Pitching Swap Gave Cardinals A Rocky Mountain High

With one bold move, the Cardinals got a No. 1 starter for their rotation and a closer for the bullpen.

RetroSimba

Pat Hentgen Was Samrt, Low-Rick Acquisition For Cardinals

The Cardinals began to rebuild their starting pitching rotation for the 21st century with the acquisition of a Cy Young Award winner.

RetroSimba

Ricky Bottalico & The Cardinals' Flawed Bullpen Plan

Ricky Bottalico was acquired by the Cardinals to be a setup reliever, became the closer instead and didn’t perform well enough to keep the job.

RetroSimba

Best All-Time General Managers: No.9 Walt Jocketty

The #9 GM on our countdown of the best all-time general managers designed one of the great organizations in baseball before attempting to do the same with one of the game’s first ever franchises.

Call To The Pen

Cardinals Took In John Tudor Tormentor Barry Lyons

Though his reputation as an unwitting villain remained intact in franchise lore, Barry Lyons was welcomed into the Cardinals organization.

RetroSimba

Hello, It's The Cardinals Calling...

At this point, the Cardinals should call about Mike Trout. Bryce Harper.

KMOX

Cardinals Had No Choice But To Extend Yadier Molina, & That's Okay

Seventeen years ago this June, the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Kansas City Royals, 5-4, to snap a three-game losing streak and move a half-game ahead of the Cincinnati Reds in the NL Central. St. Louis got two home runs off the bat of J.D. Drew and starter Alan Benes pitched 7.1 innings with Dave Veres going 1.2 and picking up the save. It was an important win for a Cardinals organization that was looking for its first playoff appearance in four years and just their second trip to the postseason in 14 seasons.

FanRags

Jeff Bagwell Was At His Best Versus Cardinals

In a career filled with consistent hitting versus the Cardinals, Jeff Bagwell reached a personal pinnacle when he hit for the cycle against them.

RetroSimba

Tony LaRussa Steals The Show At Winter Meetings

He’s in The Hall, but today, he’s just in the hall. I don’t know if they knew, so some passersbys simply passed by, slightly slumping shoulders as they awkwardly wedged through the hotel hall, between some sportswriter against one wall, a Hall of Famer against the other.

Hochman

Sticking With Tevor Rosenthal Is The Right Course...For Now

Put yourself in Mike Matheny's seat for a change. If you decide to remove Trevor Rosenthal as your closer, what do you do with the closer and how do you shift your bullpen roles around? The Matheny haters have a fun time jumping to conclusions but I try my best to stay even keeled with the Helter Skelter routine. I can question Matheny until the end of the day and wonder about his future, but simply saying pull Rosenthal and replace him with Pat Neshek isn't as easy as it sounds

KSDK

Dave Veres Works With Kids Dealing With Drug & Alcohol Abuse

A new video from Best Drug Rehabilitation is featuring an interview between CEO Per Wickstrom, and former MLB pitcher Dave Veres on how to help kids avoid alcohol and drug abuse.

PR Web

Bill DeWitt's Visionary Thinking Transformed Cardinals

The task was ambitious, the timing perhaps unorthodox to those who were too shortsighted to see beyond the success.

St. Louis Official Site

Fernando Salas: Fastest Cardinal To 10-For-10 In Saves

When St. Louis Cardinals reliever Fernando Salas picked up his tenth save in ten opportunities on Tuesday night at Busch Stadium against San Francisco, he joined two others in a tie for the sixth-longest perfect save run to begin a Cardinals season.

The Cardinal Nation Blog

Cardinals Offense Not Helping Overcome Blown Saves

As previously documented here at The Cardinal Nation Blog, the St. Louis Cardinals have compiled a Major League-leading total of nine blown saves through the first quarter of the 2011 season. While they are concentrated on Ryan Franklin’s four, five other Cardinals relievers have contributed one each.

The Cardinal Nation Blog

Mitch Boggs' 3-For-3 In Saves A Good Start, But Not Unusual

Lacking the excitement surrounding his recently-demoted predecessor Ryan Franklin, new St. Louis Cardinals closer Mitchell Boggs quietly converted each of his first three save opportunities during the club’s most recent homestand.

The Cardinal Nation Blog

Bernie Bytes 4-1-11: It's Ryan Franklin Or Bust

This is not a defense of Ryan Franklin, per se. But let's keep his opening-day blown save in perspective. This is what we know: he pitches to contact. He doesn't miss many bats. The contact rate against him is high. If he misses location, he's extremely vulnerable. When you have a closer who isn't a power pitcher, the ball will be in play. A lot. And bleep happens.

Bernie's Five Minutes

Cardinals All-Decade Team: Closer

St. Louis Cardinals closer Jason Isringhausen, the franchise’s all-time leader in saves, once said the thrill he coveted the most wasn’t that franchise record. It wasn’t the 300th save that still beckons. It was the hug that only a champion knows.

Birdland

Leverage & Tony LaRussa

While I was thinking about looking at this I wasn't sure whether the (relative) fungibility of relief pitching made it more likely to reveal a manager's innermost thoughts and desires—i.e. he can use anybody, and there are lots of candidates for the role, so he can lean toward his older pitchers if he wants—or less, that they were so difficult to predict that when one reliever does well he's as good as any other, age be damned.

Viva El Birdos

Diamondbacks Debut: Logo Is Better Than The Lineup

When I found myself trying to decide between Miguel Batista and Aaron Cook as my No. 5 starter while others were wondering if Cy Young or Steve Carlton would fill out their rotation or whether Randy Johnson has a place in their bullpen, I knew I was out of my league.

Birdland

What If Jack Wilson Had Never Been Traded?

In the midst of Pittsburgh’s two-game visit to Busch this week, watching former Cardinal farmhand Jack Wilson in a Pirate uniform got us wondering: What would the last seven and a half years have been like for the Cardinals if they hadn’t traded Wilson back in 2000 for bust LOOGy Jason Christiansen?

Fungoes