be ready to go."

While the Cardinals await a more definitive prognosis on Beltran, they will have to mull over how quickly the fundamentals went awry Wednesday. Wainwright closed the second inning with his 60th pitch of the night. By that point, Pete Kozma had committed a pair of errors, Shane Robinson had fumbled a pickup in center, a popup had fallen between Wainwright and catcher Yadier Molina and two other balls narrowly skipped past infielders.

It led to five runs -- two of which were unearned -- and a deficit St. Louis never seriously threatened against Boston lefty Jon Lester. Though Wainwright would follow with three scoreless innings, his first career World Series start will be remembered for all that went wrong. He included his performance at the topof that list.

"Tonight was a clear case of the starting pitcher -- me -- going out there and setting the wrong tone. It was terrible. You cannot walk the leadoff hitter of the game [Jacoby Ellsbury], especially a guy who is as dangerous as he is on the basepaths," said Wainwright, who had walked just one in his previous 23 postseason innings.

A one-out single by Dustin Pedroia brought up Ortiz, and the Cards defended him with a shift, shading second baseman Matt Carpenter toward first and moving shortstop Kozma to the right side of second base.

Ortiz hit into the defense, but a potential inning-ending double play was foiled by a loose throw from Carpenter that Kozma didn't glove. Second-base umpire Dana DeMuth initially called Pedroia out, believing Kozma