Cardinals complain Texas fans cheer too dang loud!

[Redbear]

La Russa explained that he wanted Jason Motte warming up in the inning, but the bullpen coach misheard and had Lance Lynn warming up instead. "What happened was that twice the bullpen didn't hear Motte's name," La Russa said."They heard 'Rzepczynski and they didn't get Motte. I looked up there and Motte wasn't going. So I called back for Motte and they got Lynn up. ... I don't know if it was noisy, probably real noisy. They just didn't hear the second time."


http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/18018/rangers-win-wacky-and-weird-game-5

[saras]

1. Bring on the vuvuzelas

[yellowcanine]

2. La Russa is full of crap and making excuses. He left Rzepczynski in to face

Napoli because there was a lefty batting next, thanks to Washington's line-up changes for exactly that reason. Then when it went bad, La Russa is looking for excuses rather than admit he got out managed. Even the Cardinal bullpen coach said that the plan all along was to have Rzep face Napoli in that situation but to intentionally walk him. Of course he couldn't do that because the bases were loaded and Motte wasn't ready so La Russa was punked. If the plan changed, La Russa sure didn't let his bullpen coach know. The big mistake made in that inning was to intentionally walk Cruz, basically gambling on getting a double play to end the inning. If that doesn't happen, the best scenario La Russa has is to walk Napoli to load the bases. The worst scenario is what happened. La Russa over manages sometimes and this time it caught up with him. Sometimes you have to let your pitchers pitch, which is what he should have done with Dotel facing Cruz and go for the strike out. That is why you have Dotel pitching in that situation and you are not even going to give him a chance to do what he is capable of doing?

I also don't quite buy the Lynn - Motte mixup. The names don't sound much more similar than Rzepcynski - Motte. Maybe La Russa needs to get his bullpen coach a hearing aid. Or back up the call to the bullpen with a text message.

[yellowcanine]

3. Oh and the bullpen phone fracas doesn't explain the base running errors.

First La Russa apparently allows Pujols to call his own hit and runs even with the tortoise Craig at first base, guaranteeing an out when Pujols fails to swing. Or maybe Craig missed a sign? Who knows, neither Pujols nor La Russa is saying. Then La Russa tries the same play on a 3-2 count in the ninth and this time Pujols swings and misses for a lovely strike em out throw em out result. You would think after the earlier fiasco with Craig running that La Russa would have decided that sending Craig with Pujols at the plate is just not such a great idea. This is all the more strange when you consider that the Cardinals need two runs, not one, to tie. Sending Craig in that situation is playing for one run when you need two. All it does is put more pressure on Pujols, - maybe if Craig is not running, Pujols decides not to swing - and the pitch appeared to be ball four. It certainly didn't appear to be a pitch which Pujols normally swings at. So instead of runners on first and second with nobody out or at worst,a runner on first with one out, you have nobody on base and no outs. That is simply not smart baseball. It is as if the fantastic success which the Cardinals and La Russa had in September has gone to La Russa's head and he thinks he can do no wrong. Maybe La Russa takes too much credit as manager for the September miracle?

[KamaAina]

4. Haven't they ever played at Miller Park with the roof closed?

:shrug:

[brendan120678]

5. MLB should ban fans from cheering at home games.

It's the only way to be fair and equitable to the visiting team.