“Break up the St Louis Cardinals.” A similarly old and plaintive cry is one that used to be aimed at the New York Yankees during their dynastic eras.
Cardinals opponents can relate now.
St Louis have not had a losing season since 2007 and have reached the post-season five out of the past six seasons.
In that time, the side have lost its franchise player (Albert Pujols), seen two ace pitchers miss seasons with injury (Chris Carpenter, Adam Wainwright) and had their Hall of Fame manager (Tony LaRussa) turn the team over to a guy with no managing experience (Mike Matheny).
So maybe breaking them up does not work, either.
“I talk to guys on other teams and they say, ‘You guys keep winning’,” journeyman relief pitcher Carlos Villanueva told the St Louis Post Dispatch.
He would know. Villanueva played with three teams before joining the fun in St Louis this year and has witnessed another banner half-season despite the team losing Wainwright in April and their best hitter, Matt Holliday, a month ago.
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“That’s what Cardinals baseball is,” Villanueva said.
Last weekend’s three-game sweep of traditional rival the Chicago Cubs had a symbolic feel to it.
The young Cubbies are enjoying their first winning season since 2009. But after they were outscored by the Cardinals, 15-4, the message seemed clear: you still are not close to us.
St Louis’s eight-game lead in the National League Central is the largest of the six division leaders. The Cardinals reached 50 wins in 74 games, the fastest to that mark for any team since 2005. The season has a charmed feel; everything clicks.
Despite losing Wainwright, the Cardinals are the stingiest run-permitting team in MLB by a wide margin.
Opponents are scoring only 2.8 per game, a half run below anyone else’s mark.
Hard-throwing young right handers Michael Wacha, 24, (10-3, 2.77 earned run average) and Carlos Martinez, 23, (9-3, 2.80) already have stepped into “ace” mode, personifying the franchise’s sensibility: put the trademark Redbirds on your chest and you are a world beater.
Even 36-year-old John Lackey (3.35) is on a roll after coming over from the Boston Red Sox in a mid-season trade last year, giving further substance to the term “charmed”.
The players the Cardinals traded for Lackey — outfielder Allen Craig and pitcher Joe Kelly, key contributors to recent Cardinals success — were busts in Boston and are now minor leaguers.
The pitching depth extends to the bullpen, which is anchored by another arm off the organisation’s amazing assembly line.
Trevor Rosenthal, 25, has an ERA of 0.51 and has converted 23 of 24 save opportunities.
The offence is not exceptional, but it does not have to be, and it, too, has a knack for repairing itself seamlessly.
Holliday set a National League record by reaching base in the first 45 games of the season, then strained a quad muscle in Game No 50.
His replacement in the No 3 spot, Randal Grichuk, started the season as a reserve. Since Holliday left the line-up, Grichuk’s slugging percentage has jumped nearly 100 points.
The Cardinals are something besides charmed, of course. The organisation values fundamentals and players with a serious, buttoned-down approach.
When stone-faced manager Matheny was asked recently about the team’s pace to a 100-plus win season, he said he has told the team only one thing: “Keep your head down and keep pushing.”
Just what they always do.
BASEBALL METRICS STILL NOT AN EXACT SCIENCE
Baseball’s dramatic embrace of data collection and statistical analysis has been well documented.
So has the friction that has burnt between “old school” baseball men who still value instincts and hunches, and “new school” stat crunchers who believe numbers do not lie.
By now, much of that dust has settled. Organisations have picked a direction they are going to go and have hired front office, and field, personnel accordingly. That does not mean disputes have disappeared entirely.
The Los Angeles Angels reportedly staged a clubhouse scene this past week that could have come from the Hollywood film Moneyball.
Angels general manager Jerry Dipoto said information from scouting reports, prepared for manager Mike Scioscia and his coaches, was not reaching the players, or being used well.
So Dipoto showed up in the clubhouse to explain the new policy and said reports also would be distributed directly to the players.
Some on the team, apparently, saw this as disrespect.
Dipoto and Scioscia have not been best buddies, anyway, since Dipoto’s first season, 2012, when he fired Scioscia’s hitting coach, Mickey Hatcher.
In any case, the rift between the pair widened.
Dipoto reportedly asked for support from ownership. He did not get it, so he packed his laptop up and departed.
Just a reminder that baseball’s advanced metrics movement is still a revolution and still counting casualties.
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