Bernie On The Cardinals: Baseball Brings Us Together Again, And It’s A Beautiful Thing

Happy Opening Day. For a baseball fan, it’s a highly anticipated annual occasion that takes us forward into a new year – but also takes us back into history to all of the years we’ve loved the game. Our minds are full of memories of shared experiences at the ballpark. And more memories are on the way, so leave plenty of room for the precious gifts to come.

“You look forward to it like a birthday party when you’re a kid,” the great Joe DiMaggio once said of Opening Day. “You think something wonderful is going to happen.”

The Cardinals already have something wonderful to offer their fans in 2022: a baseball museum of living history. Albert Pujols has returned to his home sweet home to spend his final major-league season with faithful friends Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright. You can’t write the history of the St. Louis Cardinals without devoting pages of words to the three legends.

The Cardinals franchise has won 134 postseason games during its existence. And either Pujols, Molina or Wainwright have competed in 48.5 percent of those victories. Sometimes it’s been just one of them, or two of the three. At other times, all three shared the same postseason pursuit. But let’s think about this again: nearly half of the Cardinals’ all-time postseason wins have featured Pujols, Molina or Wainwright in one formation or another. Stunning.

Since Bill DeWitt Jr., rescued the Cardinals from mediocrity and became team chairman in 1996, the Cardinals have competed in 16 postseasons. And 14 of the 16 playoff teams had Pujols, Molina and/or Wainwright on the roster. (The only exceptions are 1996 and 2000.) Pujols made his debut in 2001, Molina was on the October scene by 2004, and in 2006 Wainwright experienced a remarkable rookie adventure in his first postseason.

In all, Pujols has been part of seven STL postseason pushes. Molina has been in the center of the fray for 12 postseasons. Wainwright’s postseason count is nine; he couldn’t pitch in 2011 after undergoing elbow surgery.

Since 2001 – Pujols’ NL Rookie of the Year season – the Cardinals have won 65 postseason games and rank third in the majors in regular-season winning percentage behind the Yankees and Dodgers. Pujols, Molina and Wainwright marked the years as guardians of a winning tradition.

In 2022 they’ll try to do it one last time. The Cardinals will celebrate them, yes. More than that the Cards will lean on them. This isn’t just a ceremonial lap; this team needs valuable contributions from Waino, Yadi and Albert. Wainwright is the staff ace. Molina is the nerve center of the pitching operation. Pujols was hired as a designated hitter at age 42 for his prowess against lefthanded pitching.

When venerated veterans reach this stage of their extensive careers with the same team, the season usually plays out like a long goodbye. A long hug. No pressure. Just enjoy the ovations, the cheers, and every moment. Winning would be nice, but that’s a bonus. Well, not with this team. Not in 2022. Not with this trio of baseball heroes. For the Cardinals to do more than just hop into another wild-card spot – for the Cardinals to win the NL Central – Wainwright, Molina and Pujols must come through. Just as they’ve done in the past. If there’s a winning formula, they’ll play an essential part.

“A lot of times when there are farewell tours, you have players who are not really contributing,” DeWitt said during spring training. “The three names that we have there we expect them to contribute greatly to a potential championship.”

That’s just one of the reasons – and a big one – why this will be such an intriguing season. Rookie manager Oli Marmol is already establishing himself as an interesting manager who will challenge our thinking. He’s appealingly straightforward, blunt, no BS. I doubt that we’ll see absurd, insulting spin-city postgame sessions that were common under Mike Matheny and Mike Shildt. When the Cardinals stink and play lousy ball, Marmol won’t stand up after the game and insist that we didn’t really see what we just saw. And Marmol uses the same communication style with his players. Honesty is his policy.

Will Marmol change during bad times? To be determined. But the confident Marmol isn’t fooling around with phony word play, and his players love that. And he isn’t afraid to manage the way he wants to manage, embracing the unconventional if he thinks it will increase the probability of winning. And when he talks about taking it all the way to the World Series and winning the damn thing … he really means it. This isn’t the obligatory message of optimism.

