The St. Louis Cardinals will be playing in the National League Championship Series for the fourth year in a row and the ninth time since 2000 after their 3-2 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night.
First baseman Matt Adams cracked a three-run home run for St. Louis in the seventh inning off Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Bernie Miklasz sets the scene:
"Kershaw had owned the Cardinals for the first six innings. He'd been scratched for one hit. The Dodgers had put everything on him, but Kershaw was carrying the weight and refusing to fade.
"But now, finally, the Cardinals were swirling. The commotion put the crowd back into the game. Everywhere you looked the color red was slowly rising, with 46,906 fans becoming more expectant by the second.
"Cards first baseman Matt Adams stood and waited for Kershaw. He was already down one strike in the count. A poor .199 hitter against lefthanded pitching during his major-league career, Adams was staring at the game's ultimate lefty. This was about as sorry a matchup as Adams could get.
"But this was the seventh inning. This is when the Cardinals had made their move on the Dodgers in winning Game 1 and Game 3. Cardinals Chairman Bill DeWitt Jr., seated near the field, felt the vibration emitting from the crowd. It was wall-to-wall sound. A feeling came over him, too.
" 'We were all saying down there, "This is our inning." So when the first two guys got on, I felt something good was going to happen,' DeWitt said."
Adams talks about his homer in this video.
Last year's NL Cy Young Award winner leaves the postseason with an ugly 7.82 ERA and two losses.
San Francisco Takes Down The Nationals In Game 4
The San Francisco Giants closed out their National League Division Series with the Washington Nationals in Game 4 of the best-of-five playoff. They beat the Nats 3-2 Tuesday night at home in AT&T Park.
Joe Panik scored the go-ahead run in the seventh inning on Aaron Barrett's bases-loaded wild pitch.
The Giants' bullpen then held off Washington to earn a spot in the NLCS.
Closer Santiago Casilla pitched a scoreless ninth inning to earning his second NLDS save.
The Giants will travel to St. Louis to play the Cardinals on Saturday. It will be a rematch of their 2012 NCLS.
That year, the Giants rallied from a 3-1 deficit to beat St. Louis and move on to the World Series, which they won — their second championship in three years.
American League Championship Series
The Kansas City Royals travel to Baltimore to play the Orioles on Friday in the best-of-seven American League Championship Series.
ESPN has a schedule of game times and TV coverage.
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