During Tuesday night's game between the Giants and Cardinals in Busch Stadium, Cardinals starting pitcher Jack Flaherty and Giants first baseman LaMonte Wade Jr. exchanged words. It caused the benches to clear for a quick second, but then fizzled and order was quickly restored.
It appeared Flaherty was angry with Wade for something he did on the basepaths and yelled in his direction a few times before Wade angrily responded. Here's video with the close-up shots of Flaherty toward the end:
Jack Flaherty and LaMonte Wade Jr. start jawing at each other and the benches clear pic.twitter.com/lM4YfJC9PN
— Talkin’ Baseball (@TalkinBaseball_) June 14, 2023
"It's just baseball, tempers flare," Wade Jr. said after the game. "Nothing comes from it. I can't speak for what he thought. I was just doing my job at second base. That's all I can do."
"Just playing the game," Flaherty offered. "That's all you're going to get out of me on that."
Regardless, the Giants would win the game, 11-3, and then topped the Cardinals again on Wednesday afternoon. In the Wednesday matinee, the Cardinals put together a four-run second inning and led nearly the rest of the game before Mike Yastrzemski tied it with a two-run shot in the ninth.
YAZ TIES THE GAME WITH TWO OUTS IN THE NINTH pic.twitter.com/ClfZDbxZ2Y
— SF Giants on NBCS (@NBCSGiants) June 14, 2023
The Giants then scored three runs in the top of the 10th while the Cardinals were unable to plate any, resulting in an 8-5 Giants win.
Details of another brutal Cardinals loss aside, Wednesday continued St. Louis' tailspin that really has lasted nearly the whole season.
"I don't know if you'd call it a stretch anymore" star third baseman Nolan Arenado said (via Bally Sports Midwest). "It's just bad baseball. We have been playing bad baseball for awhile now. Do I think we can play better baseball with the players we have in here? Sure. But that remains to be seen."
They started the season a miserable 10-24 and then got hot for about 2 1/2 weeks. They are 2-10 in June and now sit 27-42 overall. That's a sub-.400 winning percentage and it's only the second time the Cardinals have been under .400 through 69 games in the Integration Era. The other season that qualifies there would be 1978, when the Cardinals were 24-45. That team ended up 69-93.
If these Cardinals are headed down a similar path, it would be a huge story. The Cardinals haven't lost 90-plus games since 1990, when they were 70-92. Hell, they've only had one losing record in the 2000s and that was a 78-84 season in 2007.
The circumstances here make things even more noteworthy. The Cardinals have the reigning NL MVP in Paul Goldschmidt along with superstar Nolan Arenado. They signed catcher Willson Contreras to a big contract in the offseason. There appeared to be some exciting youngsters.
And yet, the rotation has been bad, the bullpen has been leaky at times and the offense can't seem to hit on the road while being inconsistent at home.
It's always possible things turn around. They still aren't even halfway into the season and thanks to the NL Central being awful, the Cardinals were only 8 1/2 games out heading into Wednesday.
As things stand now, though, it's one of the worst Cardinals seasons in a long time. It's possible part of that general frustration was what boiled over with Flaherty's shouting. Likely a frustration that moves forward with the latest loss. The Cardinals will get a day off Thursday before squaring off with another team that has been a total mess of late, the Mets, in New York Friday.
