LOS ANGELES _ The only previous time Jack Flaherty started a game at Dodger Stadium, he was in high school, and before the game began he and his teenage teammates sat in the stands and marveled at how unfamiliar the ballpark felt without a big-league crowd, how empty it was.
The seats were filled Wednesday.
It was the scoreboard that remained empty.
Two rookie pitchers, Flaherty and the Los Angeles Dodgers' Walker Buehler, engaged in a peppy, postseason-like exchange of zeroes through five innings Tuesday before the game was decided in the ninth by the St. Louis Cardinals' knack for late shows of force. Tyler O'Neill tied the score with a solo home run in the eighth inning, and Paul DeJong won it with a two-run shot in the ninth for a 3-1 victory against the Dodgers. The seats weren't empty, just silent. The win completed the Cardinals' first sweep of LA in LA since 2006 and allowed them to widen their lead on the Dodgers to four games in the wild-card race.
The Cardinals (71-57) remained 2 { games behind the Cubs (72-53) in the National League Central and did not add to their lead atop the wild-card standings.
Buehler outpaced Flaherty's start with seven shutout innings to funnel a 1-0 lead to the Dodgers' unsteady bullpen. O'Neill's pinch-hit homer was his first in the majors, and DeJong's home run was the third the Cardinals hit in the series off Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen. The righthander returned from the DL on Monday night and allowed two homers to tilt that game to the Cardinals, and on Wednesday offered LA a sequel. Jedd Gyorko flipped a single to left field to start the rally and DeJong punctuated it. Jordan Hicks clinched the game by striking out the side in the ninth for his fifth save.
Flaherty took a no-hitter through five innings in his return home to the ballpark where, he said, "Baseball kind of started for me." One out into the sixth, he had his 10th strikeout. Two outs in the sixth, and he was down 1-0 on a solo home run by Dodgers leadoff hitter Joc Pederson. The jolt came off an 83 mph slider that Flaherty knew had been socked a long way as he doubled over after hearing it crack off Pederson's bat.
That was the only dent in his six-inning start, and through 6 { innings it was the only run allowed in a taut pitching duel between two of the league's top young pitchers.
Two years older and drafted one year after Flaherty, Dodgers righthander Buehler set a career high when he got his ninth strikeout as he tried to tiptoe around a threat from the Cardinals in the seventh inning. Down by a run, Gyorko lined a double down the left-field line, just out of the reach of third baseman Justin Turner. Buehler struck out DeJong for the second time in the game to unplug the Cardinals' ability to tie the game with productive outs. He got a grounder from Kolten Wong for the second out, and that brought a familiar face to the plate in Harrison Bader.
Buehler, a Vanderbilt alum, faced Bader back in their college days of SEC baseball. In his first look at Buehler on Wednesday, Bader walked. He was left stranded at third. The next time, Bader lined out to center. With Gyorko on third base in the seventh, a base hit would have tied the score.
Bader flared a pitch to shallow left field.
That's where shortstop Manny Machado greeted it for an out.
In the eighth inning, Machado, the prize landed by the Dodgers in this past July's trade sweepstakes, had a chance to reclaim the lead for the Dodgers. Against rookie setup man Dakota Hudson, the Dodgers loaded the bases. An error at third by Gyorko made it possible just as a diving play by Matt Carpenter at first base gave Hudson a reprieve and kept a run from scoring. With two outs and nowhere to put him, Machado saw sinker after sinker from Hudson. He dutifully grounded out to end the threat.
The Cardinals swept the series one inning later.
Back in 2013, one year before the Cardinals drafted him 34th overall, Flaherty and his Harvard-Westlake team played in a CIF Southern Section title game. Earlier this week, Flaherty said he didn't romance the chance to get on the Dodger Stadium mound, didn't let his mind wander to whether or not he would return there someday, in a paid capacity. He said he thought nothing "else but go out and compete." That he did. Flaherty struck out seven and threw Harvard-Westlake to a 1-0 win in the championship.
With a full count and two outs in the third inning, Flaherty stung the single that provided the game's lone run. The opposing coach told The Los Angeles Times after the game that Flaherty was the "real deal."
North Carolina thought so.
He was committed to go there.
The Cardinals lured him out of that commitment with one of the largest bonuses in his slot of the draft, and within four years he's not only ascended to the majors but become the starter the Cardinals are shifting the rotation around. He had his start pushed back a week ago so that he would face three consecutive teams grouped around the Cardinals in the standings. It also meant that he would get the series finale at Dodger Stadium, not too far from his North Hollywood high school and his home. All week he was surrounded by family. On Monday, he saw a familiar face, ran over, and hopped a barrier rope just to throw his arms around the taller gentleman for a hug.
Robert Horry, a seven-time champ NBA, hugged Flaherty back.
"Family friend," Flaherty explained. "For many years."
Flaherty's voice was starting to crackle and soften by day two of his Dodger Stadium visit, but it didn't take long Wednesday for him to clear his throat. Flaherty struck out the first two batters he faced, getting No. 2 hitter Turner fishing at a slider in the dirt for the second out. He walked Machado, and then buckled Cody Bellinger with a 78 mph knuckle curve. Flaherty seesawed through the order like that for most of the game. He had his 95 mph fastball that Machado couldn't catch up to in the fourth inning for a strikeout, and then he had the two breaking balls that he could fillet hitters with at any point.
In the fifth inning, Flaherty again struck out the side. Brian Dozier stared at an 86 mph changeup. Max Muncy fell for the 86 mph slider for a second time in the game, and Yasiel Puig punished his bat for not connecting on an 85 mph slider to end the inning.
Puig snapped the bat over his knee.
After Pederson's homer with one out in the sixth, Flaherty retired the next two batters he faced to complete the quality start. He was replaced for the seventh inning having thrown 101 pitches, 100 of which did not result in a run or a hit. The one slider was the only scar in his homecoming. In the Cardinals' clubhouse a day before he returned to the Dodger Stadium, he considered what the outing meant to him and quickly described how it wasn't just this one start that stood out, and it was just any start at Dodger Stadium.
"Hopefully, it's the first of many," Flaherty said. "The first of many."
