“That was the closest 9-4 ballgame I’ve ever seen,” said USA Baseball CEO Paul Seiler, just minutes after I ran into him behind the USA dugout, following the United States’ critical, do-or-die victory over Canada this afternoon at Chase Field in Phoenix.

He couldn’t have summed it up much better. It absolutely was a nailbiter. It always is, when Team USA and Canada meet on the diamond (as described in my book Miracle on Grass, when Canada shocked Team USA in the very first game of the 1999 Pan Ams, 7-6 in extra innings).

Only when Team USA’s Eric Hosmer ripped a bases-clearing double in the top of the ninth, with Team USA ahead 6-4, did anyone in the USA dugout feel comfortable.

The Americans were literally six outs from being ELIMINATED from this World Baseball Classic. They trailed Canada 3-2, going to the 8th inning. Yes, it would have been a natural disaster had Team USA lost this game. MLB was counting on them for higher TV ratings and higher ticket revenues for the next round in Miami, and possibly the finals in San Francisco.

When Canada’s Michael Saunders launched a 2-run homer in the second inning of USA starter Derek Holland, we were already off to a bad start. But the Americans battled back and tied it 2-2 in the 4th. Canada went back ahead 3-2 on a base hit by Adam Loewen, and it stayed that way until the critical 8th. That’s when Orioles star Adam Jones came up with the biggest hit of the event so far for Team USA, drilling a one out, two-run double into the left-center gap off Canadian reliever Jim Henderson. It gave Team USA a 4-3 lead.

But, just as they always do (see my column here that I wrote prior to the WBC starting): Canada fought right back, and had cut the lead to 5-4, with the bases loaded and two outs. Joe Torre went to relief pitcher Steve Cishek, to face Canadian pinch hitter Tim Smith. In what was the game’s most critical moment, Cishek got Smith to ground out to second base, securing the 5-4 lead.
The Americans then blew it open with four runs in the 9th, and all of the Canadian fans began to gather their things and walk out up the aisles and out of the stadium, as soon as Hosmer’s double cleared the bases. Craig Kimbrel came on to secure the final three outs, for Team USA.

It was a rousing way for Pool D to come to an end, and this will be remembered for the raucous fight between the two teams that failed to advance: Mexico & Canada, along with the surprising Italian team, that beat both of those squads to join the Americans in Miami.

Incredibly, Team USA came ever so close to being knocked out of the event and finishing in last place in the pool. Instead, they won Pool D outright and will meet the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, and Italy later this week in Florida.

I’m excited that they have advanced, but – if they wait as long as they did here in Phoenix to put their game faces on – I’m afraid they might not make it to the finals in San Francisco. The DR is my favorite to win the next round, and it will be up to the other three teams to decide which one grabs the second flight to California. Should be fun to watch. I will blog again during the second round. That’s all from here in Phoenix.

Here are some photos from today’s action between Team USA & Canada (use the navigation arrows to view all seven images):

Anthems

◄ Back

Next ►

Picture 1 of 7

National Anthems before the game.
Follow David on Twitter @miracleongrass.

David Fanucchi is the author of “Miracle on Grass” – How Hall of Famer Tommy Lasorda led Team USA to a shocking upset over Cuba, capturing the only Olympic gold medal in USA Baseball history. He was the official Team USA Press Officer for both the 2000 USA Baseball Olympic Team and the 2006 USA World Baseball Classic Team. More information about Fanucchi and Miracle on Grass can be found on his website at www.davidfanucchi.com. Follow him on Twitter @miracleongrass.  

Due to a strained right wrist and forearm from Team USA and Yankees first baseman Mark Teixeira, Eric Hosmer gets the opportunity to join Team USA for the World Baseball Classic.

After getting permission from general manager Dayton Moore and manager Ned Yost, Hosmer joined team USA Wednesday night to play an exhibition game against the Colorado Rockies. Team USA begins WBC play against Mexico this Friday night at Chase Field in Phoenix, AZ.

Hosmer joins fellow Royal Tim Collins on the USA team and is the ninth Royals player to take part in the World Baseball Classic. Other Royals players are reliever Kelvin Herrera, infielder Miguel Tejada and reliever Atahualpa Severino playing for the Dominican Republic, catcher Salvador Perez with Venezuela, pitcher Luis Mendoza with Mexico, infielder Irving Falu with Puerto Rico and Minor League outfielder Paulo Orlando with Brazil.

Now there might be some concerns about Hosmer being away from the Royals to play in the WBC, but to put into perspective, the WBC is like Spring Training: the games really don’t matter. Of course it’s an honor to represent your country in the WBC, but the games are the same as Spring Training games. And Hosmer will be the Royals first baseman this season, so it’s not like he’s competing for a job. He’ll get to play with different players and be managed by Team USA manager Joe Torre, which is a good thing. There’s the risk of injury, but that can happen in Spring Training games too. Overall, it’s a good experience for Hosmer and the other Royals players participating in the WBC. Oh yeah, Go Team USA!

When the marriage between Major League Baseball and USA Baseball (the national governing body for the sport) took place in 1999, a New Jersey native and former college soccer player named Paul Seiler was second in command of the USAB operation, behind long-time MLB executive Dan O’Brien Sr.

Joe Torre and Tommy Lasorda discuss strategy

Seiler and O’Brien worked together to introduce the two organizations to one another, and help the MLB executives that were chosen to guide USA Baseball through the player selection process for the first-ever professional Team USA, that would represent the country at the 1999 Pan Am Games. That event would serve as the qualifying event for the 2000 Olympics.

One year later, after Team USA had successfully qualified for the Olympic Games in Sydney, O’Brien stepped down, and the USAB Board of Directors gave the job of CEO to Seiler, on an interim basis. They wanted to see his leadership ability, as the 2000 Olympic Team was being put together.

