The Cardinals’ climax to a year of strangeness was fittingly bizarre.
On Oct. 2, 1981, the Cardinals’ chances of reaching the playoffs evaporated in the ninth inning of a game played in a mostly empty stadium on a night with the feel of winter in Pittsburgh.
After the Cardinals came from behind with a pair of home runs in the top of the ninth to tie the score, the last-place Pirates got a run in the bottom half of the inning against the National League’s best closer and won, 8-7.
The loss dropped the Cardinals 1.5 games behind the first-place Expos with two left to play. The Expos clinched the division title the next day, beating the Mets.
In a year when baseball made a sick joke of the season _ foreshadowing a series of decisions that purposely devalue regular-season excellence and reward mediocrity _ the Cardinals finished the 1981 schedule with the best record in the National League East and were excluded from the farce called the postseason.
Bonehead baseball
After major-league players went on strike in June 1981 and ended the walkout in August, those who run baseball decided to have two regular seasons in 1981. All division leaders at the time the strike began were declared champions of the first season. The second season consisted of games played after the strike. Like with the first season, those who finished in first place in a division went to the playoffs.
It didn’t matter to baseball officials that all teams didn’t play the same number of games in either season, or that some played more road games than home games. Baseball held an expanded playoffs _ with four division champions in each league instead of two _ and hoped the manufactured excitement would make fans forget being spat on by the strike.
The Cardinals (30-20) placed second to the Phillies (34-21) in the East Division in the first season.
With three games remaining in the second season, the Cardinals (27-22) trailed the first-place Expos (28-22) by a half-game. The Cardinals closed with a series at Pittsburgh versus the Pirates while the Expos were at New York against the Mets.
Winter wonderland
The series opener at Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers Stadium was played on a Friday night when the temperature at game time was 39 degrees and the wind chill made it feel like 25.
“A swirling wind made pop-ups adventurous, and intermittent drizzle felt like snowflakes,” the Pittsburgh Press reported.
According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, “The weather conditions were fitting for a Steelers playoff game in late December.”
A mere 2,348 spectators attended in a stadium with capacity for 47,971. It was the smallest attendance for a Pirates game since the stadium opened in 1970.
The brand of baseball the frozen faithful witnessed that Friday night caused shivers, too. The Pirates made four errors, one more than the Cardinals.
“Even on ordinary plays, balls popped out of gloves like in a game of flip,” the Pittsburgh Press noted. “There were more drops than in an eye doctor’s office.”
Blaming the weather, Pirates manager Chuck Tanner said, “Hard gloves and cold hands produce a lot of errors.”
Cardinals catcher Darrell Porter suggested frayed nerves played a factor, too. “I wouldn’t say we’re tight, but we haven’t played like we’re in a pennant race,” Porter said.
Coming back
Trailing 7-2, the Cardinals scored three in the sixth to get within two.
In the ninth, George Hendrick led off with a home run against Rod Scurry, working his third inning of relief, but the next two batters made outs.
Porter was the Cardinals’ last hope. After he fell behind in the count, 1-and-2, Porter pounced on an inside fastball.
“I don’t know if I’ve ever hit a ball better than that,” Porter told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
The ball barely stayed inside the foul pole but cleared the wall in right by plenty for a home run, tying the score at 7-7.
“When something like that happens, you think you’re going to win,” Porter said to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
Especially, Porter might have added, when the Cardinals had Bruce Sutter to pitch the bottom of the ninth.
Sutter led the National League in saves for the third consecutive year in 1981.
Walks will haunt
Speedster Omar Moreno led off the ninth for the Pirates and drew a walk. After Tim Foli’s sacrifice bunt moved Moreno to second, Sutter gave an intentional pass to Dave Parker.
Mike Easler batted next. He played in the Cardinals’ farm system in 1976, and he would become the Cardinals’ hitting coach for three years when Tony La Russa was manager.
With the count 2-and-2, Easler sliced a double to left-center, scoring Moreno with the winning run. Boxscore
“Sutter has to pitch low to be effective,” Easler told the Pittsburgh Press. “His pitches dropped a foot. The one I hit did, too, only it was high and dropped right into my swing.”
Flim-flam
In its game story, the Pittsburgh Press declared, “The Pirates didn’t bury the Cardinals. The Cardinals picked up the shovel, dug the hole and jumped in.”
The loss to the Pirates, coupled with the Expos’ 3-0 victory that night, meant the Expos would have to lose their remaining two games for the Cardinals to have a chance to finish atop the division. It didn’t happen. The Expos finished (30-23) a half-game ahead of the Cardinals (29-23).
The Cardinals completed the 1981 schedule with the best overall record in the East Division at 59-43, two games ahead of the Expos (60-48) and 2.5 ahead of the Phillies (59-48).
The Reds had the best overall record in the West Division at 66-42, but, like the Cardinals, didn’t finish atop the division in either season, and didn’t get into the 1981 playoffs.
Incredibly, baseball devised a system in which four National League teams got into the 1981 playoffs, but excluded the two with the best overall records.
Whitey Herzog, who served the dual roles of Cardinals manager and general manager, said baseball’s hierarchy were “dumb dips,” The Sporting News reported.
“This second season is a farce,” Herzog said. “As good as the game was, I can’t believe they messed with it. You wonder why you beat your brains out.”
Since then, baseball has continued to dilute the regular season. Now, a team with the fifth-best record in its league qualifies for the playoffs.
It will get worse. Team owners want to expand the playoffs, following the model from 2020, when 16 teams qualified after the regular season was reduced because of the pandemic. Two of the playoff qualifiers had losing records. Three others, including the Cardinals, who didn’t even play all their scheduled games, got in by finishing two wins over .500.
The same thing happened to my Reds!
Unfortunately, it was a raw deal for both Reds and Cardinals
And the hated Dodgers won!
1981 was a bitter pill to swallow for both St. Louis and Cincinnati fans. The Cardinals had some tough luck over the final 5 weeks of the season. 8 losses by one run. 5 of those were walk off losses. Over the same period the Expos won 8 games by one run. Two of them were against us.
Thanks, Phillip. That’s a lot of tight games.
The Cubs swept the Cards at Busch Stadium, September 7-9. Bobby Bonds played a big role in two of those Chicago wins: 4 home runs, 8 RBI. His season totals: 6 home runs, 19 RBI.
Oh, my. Getting beat by a fading Bobby Bonds the year after he flopped with the Cardinals was unusually cruel.