This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Oct. 10, 2012 - WASHINGTON – Powered by a 14-hit offense and a clutch performance by Chris Carpenter, the Cardinals quieted the record home crowd and dominated the Nationals, 8-0, on Wednesday afternoon. So the nation's capital still hasn’t witnessed a playoff win since 1933.
Now, ahead in the series 2 games to 1, the soaring Redbirds hope to clinch the National League Division Championship –— and the Nats will try to win their first postseason game before a hometown crowd — in Thursday's Game 4. In that key game, at 3:07 p.m. Central Time, the Cards' Kyle Lohse will face the Nats' Ross Detwiler, a Wentzville native who pitched for Missouri State U.
There were plenty of Cardinals fans at Wednesday's game, but they were lost in a sea of Nationals red. The 45,017 fans waved red "Natitude" rally towels, but didn’t have much to cheer about other than mascot Teddy Roosevelt’s second footrace win against rival giant-headed presidents. [End update]
The last time the nation's capital hosted a postseason baseball game, the Great Depression was in full swing, FDR was a rookie president, and Babe Ruth was still swatting homers for the Yankees.
That was in October 1933, when the AL-champion Washington Senators lost the World Series to the New York Giants. Seventy-nine years later, the Washington Nationals — known here as the Nats — are hosting the St. Louis Cardinals in the final two or three games of their National League Division Series.
In this city of power and politics, the bunting is up and the grass painted in playoff patterns at Nationals Park. Confident Nats fans are showing their "Natitude" with team gear. And the Washington Post is devoting five full pages of coverage per playoff game.
It's time for big-time baseball in D.C.: Cardinals Karma vs. Nats' Natitude. Mascots Fredbird vs. Screech. The Mayor Slay team vs. the Mayor Gray team. Power Hitters vs. Power Fans. Baseball Heaven vs. Baseball Purgatory.
Purgatory because D.C. had been, up until this year, a frustrating home for baseball teams and their fans. The old Senators team — the 1924 World Champions that fell on hard times after the '33 Series — left for Minnesota in 1960. An expansion Senators team played in D.C. for a decade, but moved to Texas in 1971 to become the Rangers.
For the next 33 years, the nation's capital tried to get another major-league team, finally nabbing the old Montreal Expos in 2004. They played the first three seasons in the aging RFK Stadium, then moved to brand-new Nationals Park in 2008 — just when the Great Recession hit. After four losing campaigns — often having trouble drawing fans — the Nats finally struck gold this year, ending the season with the best record in baseball.
"First in war, first in peace, and first in the National League East!" crowed the Washington Post in a full-page ad celebrating the Nats' division win.
And now Nats Nation faces Cardinal Nation. During the regular season, plenty of Cardinals fans showed up when the two teams met at Nationals Park — with more than a quarter of the fans sporting Birds-on-the-Bat caps and T-shirts. There will be plenty of Redbird backers this week, too, although — to those watching on TV — they may disappear in the sea of red Nationals jerseys and caps, sporting the curly-W team symbol.
"Fans urged to show their October Natitute by wearing red to all games this week," Nationals management said Tuesday. As if fans wearing red are going to scare the Cardinals!
Hall of Famer Frank Robinson will throw out the first pitch, and the ballpark is offering live music, face-painting, balloon art and caricatures for fans.
[MLB Network will exclusively televise Game 3 at noon (CST) on Wednesday, with the game play-by-play and color by Bob Costas and Jim Kaat.]
Power series in a power town
It's a power series in both senses of the word, with both teams fielding sluggers, and the Nationals fan base featuring some real power: Supreme Court justices, Capitol Hill lawmakers, Pentagon generals, and D.C.-based columnists.
In fact, one of the few things Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., agree on is their praise of the Nats. Reid is a rabid Nats fan, with a special place in his heart for fellow Nevadan Bryce Harper.
(That’s 19-year-old Harper, the wildly popular center fielder who wears eye black-like war paint for day games — giving him a deranged look. His first biography, an e-book called "The Bryce Harper Story," was issued this month.)
McConnell also pulled for the Nats during the season but might back off if the Cincinnati Reds — just across the Ohio River from his home state of Kentucky — end up playing the Nats in the NL championship series.
Another Nats booster is former GOP presidential nominee and U.S. Sen. John McCain, who recently demanded a Senate investigation (tongue-in-cheek, of course) of why one of the Nats mascots — Teddy Roosevelt — had failed to win any of the more than 500 races against giant-headed presidents Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln, which are staged in the middle of the fourth inning of every game.
Teddy — wearing a sweatband and gold running shoes, and cheered on by thousands of fans wearing "Let Teddy Win!" T-shirts — finally won the race in the last game of the regular season. McCain immediately sent a triumphant Tweet: "Teddy won! Teddy won! We’ve defeated the massive left-wing conspiracy!"
But the White House denied that charge, with press secretary Jay Carney telling reporters that he agreed Teddy's string of losses was "an outrage." He added: "I'm comfortable saying that my boss [President Barack Obama] agrees with Sen. McCain."
(Note: The official Nats mascot — and counterpart to Fredbird — is a stylized bald eagle named Screech [http://screech.mlblogs.com/ ]. But fans prefer the presidents.)
Some details of Wednesday’s opening ceremony were being kept secret, but there’s no doubt that plenty of power celebrities will be there — if they can take off work at noon. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell is a fan. So are "Meet the Press" host David Gregory and rival "Face the Nation" host Bob Schieffer.
At least five Supreme Court justices have been spotted at Nationals games this year, including Sonia Sotomayor.
It may be top secret which team CIA Director and former Gen. David Petraeus is supporting. But when Petraeus visited the Nats clubhouse this summer, the Post reported that he "was interested in some classified information — the grip that the 21-victory starting pitcher Gio Gonzalez puts on the ball."
As always with baseball playoffs, there are bets on the line. St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay placed a rival flag bet with D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray. If the Cardinals win, D.C.'s city hall will fly the St. Louis "Three Rivers" city flag; if the Nats prevail, St. Louis City Hall will hoist DC's "Taxation without Representation" flag.
"We're no stranger to postseason play in St. Louis," Slay said in a statement. "So, we're thrilled to show the upstarts how to do it right. I look forward to our city's flag flying proudly over the John A. Wilson Building when our boys wrap this thing up."
Perhaps the oldest fan invited to Wednesday’s game is 99-year-old Bertram R. Abramson, who roots for the Nats and recalls being in the old Griffith Stadium in D.C. to see the Senators play the first game of the 1924 World Series. That was the the last Series won by a Washington team. President Calvin Coolidge threw out the first pitch and Hall of Famer Walter Johnson started the game for the Senators.
Abramson told the Post that this year's D.C. team may be better. "Washington has never had a team like this," he said. "Not even in '24."
Cards fans, including 91-year-old Stan Musial, aren’t so sure about that. But, win or lose, some Nationals fans say the team’s winning season — under the leadership of 69-year-old veteran Davey Johnson — offers lessons that go well beyond baseball.
"People decry the absence of leadership in Washington these days. My response: Look no further than the home-team dugout at Nationals Park," wrote fierce Nats fan Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.
Noting that Johnson is "willing to sacrifice short-term tactical advantage for the long-term benefit of bolstering the confidence of a player in whom he sees great potential," Bernanke added: "Many of us in Washington could learn a thing or two from the Nationals' approach."