CHICAGO -- Over the past six months, it felt like for all the good stuff there was during the 2018 regular season, we heard almost as much about the things in baseball that could be a little better.
But now it's October, and the Chicago Cubs and Colorado Rockies just reminded us once again why baseball is still great.
By the time Albert Almora Jr. struck out to end Colorado's 2-1, 13-inning, 4-hour, 55-minute thriller, Tuesday's National League wild-card classic had extended into Wednesday. Lists were circulating about the game being the longest ... everything. Longest postseason game in Wrigley Field history. Longest wild-card game in the seven years of that round. Longest win-or-go-home game ever.
"Well, this was a great one," Rockies manager Bud Black said. "I think this is a classic. I think this will go down as a Major League Baseball classic."
The game was indeed long, but it wasn't about quantity. For a game that saw so few runs scored, it was packed with countless details, any of which might have been spun off into a game story, or at least a sidebar. It was tense and terse, from stem to stern. It was the perfect way to kick off the 2018 postseason. It was the perfect opening act.
That's right: We've got a whole month of this ahead of us.
Obviously that's little solace for the Cubs, who for much of the season looked like the class of the National League. But in the span of a few days, they saw their hold on first place in the NL Central slip away, then their chance at salvaging the division crown vanish with a tiebreaker loss to Milwaukee, and now, after 13 innings and nearly five hours against Colorado, the end of their season.
For the Rockies, there is one day of recovery and a short jaunt north to Milwaukee, where a Brewers club is waiting for them, surely gleeful over watching the wild-card combatants slug it out and churn through their pitching staffs. This was not a matchup you might have envisioned back in March, but then again, neither is the Braves-Dodgers series on the other side of the NL bracket.
For the Rockies to set up this Coors-Miller beerfest, they had to survive one of the wackiest, most-intriguing classics you'll ever see in a win-or-go-home game. There weren't any home runs, which might make the game look look an anachronism on paper, but it had everything else.
"Both sides pitched as good as you could possibly pitch," Cubs manager Joe Maddon said. "Kind of an instant classic kind of a game."
Great starting pitching
You have to start with the two lefties who took the mound at the beginning. You had Jon Lester, whose 148 career postseason innings entering the game were the most among active pitchers. And you had Kyle Freeland, a Denver native, who has spoken often of watching Colorado's 2007 run to the World Series from his family's couch as a 14-year-old. Freeland was making his first playoff appearance. This time, the couch-dwellers were watching him and they were seeing him pitch for the first time on three days' rest.
"Isn't that great?" Black said before the game, when asked about Freeland's blank postseason record.
Freeland worked 6⅔ scoreless innings and departed after throwing only 82 pitches. He was amped early in the game. According to Statcast, he averaged 92.9 mph over the first three innings with his fastball. His average heater is 91.6. Black termed it "throwing," but then Freeland started to pitch, setting down 12 straight Cubs at one point. Based on his pitch count, it seemed as if Freeland could have gone deeper. But his early effort was taking a toll.
"There was a limit, and I know that the adrenaline in these games catches up with you," Black said. "From the time that he woke up this morning he was excited, and you could tell that he was excited the first inning based on how he was throwing."
On the other side, Lester yielded a Colorado run three hitters into the game. Charlie Blackmon worked Lester for a walk, went to third on DJ LeMahieu's double and scored on Nolan Arenado's sacrifice fly. But this is the postseason, and that's Jon Lester. It was about three hours before another run scored for either team.
Lester went six innings, giving up only that first-inning run and matching his playoff career high with nine strikeouts. He was removed for pinch hitter Ian Happ when his spot was due to lead off the bottom of the sixth. Like Freeland, Lester had a low pitch count -- he finished with 86 -- and Maddon would have liked to stick with him, had the game allowed him to.
"Yeah, I didn't want to take Jon out," Maddon said. "Jon was good to go. He was definitely good to go and Happ starts out the inning we put ourselves in a position possibly to score and it went away. But Jonny had a lot left in the tank, a lot. And their kid Freeland pitching on three days' rest, that's pretty darn impressive."
On paper, Freeland won the duel. His team led 1-0 when the games were turned over to the bullpens. But in reality, this was a classic duel between a veteran lefty and an emerging lefty. It should have been the story of the game. But the game had so many more narrative threads.
"It was awesome," Freeland said. "It was so much fun to compete out there tonight and [Tony Wolters] coming up with the huge knock there in the 13th inning and that's after being on the bench for four hours, absolutely incredible. It just shows the resiliency of this team. But it's going to be a lot of fun to continue this ride."
Managerial chess match
Before the game, Maddon told a story about his close friend, Black, who stood for five hours on the top step of the dugout opposite his own at Wrigley on Tuesday. It was about why he calls him "Pepe Negro," a moniker that traces back to a trip to Mexico for a spring training camp when they were both coaches for the Angels under Mike Scioscia.
During the game, both managers pulled about every lever there was to pull. There were pinch hitters galore, 15 pitchers, pinch running, double switches, bunts, stolen bases, replay challenges. All told, 43 players appeared.
"I don't know about fun, but it was a game to manage, I know that," Black said. "I think there was so many twists and turns. And in a low-scoring game where pitching is so precious and every out is so important as the game unfolds. You try to put your guys in the best position to succeed and do their thing and also think about what is the right thing to do strategically. I know Joe over there on that side was doing the same thing."
There was plenty of fodder for second-guessing, which of course is part of the fun. Maddon went to Jason Heyward as a pinch hitter with the bases loaded in the seventh instead of Kyle Schwarber. Black double-switched Blackmon out of the game. Maddon ran out of bench players, leaving pinch-running specialist Terrance Gore to bat twice in the late innings.
