Bad baserunning kills Cards in Game 3 before Martinez meltdown

Harrison Bader's boneheaded play of getting picked off by Darren O'Day in the bottom of the eighth wouldn't have mattered if Carlos Martinez had not been even shakier in his last couple of regular season appearances and his near-implosion in Game 1.

But, that's where things started.

As I said in Game 1, when 3B coach Ron Warner didn't send Yadier Molina home on Kolten Wong's double, I am still worried that Mike Shildt does not have this Redbirds team fully past its baserunning boners of the Mike Matheny era.

Let's say Bader isn't picked off. Jose Martinez' pinch-hitting flare loads the bases with 1 out. A sac fly gets a second run.

But maybe Shildt should have done something different before that. If he's going to pinch-hit, which of course he is, have Paul DeJong bunt Bader to third and Tommy Edman to second. (I wondered at the time why Shildt wasn't doing this. I also accept that the matter of how good a bunter De Jong is, is a matter of conjecture, in part because he has ZERO sacrifice bunts in his MLB career. And that itself is probably something Shildt needs to address in 2020 spring training. I'm not looking for Whiteyball, but I am looking for continued growth in "the little things.") Braves manager Brian Snitker is then forced to either walk Martinez to put the force back on, and you're bases loaded with 1 out again, or else play the infield halfway.

Anyway, I have no idea what was in Bader's mind. He has decent speed, but has never been thought of as a huge base stealer. And, especially against a submariner who had been in the AL for years until this season, if you can't read his motion, it's dumb to take any sort of big lead, let alone be thinking of stealing third. And, he was brought in cold as a pinch-runner, to boot. You HAVE TO "stay within yourself" on something like that.

That said, the biggie is of course that Martinez melted down.

Should Andrew Miller have been kept in after his strong work in the top of the eighth? That one may get debated, too. What seems pretty clear right now is that Martinez doesn't have it.

Red Satan ranked the Cards' bullpen overall as sixth-best, or glass half empty, third worst, among the eight playoff teams.