St. Louis Cardinals: How the Atlanta Braves' Choke Job Gave Life to Cardinals

A month ago, the St. Louis Cardinals were done.  Stick a fork in 'em.  Dead, on the side of the road.  They couldn't play defense, their pitching was falling apart and even their offense was sputtering.  They traded their best young player for help down the stretch, and they were still going to miss the playoffs by a mile.

Oh yeah, and Albert Pujols was a free agent, and he would surely sign with the Cubs in the offseason.

Everything you read or heard about the Cardinals was gloom and doom.  Well, everything except this piece I wrote.  Okay, sorry for the shameless promotion, but I have to say it: I told you so.  Well, I almost told you so. 

I called it.  I said the Cardinals would come back.  I just thought it would be against the Brewers.  I couldn't see any way whatsoever that they could even dream of catching the Atlanta Braves, not with the Braves pitching, defense and that bullpen—and Chipper.  I thought Atlanta was the second-best team in the National League, right behind the Phillies. 

The Braves were a lock to make the NL playoffs, right? 

Not so fast. 

The Braves are choking hard in September.  The core of their lineup (Brian McCann, Dan Uggla, Chipper Jones and Freddie Freeman) have combined to go 11-74, a paltry .148 average, during the last week.  The Braves don't have a deep lineup to begin with, so when these guys stall, the whole offense grinds to a halt. 

The pitching has also been even worse.

Jair Jurrjens is one of the top pitchers in baseball, posting a 1.87 ERA before the All-Star break.  He can't help the Braves right now, though, because he is injured.  So is Tommy Hanson, another great young pitcher on the Braves staff.  So that leaves the rest of the heavy lifting to Tim Hudson, the veteran of the staff, and he has been solid. 

The problem is, Hudson needs some help.

Derek Lowe has lost his last four starts.  The two young guys expected to help, Brandon Beach and Mike Minor, haven't been able to stop the bleeding.  Beach has lost four games in a row and has an ERA of 5.06 in September.  Minor has won two of his last three decisions, but his ERA of 4.03 means that a lot of games are too close for comfort.

And when your starting pitching breaks down, it always spills over into your bullpen.  The Braves have a good record mainly because that starting pitching has been good, and then they hand the ball to a great bullpen.  Their rookie closer Craig Kimbrel has had a spectacular season, but down the stretch he has lost five games in September, with an ERA of 10.13.

So when the offense sputters, the pitching goes awry and the bullpen fails, you have all of the necessary ingredients for a choke.  The Braves effectively "left the door open," and all the Cardinals had to do was get hot.  The Cardinals have won 12 out of their last 14 games.  The offense, led by Pujols, is on fire.  The pitching has been solid. 

The Cardinals have one more game in New York against the Mets.  After that, they head home for three games against the lowly Cubs.  They close the season out on the road with three games against the Houston Astros, the worst team in baseball. 

I think the Cards will go 5-2 during this stretch.

The Braves head to Washington for three games, where they will have to face Stephen Strasburg.  They close the season with three games in Philadelphia.  The Phillies have clinched home-field advantage throughout the NL playoffs.  It will be interesting to see if they rest their players or go all out for the win.  Because, if the Braves win, the Phillies would probably play the Cardinals in the first round of the playoffs.

I'm not sure anybody wants to play the Cardinals right now.

So, it will be an interesting final two weeks of the season.  I think the Braves will close the season out by going 2-4.  The Cardinals will win the NL Wild Card on the last day of the season. 

And my prediction will have come true.  Sort of.