Lots of stuff like that happened. It was the strategist's dream come true. The beauty of the baseball chess match. And after the game, Maddon made a point to begin his postgame news conference with a nod to his old friend.
"Before you ask [questions] I want to congratulate the Rockies and my good friend Pepe Negro," Maddon said. "That was a hell of a ballgame right there."
MVPs being MVPs, and the unlikely hero
Obviously not a lot of runs went up on the scoreboard, but the stars were present. Colorado's Trevor Story and Arenado were both part of the NL MVP conversation, of which Chicago's Javier Baez emerged as a prime candidate.
Arenado drove in the first run and played his usual dynamic defense at third base. Story had three hits and scored the go-ahead run in the 13th. But it was Baez who most rose to the occasion with an RBI double in the bottom of the eighth to score Gore, who had just swiped second base. The Wrigley Field fans, who had been lively but anxious for much of the night, erupted.
But the game winner, the hit that finally broke the long stalemate, was stroked by Colorado's Tony Wolters. Wolters had spent four hours in the Rockies' dugout biting his nails before entering the game on a double switch. He had gone hitless since Sept. 10. Here's how Black described Wolters:
"Tony's like everybody's little brother. He's the guy that everybody looks out for and sort of just keeps their eye on because Tony can sort of run astray a little bit. But they love him."
Wolters stroked a Kyle Hendricks changeup into the outfield to plate Story, putting the Rockies ahead. It goes without saying that it was his biggest moment as a big leaguer.
"Are you kidding me?" the incredulous Wolters exclaimed when asked if it was the biggest hit of his life. "Yeah, that was probably the biggest hit I've ever had, that's for sure."
Miscues and wackiness
There were miscues. Colorado's David Dahl overran a Kris Bryant blooper, a play that Statcast tabbed with a 91 percent out probability. Ian Desmond was thrown out at second on an ill-advised decision to try to advance on a medium-depth fly ball to left.
But there were some outright crazy plays as well. LeMahieu's first-inning double ended up tangled in the ivy on the outfield wall. Blackmon was flying around third base and would have scored, while LeMahieu appeared to have a shot at a triple. The ground rules are clear: An ivy ball is two bases. If LeMahieu had indeed tripled, it might have been him scoring on Arenado's sac fly with what would have been Colorado's second run.
Chicago's Tommy La Stella, who is a strange kind of wizard when it comes to reaching bases on catcher's interference, did it again in a key pinch-hitting spot in the seventh. Gore acted as if he were hit by a pitch in the 13th that actually struck plate umpire Chris Guccione. The replay crew made sure he didn't get away with it. But you have to admire the chutzpah of a pinch runner who tries to steal first base.
There was also a crazy play in the 11th, when Willson Contreras hit into a fielder's choice with runners on first and second. Arenado fielded the grounder and tagged Baez, caught between second and third. There probably was no real double-play opportunity there, but we'll never know.
Baez decided that moment was a good time to engage Arenado in a hug. There is actually a rule against that, and Black had a conversation with the umpires. But nothing came of it.
Maybe the wackiest thing wasn't a single play but the fact that for the second straight game, the Cubs scored one run. It has been the theme of their baffling, inconsistent offense all season. Only eight teams in the majors scored more runs than the Cubs. But Tuesday's game was the 28th time in which they finished with exactly one run. It was their most frequent run total.
"We played that game a lot," Maddon lamented. "Believe me, it was on my mind for a large part of it. We had some opportunities, we just could not cash in. They pitched really well too, but we need to figure that out in the offseason and next spring training."
Effort and energy where there should have been none
Maybe as impressive as any of this is just how well both teams played and the circumstances in which they did it. Colorado played its season finale on Sunday at home in Denver, flew to Los Angeles for a tiebreaker on Monday, lost that, and ended up in Tuesday's wild-card game, which also became Wednesday's wild-card game.
"Knowing these guys like I do, it doesn't surprise me the effort and the preparation those guys put in today," Black said. "All the work that each guy does individually on their own, whether video, early work in the cage, some stuff in the weight room, the trainers that work on players. They do it."
The Cubs' journey was kinder. Their three games in three days were all at Wrigley Field. But to say the journey was kinder is not to say it was not a tough ask, and when it ended so abruptly on that Almora strikeout, it was an emotional scene in the home clubhouse.
The Rockies kind of get a day off before they begin their division series matchup with Milwaukee. They'll take the bus up to Brewtown and there will be a workout at Miller Park on Wednesday. It'll be their fourth city in as many days. It sounds exhausting, but they wouldn't have it any other way.
Last year, the Rockies made the postseason, also playing the one-and-done game. It was at Arizona and the Rockies lost an 11-8 thriller. That not only ended their 2017 season, but it meant a playoff appearance without a playoff home game. If Tuesday's game had gone just a little differently, the unfortunate end for Colorado would have been repeated.
Instead, the Rockies play on, and after two games in Milwaukee they will get to treat Denver fans to some October baseball. After this incredible meandering journey, the Rockies, and Freeland, will be headed home.
"It's going to be extremely exciting," Freeland said. "It's been awhile since playoffs have been in Denver. We got a little taste of it right before we left for L.A. the other day, seeing the entire city rally around us playing against Washington and kind of getting that playoff environment feel. It's going to be extremely exciting to bring some more playoff baseball to Denver and hopefully win some games."
Freeland could have been speaking about the postseason in general. If the rest of the month is anything like the playoff opener, this will be an October to remember.