Lance Lynn was a prolific winner, a strikeout artist and a durable starter for the Cardinals, but, for all his attributes, the feat he struggled most to accomplish was pitching a complete-game shutout.
Lynn had a regular-season career record of 72-47 for the Cardinals, struck out 919 batters in 977.2 innings and pitched 175 innings or more in each of his last five active seasons with the club.
Though he made 161 regular-season starts for St. Louis, Lynn pitched only one complete-game shutout. That occurred on May 27, 2014, against the Yankees at St. Louis.
Sink or swim
Lynn, a right-hander who reached the major leagues with the Cardinals in 2011, won Game 3 of the 2011 World Series, became a full-fledged member of the starting rotation the following season and posted records of 18-7 in 2012 and 15-10 in 2013.
In 2014, he took a 5-2 record into his start against the Yankees at Busch Stadium.
Facing the Yankees for the only time in his big-league career, Lynn got them to hit into 15 groundouts. “They were caught off guard by the sinker and didn’t expect me to use it as much as you can,” Lynn said to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “I elevated later in the game to get fly balls when I needed it.”
The Yankees got five hits and three walks, but were 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position. “We squared some balls up,” Yankees manager Joe Girardi said to Newsday. “We had some chances to score a few runs.”
Cardinals hitters supported Lynn with four runs in the third and a run each in the fifth and seventh. Allen Craig and Matt Holliday each hit a solo home run.
Elusive goal
Lynn threw 116 pitches in eight innings. Manager Mike Matheny usually would relieve a pitcher at that point, but, knowing how much Lynn wanted a chance at a shutout, Matheny and Lynn reached a compromise. Matheny let Lynn start the ninth, but told him he would be lifted if a batter reached base.
Lynn retired the Yankees in order on 10 pitches, getting Yangervis Solarte and Alfonso Soriano to ground out and Brian Roberts to fly out. Boxscore
“Since my first day in the major leagues, that’s your goal, always to throw a complete-game shutout,” Lynn said. “Every time you go out there, that’s your goal _ not give up any runs and finish it. Took me way too long.”
Matheny told The Sports Xchange, “Everyone on the bench knew how much this meant to him. You could tell how long and hard he’d worked to make this happen. You could see the reaction of his teammates.”
Very good pitcher. I wish him continued success.