Atlanta Braves fall to St. Louis Cardinals 3-6 as Chipper Jones misses double play - MLB Update
Starter Kris Medlen becomes victim of poor throwing by fielders in their Wild Card game as Atlanta Braves face a 3-6 defeat against St. Louis Cardinals at Turner Field, Atlanta, Georgia on October 5, 2012.
Catcher David Ross provided Atlanta an early lead by hitting a two-run homer in the second inning.
Momentum from there onward could not be carried forward by the Braves.
Instead of strengthening their lead and putting pressure on the opposition in a crucial game, they let them dominate and eventually win.
Fourth inning proved decisive as the Cardinals produced three runs in it. Momentum all of a sudden shifted towards the Cardinals. Confidence of the Braves in the process suffered a major dent.
However, the Braves kept striking hits and trying to bounce back at the earliest. Unfortunately most of their hits could not be transformed into runs on the scoreboard.
Atlanta offensively was better than Cardinals in many ways. They managed 12 hits which are far more than the six coming from St. Louis.
Medlen will be extremely disappointed. He was fairly impressive on the mound but he was undone by throwing errors from the fielders. Had the defence of Atlanta been good enough, outcome may have been very different.
In little more than six innings, Medlen gave up five runs while only two of them were earned and the rest were caused by the fielding errors. The fact he leaked just three hits proves that he was not far from his best.
Third baseman Chipper Jones who played his last Major League game does not have anything to cheer at the moment. He was in a position to make a double-play but instead of this his poor throwing led the base-runners aboard.
"Ultimately, I feel I'm the one to blame," Jones said. "That should have been a tailor-made double play."
Talking about the umpire decision which resulted in protest from the fans and the halting of the match for a couple of minutes, Jones said they have nobody to accuse of the failure but themselves.
"That one play didn't cost us the game. Three errors cost us the game," he said. "We just dug ourselves too big a hole."
The long arduous season has ended for the Braves. They will be looking to build up a strong team for the future.
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