As we awoke this morning we found our beloved Redbirds in an unfamiliar place. First place that is. Yes indeed with a win last night against the Houston Astros, the Cards have taken a ½ game lead in the Central Division for the first time since 2006 (you know.. the year we won the World Series). Here’s a quick recap of this series and then we’ll get right into my thoughts on our first place team.
Game 1- Todd Wellemeyer probably pitched the best game of his career, but still couldn’t get the win. He gave up back to back home runs to Lance Berkman and Carlos Lee in the seventh inning which wiped away his shut out chances. Kelvin Jimenez came in and gave up another run in the eighth to make it 3-0. But the Cardinals made a frantic comeback in the top of the ninth with Troy Glaus bringing Miles home and Ryan Ludwick doubled to bring Izturis and Glaus home right after to tie the game at three. But it wasn’t to be as rookie Kyle McClellan gave up a two run walk-off homer to Miguel Tejada in the bottom of the ninth to end the game.
Cardinals 3 Astros 5
Game 2- Brad Thompson ended the impeccable start to the season for the starting rotation by giving up three runs in four innings before being replaced by Anthony Reyes. Reyes, on the other hand, gave the Cardinals a chance by pitching three scoreless innings, before Franklin took his place in the eighth and Izzy in the ninth. Down 3-2 in the sixth, Adam Kennedy singled to score Chris Duncan to tie the game, and in the eighth Troy Glaus doubled to bring in Duncan and Pujols for the deciding runs. Cardinals 5 Astros 3
Game 3- Braden Looper allowed three runs in 5 2/3 innings and Flores allowed the other, but the Cardinals’ bats finally came to life to seal this win. Pujols hit his first two homers of the season in consecutive at bats in the seventh and ninth to decide the game.
Cardinals 6 Astros 4
Thoughts
Welcome back Albert! Apparently, during game two Pujols slid into Houston catcher J.R. Towles’ legs that some have called a cheap shot. Pujols did call Towles after the game to apologize for the hard slide and both said that the subject was dead after that. But was it? Oh no. During batting practice the next day Houston pitcher Brandon Backe got into a heated argument with Pujols about his slide into Towles, which ended with coaches and players having to step in between the two before anything physical happened. Oh Brandon… (shaking head) You poor little man… I’m embarrassed for you… When will you learn not to wake the sleeping giant? Albert decided the matter, and asserted his manliness, that night in Houston as he single handedly decided the game with two giant pecker-smacks in the seventh and ninth innings to seal the win. Good to see you back Albert. With those two homeruns that projects Albert’s full season total to 36. I hope Mr. Backe won’t forget what happens when you tangle with El Hombre again as it appears he forgot what happened to his former teammate and former Houston closer Brad Lidge a few years ago in the NLCS. If you’ve forgotten… Here's What Happened
Lesson: Don’t fuck with Albert.
In other news, the Cardinals have gained soul possession of first place in the NL central after opening 7-2 this season. Can’t remember the last time we started the season so well? Neither can I. So I did a little research and this is what I’ve come up with:
The last time we opened the season 7-2 was in 2000. Only the 1982 Cards team opened the first ten games of the season with an 8-2 record. With Adam Wainwright pitching tonight this Cardinals team could match that. Furthermore, in the past 40 years only five other Cardinals teams have opened the season with a record of 5-1 (as this 2008 team did before it lost the first game of the series to Houston). So that’s a pretty impressive start.
What makes it more impressive is that we’re doing it with a starting rotation that has literally been duck-taped together in the hopes that it’ll hold up until reinforcements come later and with almost no offensive production. The Cards are ranked 11th out of 16 NL teams in runs scored and eighth out of 16 for RBI. These numbers don’t make a whole lot of sense when you consider that they’re sixth in the national league in batting average, fifth in slugging percentage, fourth in OPS, and first in on base percentage. Somehow they’re getting on, and hitting it decently, and yet they’re just not scoring the runs. Give the pitching the credit for the wins then. The Cards are number one in the NL with seven wins and a 2.48 ERA over 80 innings pitched allowing only 25 runs- 22 of which are earned. They are fourth in the NL in batting average allowing opposing teams a .233 average. Nice.
Common sense tells us we can’t expect the pitching to hold up this well all season, but also that our hitting and runs scored can’t continue to be held this low. It’s nice to see that lead off man Skip Schumaker has raised his .000 batting average to .167, which he’ll hopefully continue to improve. Troy Glaus is finally coming around raising his average to .250, and one of last years biggest disappointments, Adam Kennedy, is hitting around .250 as well. Albert Pujols, Rick Ankiel, and, yes, even Yadier Molina are hitting over .300 with BAs of .379, .314, and .308 respectively.
To reiterate an earlier post, the most important thing to do over a 162 game season is to win each series. Right now the Cards are a perfect 3-0 in series play and with a four game series in shitty shitty San Francisco coming up they are looking to expand it to 4-0 while expanding their NL central lead.
Another noteworthy piece of information: Starter Joel Piniero may be coming back into the starting rotation on Sunday against the Giants, which means the bullpen should be receiving a little more dept with Brad Thompson moving back into relief. But LaRussa hasn’t ruled out that Piniero might replace someone else (Looper or Wellemeyer) or could, depending on how happy the coaches are with the current starting rotation, give Piniero one more start in triple A to make sure he’s back to 100% before throwing him back out on the mound. However, I’m expecting Thompson to be sent to the pen and Piniero to start Sunday. With his start that would be one member of the cavalry back and three more to go with Mulder coming in early May, Clement in late to middle May, and Carpenter still penciled in to return sometime in July. Can’t wait to see what happens.
NL Central Division Standings
St. Louis 7-2
Milwaukee 6-2
Chicago 5-3
Cincinnati 5-4
Pittsburgh 3-5
Houston 3-7
Next Up: At San Francisco Giants (4 Games)
153 games to go
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