Leyland chooses to not play his ace

With one game to extend the season and his best pitcher available to go on regular rest, Tigers Manager Jim Leyland gave Friday night’s start to rookie Justin Verlander, not Kenny Rogers.

Verlander gave up seven runs in five-plus innings of Game 1, when his fastball lacked its usual upper-90s zip. Rogers hadn’t given up a run in his first 23 postseason innings.

“The bottom line is we have to win three games,” Leyland said. “So, if somebody thinks, well, you have a better chance to extend it by pitching Kenny, well, that may or may not be. But my thought process is I’m not going to change anything. Plus, Kenny, you know, he’s had quite a bit of rest during this run ... and he’s responded very well to it. We have to win three games. I made that decision and however people want to look at that, I’m sure you can make a case either way.

“And I will say this, if it was one game left, I would pitch Kenny. But we’ve got to win three.”

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Adam Wainwright is a former Atlanta Braves prospect who three years ago came to St. Louis in a multi-player trade for, among others, J.D. Drew.

He was a starter for six minor league seasons, then appeared in 61 games this season, all as a reliever.

He throws a hard fastball, a hard slider and a reliable curveball, riding those to a 3.12 ERA in those 61 games, though hardly ever in the ninth inning. When Jason Isringhausen’s season ended because of a hip ailment in early September, after some early indecision, the Cardinals made Wainright their closer.

In nine postseason games, Wainwright did not give up a run. Most memorably, he finished the NLCS by freezing Carlos Beltran with a backdoor, 2-and-2 curveball with the bases loaded, then he finished the World Series by throwing a slider past Brandon Inge with runners at first and third.

“I’ll probably never throw a curveball or a slider again,” he said, “without thinking of those two pitches.”

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Cardinals Manager Tony La Russa believed he needed Chris Duncan’s left-handed bat in the lineup against right-hander Verlander, so he batted him second. Along with that decision, in the National League park, Duncan had to play right field.

While Duncan’s father, Dave, the pitching coach for the Cardinals, had railed against an anonymous scout’s characterization of Chris as “a butcher” in the outfield at the beginning of the series, Chris did, indeed, have a difficult night in right.

He dropped a short fly ball in the fourth inning, one pitch before Sean Casey homered to right field to give the Tigers a short-lived 2-1 lead. He then stumbled around on a well-hit ball in the sixth, eventually turning it into Casey’s two-out double. Jeff Weaver struck out Ivan Rodriguez to end the threat.

Deciding he’d gotten all he could from the situation, La Russa subbed Preston Wilson into the outfield in the seventh inning.

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Cardinals pitcher Jeff Suppan, on his pending free agency: “Stay tuned. I don’t know.” ... Steve Finley, the former Dodgers and Angels outfielder, plans to play another two seasons at least, according to his new agent, Casey Close of Creative Artists Agency.

tim.brown@latimes.com