Cardinals facing quite an uphill battle

— -- SAN FRANCISCO -- Randy Choate stood there -- his eyes a little bleary, his voice betraying a hint of a tremor -- and answered every question that came his way. He was less than 15 minutes removed from throwing Gregor Blanco's bunt down the right-field line to give the  San Francisco Giants a 5-4 win in the 10th inning of Game 3 of the National League Championship Series, and he was -- in the lingo of the game -- manning up. Around the room, his teammates, at least those who weren't seeking sanctuary in their phones, were watching.

Choate, a 38-year-old who long ago became the most specialized of left-handed specialists, was presented with every possible excuse. Was his grip bad? Did Blanco's speed force him to rush? Did he fall victim to the invisible gremlins that roam the field making sure the Giants win in the most unlikely ways?

He listened dutifully and discarded each one like rotten fruit. "[Blanco] did exactly what I wanted him to do," Choate said. "I just sailed it down the line." Finally, when it appeared everything that could possibly be said about a bad throw had been said at least twice, Choate broke an uncomfortable silence by saying, "When you're on this side of it, it sucks."

It was just one game, of course, but in the thick silence of the Cardinals' clubhouse, it could have been mistaken for two or three. It must be tough to face a team that insists on winning in the weirdest, most knife-twisting fashion. There was a pinched, clenched-jaw vibe coming off the Cardinals, as if they were fighting not to say what they wanted to say.

"We just have one game -- [on Wednesday] -- and don't take it any further than that," Cardinals manager Mike Matheny said. "Once again, the simpler the better for us."

Second baseman Kolten Wong said, "Once we leave these doors, the game's done."

Platitudes are probably the way to go right now. They're safer, more comforting and far less scary. Besides, the alternative is almost too daunting to consider; if the Cardinals started to really think about the forces that might be working against them, they might think twice about showing up for Game 4.

Giants manager Bruce Bochy made one lineup change for Game 3, a seemingly innocuous move of Travis Ishikawa from eighth to seventh in the order, and Ishikawa -- a guy who had never played left field before September, a guy who considered quitting the game less than a year ago -- hit a two-out, three-run double in the first inning. Of course he did. Sergio Romo fell behind 3-1 to Matt Holliday with a runner on and two out in the 10th, and Holliday hit a sharp grounder behind third that Pablo Sandoval snared with a dive, threw to first and then spit his gum in the air and caught it with his glove. Juan Perez, whose inability to bunt has been exceeded by only his inability to hit, fouled off two bunts with Brandon Crawford on first in the 10th before Bochy took the bunt sign off (no doubt figuring he couldn't bear to watch another one), and Perez singled to left to set up Blanco's bunt and Choate's error.

Asked to describe what it's like to manage this team, Bochy said, "I'm a little delirious, I guess."

Delirium was the special of the day. The Giants took a 2-1 lead in the series on a walk-off throwing error on a play in which they were trying to give the Cardinals an out. And, as Crawford crossed home plate with the game winner, it immediately became the most conventional of their two wins. Scoring from second after a throw pinballs down the right-field line is practically a walk-off homer compared with scoring the tying run from second on a wild pitch.

Asked if the Giants are lucky, Buster Posey scrunched his face a little and said, as politely as possible, "I don't think anybody cares."

Besides, as starter Tim Hudson joked, "Anybody can score on base hits."

The Cardinals? Not laughing. Their clubhouse after the game was every bit the jumphouse of jocularity and exuberance you'd expect. Without Yadier Molina and cognizant of the uncertainty surrounding ace Adam Wainwright, the Cardinals began a steady march back into the game after trailing 4-0 after the first. When they tied it in the seventh on a Randal Grichuk solo homer, it seemed almost inevitable they would score again before the Giants remembered how to hit.

It's always great barstool psychology to discuss swings of momentum in postseason baseball: pivot games (this was one), brutal losses versus blowouts (this was the former) and the ability of players to put aside the momentary pain of a gut-wrenching loss to refocus on the task at hand (first pitch: 8:07 ET on Wednesday).

"When we lost that tough game the other night on a walk-off, we actually just looked at each other and said, 'You know what? That was a good baseball game,'" Giants reliever Jeremy Affeldt said. "Nobody wanted to end up on the losing side, but in a way we did say, 'So what?' It was a swing game, but they're not going home tomorrow. We still have a lot of work to do, and they know we do."

Or, in the short-and-sweet of Cardinals starter John Lackey: "This is October. It all stings the same."

In this case, though, the pain of the loss is compounded by the joy of the potential win. If the Cardinals, facing the first of three games at AT&T Park, had somehow pulled this one out to take a 2-1 series lead, it would have been bigger than big.

If you believe in numbers -- and most ballplayers are specifically trained not to -- the Cardinals are fighting history as well as their own fragility and whatever it is the Giants are conjuring from their dugout. The team that has won Game 3 after splitting the first two has taken a seven-game series 71 percent of the time.

The Cardinals can find consolation in experience -- another unproven psychological assumption, especially when they're facing a team with a similar postseason pedigree. In Game 4 on Wednesday night, in a game of undeniable importance, they'll send 23-year-old Shelby Miller to the mound to face Ryan Vogelsong, whose 1.19 postseason ERA over 30? innings suggests he's just one more Giant who has a working relationship with the supernatural.

"We're playing the exact same team we are," Wong said.

Sounds good, but the Cardinals need to know it's OK for them to believe they're fighting something bigger than themselves, something quite possibly out of their control. For one more night, though, they're probably better off refusing to believe in the occult-like powers of their opponents -- at least until the Giants give them another reason to believe they're pact-making wizards putting together a playoff run made entirely of rusty wire, wet straw and primitive hexes.