As I mentioned in my last post my folks were in town for Turkey Day, and as it so happened, my dad's two favorite teams were playing next in this Statis Pro season. He was born in Brooklyn while the Dodgers were still there, and so that's always been his favorite team, but when he was a young kid his family moved to St. Louis. That made the Cards his second favorite. My dad is the one who bought me this game as a kid, so it was fun to be back together playing again.
My dad took control of the Dodgers and made a couple of interesting lineup decisions, including batting Ken Landreaux in the third spot. I quickly figured out why he did it: Landreaux has a "hit and run" rating of 2, and my dad loves to use the hit and run. When my dad bought this game for me it came with the 1985 season, and most of our games consisted of his Dodgers versus my Orioles. For some reason Landreaux had a lot of timely hits in those games and those negative memories are still burned in my brain!
Bob Welch was pitching for the Dodgers and kept working in and out of jams. The lead-off hitter got on base the first five innings in a row, and each one of them stole second base off a battered Steve Yeager. All told the Cardinals stole six bases during the game, which is definitely the most I've ever stolen in a single game this season. St. Louis put two runs on the board in the second with RBI singles from Darrell Porter and Ozzie Smith, but that was the only real damage done in the first seven innings.
The Dodgers offense was much worse, as Kurt Kepshire was pitching a career game through the first five innings. Not a single Dodger had reached base with the exception of a Ken Landreaux (of course) walk. But with two outs in the sixth and the no-hitter still intact Steve Sax reached on an error. My dad then used Bill Russell's hit and run rating of 1 to push Sax to third on the first hit of the game. Kepshire retired the next hitter to keep L.A. scoreless.
In the top of the eighth Kepshire put two Dodgers on the bases and was finally pulled for Bruce Sutter. But Sutter gave up an RBI single to Bill Russell and an RBI ground out to Landreaux to tie the game. That made it a 2-2 game going into the bottom of the eighth.
I'm not going to go into all the details, but the Cardinal offense exploded in the bottom of the inning. Jerry Reuss and Burt Hooton gave up a combined six runs. What went from an exciting game between father and son turned into a route. It always feels good beating your old man in a game!
Winning Pitcher - Bruce Sutter
Losing Pitcher - Jerry Reuss
Player of the Game - Ozzie Smith, 2-3, 3RBI's, 2BB's, R, 2SB's
Hall of Famers in the Game - Ozzie Smith, Bruce Sutter
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