The Cardinals got two mighty swings from Paul Goldschmidt and, through nine innings, the two runs those swings produced proved to be too few as the slimmest possible lead slipped away in the ninth.
So abridged ball took over.
In the 10th inning, with the winning run gifted to the Cardinals by rule at second base, the Detroit Tigers sidestepped Goldschmidt by just putting him on base. Without a pitch thrown, the Cardinals had two runners on base, no outs, and were 180 feet from splitting the two-game interleague series. After a double steal, an intentional walk for Nolan Arenado loaded the bases. Already with 14 strikeouts in the game, the Cardinals didn’t get the ball in play to produce the winning run — until rookie Lars Nootbaar threaded a single to right.
