SPRAY HITTER: Carlos Beltran, back in the playoffs for the first time since his infamous 2006 strikeout with the Mets, douses Jon Jay after the Cardinals won Friday’s wild-card game over the Braves. (Getty Images)
ST. LOUIS — If it’s October, the Cardinals must be rising up again.
The team that wouldn’t quit last year, with a shocking run just to make the postseason — mere prelude to winning the World Series in dramatic fashion against the Rangers — is embracing its underdog status heading into today’s Game 1 of the NLDS against the Nationals at Busch Stadium.
”You can take your predictions and underdogs and do whatever you want with them, because it all happens out on the field,” Cardinals manager Mike Matheny said. “And our guys are prepared to go and compete.”
Last year, the Cardinals rebounded from a 10 1/2-game, late-August wild-card deficit to secure a playoff berth on the final day of the regular season before surprising the Phillies in the NLDS and beating the Brewers in the NLCS.
Then came a true Fall Classic. Twice down to their final strike in Game 6 of the World Series, the Cardinals rallied to beat the Rangers before prevailing in Game 7.
The Cardinals secured the NL’s second wild card this season, and on Friday beat the Braves 6-3 in a play-in game to get a shot at the top-seeded Nationals.
Gio Gonzalez, who led the league with 21 victories, will get the ball for the Nationals. Adam Wainwright, who was relegated to watching last year’s magical run while recovering from Tommy John surgery, will start for the Cardinals.
“I tricked myself into believing I was pretty important last year,” Wainwright said. “I felt like I was there for anybody who needed me, at whatever level that was. Nothing else to do, right?
“But looking back on it, it really hits me when autograph seekers hand me a ball and it’s a 2011 World Series ball, and then they take it back and say, ‘No, no, sign this one instead.’ That’s when it hits that I really didn’t get to do a whole lot.”
Other than Wainwright and Matheny (who replaced retired Tony La Russa), the Cardinals’ other key addition from last October is Carlos Beltran, who helped lessen the sting from Albert Pujols’ departure to the Angels.
Matheny would like to think a game such as Friday’s — in which a disputed infield-fly call benefited the Cardinals — will toughen his bunch.
The call in question occurred in the eighth inning as Matt Holliday and shortstop Pete Kozma converged for a fly ball in short left field. The ball dropped, but umpire Sam Holbrook invoked the infield-fly rule, effectively killing a promising Braves rally. Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez unsuccessfully argued the ball was hit too deep for the infield-fly rule to be an option.
“Those close games, where things just don’t go smoothly, I think they develop character,” Matheny said. “I think they develop perseverance.
“To me, as I look at our club, that’s what I see. I see a team that’s tough to beat when you have a great mix of character and talent. They’re going to continue to believe in themselves, and that’s what we have.”