As this exciting season rushes to a conclusion, I figured it was worth breaking the series-by-series update pattern to spotlight the games even more closely in the final stretch of the pennant chase.
Jack Bauer Squared entered a four-game road series against second-place Steroids Make You Fast; Just Ask Jose with a one-game lead with 12 games left in the season. The goal in a series like that is to do no worse than a split, so we would at least emerge with a one-game division lead with 8 to play.
In the 2nd inning, Steroids got back-to-back homers from Willie McCovey and Andy Van Slyke to open the scoring, but Kal Daniels responded with a 2-run homer in the 3rd to even it. Steroids responded with two more runs in the 3rd, but we tied it again in the 4th on run-scoring singles by Garry Maddox and Rafael Ramirez. Definitely a playoff feel to this one!
In the top of the 6th we broke the tie on a sacrifice fly from Ramirez and turned a 1-run lead over to the bullpen to protect for 4 innings. In the 7th, Ryne Sandberg walked, stole second, and scored on Carlos Delgado’s single to put us up 6-4. Everyone seems to be chipping in on this one.
Cal Ripken Jr. led off the bottom of the 8th with a homer to cut the lead to 1, but that was the extent of the damage. Bob Woodward took the mound in the 9th to try for his 35th save and struck out Jose Canseco with the tying run on second to preserve a 6-5 win. Woodward’s ERA dropped to 0.55, and he still has only allowed earned runs in one game all season and any runs at all twice in 38 appearances.
That was huge, as it put us 2 games up with 11 to play and at the very least assured we wouldn’t get swept. We brought back Mike Cuellar on short rest to start the next game and hoped for one of his Dr. Jekyll outings that have at least recently been more common.
The second game began auspiciously as Daniels led off with his 19th homer, and we took advantage of an outfield error by Canseco (famously not the best of outfielders) with a run-scoring single by Bobby Bonilla for his 100th RBI (joining Delgado and Bobby Murcer in the club). Cuellar helped his own cause with a run-scoring single in the 4th, and Sandberg drove him in to put us up 4-0.
Murcer hit his 27th homer in the top of the 7th to make it 5-0, and Cuellar kept it going until the 8th. An error by Ramirez helped Steroids pick up two runs, but Cuellar got McCovey to hit into a 3-6-3 double play to end the frame.
With Woodward resting, Rod Beck took the mound for the 9th and worked a 1-2-3 inning for his 3rd save. Cuellar upped his record to 17-12 and lowered his ERA to 4.34, the best it’s been the entire season. Considering it was at 6.72 after his first 10 starts, he’s been pretty solid in the 33 since (3.67 ERA across that span).
The win put us 3 games ahead of Steroids with 10 to play and actually made me look for the first time at our magic number, which is 8. That means any combination of our wins or their losses reaching 8 puts us in the playoffs, and with two more head-to-head games here we could knock 2 or 4 more off that total.
Still, it’s a long 10 games starting with these two to finish the series and then facing the rest of the division. A Rod, some Wood and a Big Unit is only 4 games back, and we play them next. I’ve blown and overcome bigger leads, so it’s nice to be sitting at the top but it’s not a comfortable spot by any means.
