Cardinals lose replay challenge in seventh inning

ST. LOUIS -- Cardinals manager Mike Matheny was left baffled in Friday night's game against the Phillies when a seventh-inning call he felt confident would be overturned was once again left to stand because of insufficient evidence to change the ruling.

The play in question came in the seventh inning and started with Marlon Byrd's ground ball to short. Jhonny Peralta fielded it cleanly and threw to first baseman Matt Adams for what should have been the final out of the inning.

But Adams' foot came off the base as he made the catch, and, though video replay appeared to show him recovering in time to touch the base on the second try before Byrd, the replay umpire determined that there was not enough evidence to change first-base umpire Larry Vanover's call.

"I'm at a loss," Matheny said after the Cardinals' 5-1 loss. "I believe the system is right. I believe the system is trying to push technology forward in a way that could be useful for us. But it has frustrated us more than anything at this point because things that we're seeing, I guess, are not being seen at the office back in New York. It has helped us very little and hurt us a lot."

A change in call would have ended the seventh. Instead, lefty Sam Freeman had to face one more batter, whom he eventually retired on a groundout to keep the score at 5-1.

Matheny is now 2-8 with his challenges this season.

"There is a lot of data out there right now that is showing that it's not helping us," Matheny said. "We're trying to be as aggressive as we can and try to use the system to our advantage. It's not working."