Smith Gets Down To Business
Ozzie Smith started at shortstop for the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 2 of the playoffs at St. Louis, and it was no sentimental journey.
Although the game could have been his final appearance at Busch Stadium, manager Tony La Russa said he decided to use the 41-year-old Smith instead of Royce Clayton because he thought he’d improve the lineup.
“This is the postseason,” La Russa said. “So he’ll play just like he did all year long, because he gives us a good chance to win.”
Smith walked in his first two at-bats and singled and scored in the Cardinals’ three-run fifth.
Before the game, Smith said he didn’t want any of the focus on him. The Cardinals retired his No. 1 jersey on Saturday and he took a victory lap at Busch after Sunday’s regular-season finale, signing autographs and waving to the crowd.
To show he was serious about it, he didn’t perform his trademark back flip when he took the field.
“I’m trying to get over all of that stuff,” Smith said. “That’s over with now and it’s business at hand.”
Cards stay aggressive
Brian Jordan heard the crack of the bat and bolted home from third without a second thought.
With the score tied 4-all in the eighth inning, Jordan was on third with the potential go-ahead run when Tom Pagnozzi hit a liner toward the mound.
Fortunately for Jordan and the Cardinals, San Diego reliever Trevor Hoffman only deflected the ball with his glove, and it bounced to second baseman Jody Reed. Reed had no play at the plate and had to throw to first as Jordan came in with the winning run to give St. Louis a 5-4 win in their best-of-5 N.L. playoff series.
“If Hoffman fields the ball, I’m out and it looks bad,” Jordan said. “But we’ve been playing aggressive baseball all year and we weren’t going to stop today.”
Torre says Jimmy’s the Key
As New York Yankees manager Joe Torre mulled his options for today’s Game 3 starter against the Texas Rangers, the deciding factor was experience.
Jimmy Key was the choice over former Ranger Kenny Rogers. Not just for his 411 career regular-season outings, but because of his seven in the postseason. Key is 1-1 with a 3.80 ERA in five appearances in League Championship Series games, and 2-0 with a 1.00 ERA in two World Series outings.
The 35-year-old left-hander certainly did not get the call because of his numbers against Texas. Key was 0-2 with an 8.71 ERA (10 earned runs in 10-1/3 innings) in two starts against the Rangers this season.
The spin on those numbers is that they came while Key was in the inconsistent phase of his recovery from rotator cuff surgery.
Since then, Key has been more like the old pitcher who was 152-93 with a 3.40 ERA in his major-league career, including 9-6 with a 3.94 ERA against the Rangers.
“His control is back, and his confidence is back,” Yankees third baseman Wade Boggs said. “Now he knows when he releases the ball it’s going into a certain area.”
Ratings skid
Ratings for the second night of baseball’s divisional playoffs were down 32 percent from last year, while total viewership is up, according to Fox Sports.
Fox received a 7.3 rating and 14 share for its Wednesday night telecast of Texas at New York, down from the 10.7 rating NBC got for the second night of last year’s playoffs. NBC, however, regionalized four games one year ago.
Two other games shown by ESPN drove the total national rating to a gross of about 12.1, representing 11.7 million American homes, compared with 10.3 million homes last year.