[jg2977]

What a day it was at Chase Field for Mike Jankowski, the 1928 National League Rookie of the Year, who chose the most unforgiving stage of all—the postseason—to deliver a performance of rare completeness.
In his first career playoff game, Jankowski did not merely announce himself; he authored a full biography in nine innings. A home run in the first, a triple in the sixth, a double in the seventh, a single to complete the cycle—and even a hit by pitch, as if the baseball gods felt compelled to include every possible footnote. Four hits, six runs driven in, four runs scored. It was the kind of game that resists hyperbole precisely because the facts already overwhelm it.
The Cardinals, feeding off that early jolt, overwhelmed the defending champions 15–6, turning what was expected to be a tense October opener into a stunningly lopsided affair. Ricky Martinez’s grand slam in the third inning did more than extend a lead—it punctured the sense of inevitability that has surrounded Arizona since last October’s miracle run. From that moment forward, the Diamondbacks were not chasing a deficit; they were chasing relevance within the game itself.
For Arizona, this was not merely a loss—it was an exposure. Their pitching unraveled early and never recovered, and even the scattered bursts of offense felt reactive rather than defiant. The champions played from behind, and for the first time in this postseason era, they looked like a team acutely aware of what they stood to lose.
When manager Alonzo Hernandez declined to speak afterward, promising answers only “if and when we win the World Series,” the remark landed less as bravado and more as a reminder of how quickly October strips teams of their assumptions.
The Cardinals now lead the series one game to none.
And the Diamondbacks—last year’s champions, masters of the late-inning miracle—find themselves on unfamiliar ground: not believing, but needing.
Game 2 will determine whether this was merely a brilliant interruption…
or the opening chapter of a champion’s undoing.