.