The 1985 Tournament is now underway and the first matchup in the Sweet 16 is the #1 seed St. Louis Cardinals vs the #16 seed Chicago Cubs. The Cardinals finished the season 101-61, 1st in the NL East and National League champs. The Cubs coming off a World Series appearance the year before finished a disappointing 77-84, 4th in the NL East.
The Cubs will send Dennis Eckersley (11-7 3.08 Grade 10YZ) vs John Tudor (21-8 1.93 Grade 20YZ) for the Cardinals. Pitchers would shut the bats down for the first three innings as we would remain scoreless. In the bottom of the 4th the Cardinals would put 2 on the board. Jack Clark would single in Tommy Herr and Terry Pendelton would double in Clark. The Cubs would bounce back in the 5th with 2 of their own. Sacrifice flies from Bob Dernier and Gary Matthews would tie it up.
The score would remain 2-2 until the bottom of the 7th when Cesar Cedano would come up with a huge pinch hit single to score Darrell Porter. The Cards would turn to their bullpen to get the last 6 outs and that is exactly what Ken Dayley and Jeff Lahti did to secure a hard fought 3-2 win and take a 1-0 series lead.
Final Score: Cardinals 3, Cubs 2
WP: John Tudor (1-0)
LP: Dennis Eckersley (0-1)
Save: Jeff Lahti (1)
HR’s: None