The Cardinals keep talking about winning the World Series and seem eerily confident about their chances of doing so.  Local media have hopped on board, all but demanding a World Series – even though there are around 10 to 12 teams (both leagues) that have more talent and fewer holes and questions than the Cardinals.

Aiming for the World Series should be a mandatory goal, but the first step is building a World Series-caliber roster that maximizes the probability of going all the way. The Cardinals haven’t done that. And in some ways their reliance on Pujols, Wainwright and Molina – average age, 40.3 years – is an indication.

The forecasts are all over the map.

– 90 wins, Sporting News
– 89 wins, USA Today
– 82 wins, FanGraphs
– 80 wins, PECOTA
– 75 wins, Clay Davenport

The determining factor should be starting pitching.

There’s understandable anxiety over a rotation that’s missing Jack Flaherty and includes Wainwright, Miles Mikolas, Steven Matz and Dakota Hudson. (Plus Jordan Hicks as a fifth starter who really isn’t a fifth starter in the traditional sense.)

I was thinking about this on Wednesday morning, and spent about 10 minutes looking up something that could give me a more relevant context.

Are there questions about the current state of the rotation? Absolutely. But I looked back to last season, and something caught my attention: the 2021 Cardinals had 95 games started by pitchers who aren’t in the major leagues right now. That excludes guys currently on the IL.

K.K. Kim returned to Korea … John Gant headed to Japan … Carlos Martinez was signed to a minor-league deal by the Giants and is nursing an injured thumb … Johan Oviedo was sent to Triple A Memphis by the Cardinals … Jon Lester and Wade LeBlanc retired … J.A. Happ is a free agent, looking for a team.

Those pitchers combined for 95 starts in ‘21 – that’s close to 60 percent of the schedule. Look, I’m not trashing them. Lester, Happ and LeBlanc were valuable additions. Lester and Happ performed above expectations after the Cardinals acquired them in low-key trades at the end of July. They provided stability and quality work over the final two months, and the rotation quietly became an asset that helped lead the Cardinals to the second wild-card ticket.

Here’s my point: none of the pitchers that combined for the 95 starts were front-line starters, coveted by other teams. The Cardinals didn’t trade for Max Scherzer or Jose Berrios at last year’s deadline; their ambitions were much lower.

Lester and Happ were pitching terribly for their respective teams (Nationals, Twins) last season before the Cardinals did a salvage job. The two lefties were No. 5 starters (at best) under normal circumstances, and wouldn’t have had a guaranteed spot in a stronger rotation. They were emergency pickups, pulled in by the Cardinals at a time of desperation. Lester and LeBlanc were worn out and retired. Others couldn’t find work in the majors this past offseason.

Despite having to lean so heavily on a group of marginal pitchers for 95 starts, the Cardinals went 46-26 after the All-Star break and managed to win 90 games. Backed by a sterling defense, the stitched-together Cards rotation turned in the sixth-best rotation in the majors (3.73) over the final two months of the regular season.

The 2022 rotation seems vulnerable. But the rotation situation in 2021 became a nightmare scenario. The Cardinals were falling apart, barely hanging on. They had to scramble for replacement-level starters. Despite all of that, the Cardinals had MLB’s third-best record (38-20) after July 31. If they could pull that off, then maybe we shouldn’t fret so much over the 2022 team.

Enjoy the day, enjoy the season. After so much bickering over a new labor agreement, everything is back in place to fill a traditional role.

Baseball has serious problems with the pace of play and diminishing entertainment value.

But baseball is bringing Pujols, Molina and Wainwright back together, so how bad can it really be?

Baseball is bringing all of us back together.

If you love this game, if you love the Cardinals, it’s beautiful day.

Thanks for reading …

– Bernie

Bernie invites you to listen to his opinionated sports-talk show on 590-AM The Fan, KFNS. It airs Monday through Thursday from 3-6 p.m. and Friday from 4-6 p.m. You can listen by streaming online or by downloading the “Bernie Show” podcast at 590thefan.com — the 590 app works great and is available in your preferred app store.

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Please email your “Ask Bernie” questions to BernScoops@gmail.com

All stats used here are sourced from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, Stathead, Bill James Online, Fielding Bible, Baseball Savant and Brooks Baseball Net unless otherwise noted.