Matt Adams ends 16-inning marathon with homer, ferocious bat flip

As soon as Matt Adams connected, the remaining fans at Busch Stadium erupted.

The St. Louis Cardinals slugger blasted a majestic walkoff home run in the 16th inning on Friday to give St. Louis a much-needed 4-3 victory over the wild card-leading Los Angeles Dodgers.

Adams’ big fly came against Bud Norris, a starting pitcher who was needed in emergency extra-inning duty, and it traveled an estimated 444 feet. Indeed, it was a no-doubter, and Adams drove that point home with a scream and a ferocious bat flip unlike any seen since Jose Bautista’s in the 2015 postseason.

	St. Louis Cardinals @Cardinals
THAT BAT FLIP!!! #STLCards pic.twitter.com/aEUQKPEj2n 10:37 PM - 22 Jul 2016

Yes, it was that epic.

Matt Adams flips his bat in celebration after hitting a walk-off home run to defeat the Dodgers. (AP)

Adams’ homer capped another dramatic come-from-behind win in the late innings. St. Louis rallied from a 5-1 deficit in the eighth inning to defeat San Diego on Thursday. On Friday, Jedd Gyorko launched a ninth-inning solo homer to push the game into extra innings after Justin Turner’s homer gave los Angeles the lead in the top half.

From there, both teams exhausted their options, leading to a matchup that one Dodgers writer wasn’t looking forward to.

	Chad Moriyama @ChadMoriyama
Hope the Dodgers score here, cause Norris against Adams is probably bad. 10:21 PM - 22 Jul 2016

The overwhelming feeling of dread was founded on this occasion. Now the Dodgers will try to bounce back on Saturday with their wild-card lead down to one game over St. Louis and Miami.

From this point on, it looks like every game and every pitch is going to count for the NL wild-card contenders. So we should definitely expect some more drama and fireworks.