Bernie: The Cubs Vs. The Cardinals At Busch Stadium. Finally, All Is Right In Our Baseball Town.

Cubs vs. the Cardinals. 

The rivalry resumes. 

And the timing is just about perfect. 

Busch Stadium is open for larger crowds, the Covid-19 protocol capacity up to 30,000. Let there be red and blue and a ballpark filled with happiness — well, at least until one team wins, or loses, depending on your rooting interest. Then other moods will kick in. 

Cubs and Cardinals fans may be socially distanced in some spots in some Busch Stadium, but that doesn’t matter. They will still be social. They will still be together. The festival will open, and the old times become new times. This will feel and look like baseball as it oughta be at Busch. 

The Cubs haven’t played in St. Louis since the final weekend of the 2019 season. And in Joe Maddon’s last game as Cubs manager, the Cardinals won 9-0 in the series finale. A lot has happened since then, much of it stressful and sad. But cheer up, because THIS is happening again: Cardinals vs. Cubs. 

The historical adversaries will be inspecting each other for the first time in 2021 at any ballpark. This opening round between the division’s two best teams has a little extra juice; the Cubs are in position to close the gap in the NL Central. 

The first-place Cardinals (25-18) lead the second-place Cubs (21-20) by 3 games. By late Sunday night, the standings will have tightened for the Cubs, or loosened for the Cardinals 

After an 11-15 April the Cubs have picked up the chase, winning 11 of their first 17 games in May. After an erratic first month, their offense is starting to click. Their bullpen has emerged as one of the best in the majors. The starting rotation has issues but is settling down — especially Kyle Hendricks, who goes against Carlos Martinez in Friday night’s series opener. 

The Cubs are playing with confidence and sounding confident. And for a team that has more than a dozen players in line for free agency after the season, the Cubs seem content to concentrate on playing ball instead of stressing over the future. 

“Are we a perfect team? No, I don’t think we’re a perfect team,” manager David Ross said. “But we’re a team that comes to work every day with a mentality to try to win that ballgame that day. I’m super happy about that. With the talent that we have in the room, if we continue to do that throughout 162 (games), we’re going to look up at the end and have had a lot of success.”

I like the timing of the matchup because the Cubs are the latest NL Central threat  to rise up in the standings to challenge the Cardinals. That’s fun. 

* Cincinnati rushed into the season to go 6-1 in the first seven dates on the schedule but has flopped around with a record of 13-22 (and a 5.35 ERA) in the last 25 games. 

* Milwaukee seized first place on April 20, and moved to seven games over .500 on May 1. But the prosperity was transient because of subterranean offense. After their promising 17-10 start the Crew has batted .209 and averaged 3 runs per game while losing 12 of the last 14.  

* Pittsburgh presented an early surprise by reaching .500 record (12-12) on April 28. That was worthy of a second-place tie with the Cardinals, two games behind the division-leading Brewers. No, it couldn’t last. The Bucs are 6-13 since hitting their high point, sinking into last place, seven games behind the Cards. 

The Cubs? Well, sheesh. Their zig-zagging April was  hard to track. And for Cubs fans it was probably hard to watch. 

April went something like this: 

A nice little 3-1 start. Good stuff! Hey, maybe they aren’t so bad, afterall. We’re gonna be buyers, not sellers! 

A 2-7 slump. What went wrong? This team is just going through the motions, waiting for the breakup. Time for Jed Hoyer to tear it down and start the rebuild! 

Hey, now! A 5-1 streak. Cubs win! Let’s go! You know, they can win this thing. Keep the faith! Rossie has them competing their butts off! 

So sad. Maddening. A 1-6 skid to end the month. Bums! OK, Jed, it’s REALLY time to do it. Trade Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, Javvy Baez. Cash them in for a massive return, and there’s gotta be a bustling market for closer Craig Kimbrel. See what you can get for Jake Arrieta. Start texting, calling, emailing. The dynasty that never happened is all but officially dead. 

Evidently not. 

Since the start of May the Cardinals and Cubs have identical records, 11-6. Not that the BFIB are willing to admit it, the Cubs are looking a little dangerous. That’s why this series is so compelling. 

It’s a credibility check for the Cubs, who are a skunky 6-12 away from The Friendly Confines. And what about this Bubble Tea schedule? Based on Friday’s standings, the Cubs have played only eight games against teams with winning records, fewest in the majors. 

The Brewers and Reds have each played 26 games against winning teams. The Pirates have 25 such games;. The Cardinals have 14. Wait, only 14? Yes, and with a 5-9 record. It seems that the Cards have their own credibility test to pass. 

Chicago comes in with sharper focus. No contract tension. No trade demands. No real trade talk. But that could change. It could change many times, based on the trends and fluctuations. 

“Right now there aren’t (contract-extension) discussions going on with the players,” team president Hoyer said via video conference before his team’s 5-2 win over the Nationals on Thursday afternoon at Wrigley Field. It’s the middle of May, we’re playing and I think that’s not what’s on their minds. We always have the door open during the season, but we’re not going to actively reach out. I think we’ve been asked not to do that in a lot of ways because that’s not what the players want to deal with.” 

Still, we wonder about the strange spot where the Cubs are standing. All of those free agents. A losing streak away from being distracted. Maybe two or three lousy losing streaks from being cleared out and traded. 

Maybe. 

Or maybe not. 

This has been a swirling hot topic for the Cubs since last offseason. It started with baseball Theo Epstein resigning. It continued with the salary-dump trade of esteemed starting pitcher Yu Darvish, and the bye-bye-see-ya treatment of fan favorites Kyle Schwarber and Jon Lester. 

The Cubs didn’t spend much money on upgrades — that was the plan, and it didn’t go over very well in Chicago. There is resentment of team ownership. There is fear of a return to the lovable-loser days. 

And the anxiety doesn’t stop. Ultimately, the pending free agents will choose the team’s direction by winning a lot … or losing a lot … by the July 31 non-waivers trade deadline. Games against first-place St. Louis mean a little more. 

“I can’t control what other people worry about or what they should worry about or what they think,” Ross said. “I don’t put my thoughts in their head. I just told you that I’m very proud of how they come to work every day and focus on winning. That’s a credit to the character of the guys in there.”

For now, anyway.

The trade deadline is coming. 

“I don’t have a mental deadline,” Hoyer said. “Obviously, I understand why everyone is asking questions about the deadline, but I have a very open mind about it. This team, I think we’ve had moments of struggle, but we’ve also had moments of playing pretty well. I think we’re playing well right now. Our last six losses have been by one run. Right now, we’re hard to beat. The games we’ve lost, we’ve lost by a run and I think we’ve been playing pretty well.” 

From the St. Louis standpoint, imagine the fan unrest that will spread and intensify if the Cardinals relinquish first place to the Cubs. Anybody but the Cubs, right? 

Imagine a scenario that has Hoyer going into the buyer’s mode and making deals. Imagine the Cubs strengthening their roster while the St. Louis front office remains cautious and sits out yet another trade deadline. 

I know it’s only May 21. But when these two teams play each other the urgency goes up. The Cubs can swipe the Cardinals from that first-place perch and get doubt to set in. The Cardinals can do their part to break up the Cubs.

It’s a little soon to make this a Statement Series.

The first statement on this series is Hey There, Hello Again.

It’s Cardinals vs. Cubs for three days in downtown St. Louis. After a lengthy break, the rivalry is renewed. It’s an exciting time. It’s time to play ball. 

Thanks for reading … 

–Bernie 

Please check out Bernie’s 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 live online and download the Bernie Show podcast at 590thefan.com  … the 590 app works great and is available in your preferred app store.