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Twitter Reacts to St. Louis Cardinals’ Controversial Walk-Off Win

By Patrick Karraker

Sep 29, 2016; St. Louis, MO, USA; St. Louis Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina (4) celebrates after hitting a walk off double off of Cincinnati Reds relief pitcher Blake Wood (not pictured) during the ninth inning at Busch Stadium. The Cardinals won 4-3. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports
Sep 29, 2016; St. Louis, MO, USA; St. Louis Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina (4) celebrates after hitting a walk off double off of Cincinnati Reds relief pitcher Blake Wood (not pictured) during the ninth inning at Busch Stadium. The Cardinals won 4-3. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports /
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The St. Louis Cardinals won Thursday’s game under some of the most controversial circumstances we’ve seen in a long while, and the Twitter reaction was ripe for the picking.

In perhaps the most controversial ending to an MLB game this season, the St. Louis Cardinals won Thursday’s game against the Cincinnati Reds 4-3 on a Yadier Molina walk-off double. The only problem: though Matt Carpenter came around from first base to score on the play, the correct ruling on the play may have been to call it a ground rule double and place Carpenter at third, as the ball touched the signage above the left field wall before bouncing back into the field of play.

The Reds could have challenged, but manager Bryan Price expressed no interest in doing so until after the umpiring crew had already exited the field of play and walked down the tunnel behind home plate. After walking onto the field as the Cardinals were celebrating (MLB Network concluded that he exited the dugout roughly 34 seconds after Carpenter crossed home plate), Price tried to chase them down the tunnel, but was told that it was too late to challenge.

Predictably, the reaction from media and fans on social media was both extremely mixed and extremely entertaining.

Shortly after the game, the beat reporters for each team were hard at work trying to figure out what compelled the umpires to leave the field so soon after the game ended, but they ended up getting conflicting information straight from the source:

The umpires were certainly the biggest targets of the night, with plenty of high-figure baseball figures (mostly out-of-town or national media) taking shots at the umpires’ quickness in leaving the field and overall failure to correctly do their jobs:

Even for those with a rooting interest in the matter, there was plenty of recognition that there was an error in the way the situation was handled. But Cardinals fans were happy to take the win:

For Mets beat writer Adam Rubin, the Cardinals’ resilience showed that they could be a force to be reckoned with in a potential wild card game:

Next: Who Starts for Cardinals in a Wild Card Game?

And at the end of the night, the Cardinals’ Twitter account enjoyed some fun at the expense of their divisional rivals’ feelings:

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