With the help of current New York Mets GM Sandy Alderson, former New York Yankees GM Bob Watson, Hall of Fame Manager Tommy Lasorda and a host of many other talented individuals throughout various MLB club front offices, Seiler guided the organization to their finest moment – a gold medal victory at the 2000 Olympic Games.

He has been the Chief Operating Officer ever since – now going on 13 years – and yet he still is looking for that next crowning achievement in the organization’s history.

“What that group of players in 2000 did for USA Baseball as an organization, was give us that world championship that we could hang our hat on,” said Seiler.  “In the history of Olympic baseball, it would have been a shame had the United States not won a Gold Medal at least once.  With our victory in 2000, we can always say that we climbed to the top of the mountain and got it done, that we were the very best baseball team in the world for one moment in time.” (as quoted in the book Miracle on Grass).

Seiler is fully aware of how difficult it can be to get back to the top of the international baseball mountain. In the 12 professional level major international baseball events that have taken place since 2000 – all of which USA Baseball and MLB collaborated on the roster selection process – Team USA has won exactly……….twice.

Although they have had success getting deep into the events and having chances to win, it just hasn’t happened often enough. They were able to win the low-profile, IBAF World Cup in back-to-back attempts in 2007 & 2009, beating Cuba both times. But three losses in gold medal games, and three other third place finishes (including the 2008 Olympics and the 2009 WBC), have added up to it being over 12 years now, since Team USA has won it all on the biggest stage, with the spotlight on the game.

Here are the results of the 14 professional USA Baseball teams that have taken the field.

Seiler saw first-hand the unique brand of motivational speak that the legendary Lasorda used on a group of unheralded minor-league players at the time. But finding the right blend of talent on the field, personalities in the locker room, and a coaching staff that can drum up the same level of success as Lasorda did, with a roster full of proven, veteran big-leaguers, has proven to be much more daunting than he would have originally thought.

For obvious reasons, Seiler is hoping that his manager this time around – Joe Torre here at the 2013 World Baseball Classic – can find that magic in a bottle, and carry the Red, White and Blue to a championship in San Francisco. As MLB.com writer Barry Bloom suggested in his column on Sunday, Lasorda’s Olympic gold has set an example for Torre, and that a WBC triumph for Team USA would get USA Baseball back to the top of the mountain, where Seiler knows they belong.

David Fanucchi is the author of “Miracle on Grass” – How Hall of Famer Tommy Lasorda led Team USA to a shocking upset over Cuba, capturing the only Olympic gold medal in USA Baseball history. He was the official Team USA Press Officer for both the 2000 USA Baseball Olympic Team and the 2006 USA World Baseball Classic Team. More information about Fanucchi and Miracle on Grass can be found on his website at www.davidfanucchi.com.  You can follow him on Twitter at @miracleongrass.

If recent history tells us anything, Manager Joe Torre better have his United States squad fully prepared for a battle when they take the field for their first game of the 2013 World Baseball Classic Friday night at Chase Field in Phoenix, Arizona.

It may seem that on paper, Team USA would be the logical front-runner in Pool D of the round-robin format, as they sit in a bracket with Canada, Italy, and Mexico. The top two teams will advance to the second round, after each team plays one another. In each of the previous two WBC events in 2006 and 2009, the Americans have at least advanced past the first round.

Talent-wise, Team USA has the firepower to go deep in this event. But, international baseball tournaments don’t always shake out the way that you think they should, even when the greatest players in the world are on the field.

As history has shown us, Team USA should never take Mexico or Canada lightly. Tracing back only 14 years to the beginning of the time (1999) when USA Baseball began utilizing professional players in major international competition, and collaborating with Major League Baseball on the player selection process, it has arguably been Mexico and Canada that have given the Americans the most trouble.

There’s no doubt that Mexico has become the biggest thorn in the side of Team USA. It started when the 1999 USA Pan Am Team got caught up in a dogfight with the Mexicans for one of two Olympic berths, at the Pan Am Games in Winnipeg, Canada. In the do-or-die semifinal game that allowed the winner to advance to Sydney for the 2000 Olympics, Mexico pushed Team USA into extra innings in a 2-2 tie. When unheralded hero Mike Neill came up with a two-out, pinch hit run scoring single to put the Americans ahead, reliever Dan Wheeler shut the door on Mexico to secure the win, and send Team USA to the Olympics. The Americans went on to win a gold medal in Sydney, behind Tommy Lasorda, Roy Oswalt and Ben Sheets (as told in my book Miracle on Grass).

But four years later, Mexico exacted their revenge when they shocked Team USA at the 2003 Olympic Qualifying event in Panama City, Panama. In a quarterfinal matchup that allowed the winner to stay alive, and eliminated the losing team, American reliever Brian Bruney gave up a solo home run in the top of the ninth inning, of a 1-1 tie. With Team USA down to their last at-bat, they placed runners at first and third with only one out. But Justin Leone bounced back to the mound, and pinch-hitter Gerald Laird popped out to end the game, killing Team USA’s chances of defending their Olympic gold medal at the 2004 Games in Athens.

Then in the 2006 World Baseball Classic, it was Mexico again that knocked out Team USA. After the Americans had won the opening round contest between the two, Mexico pulled off the upset over Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Ken Griffey Jr., and company, in a game started by Roger Clemens. Team USA was stymied with the bats all night, and lost 2-1 in a game they had to win, in order to get to the finals in San Diego. Instead, Japan advanced, and ended up winning the entire thing.

The Canadians have given Team USA all that they could handle as well. At the 1999 Pan Am Games, it was Canada that shocked the Americans in the very first game, 7-6 in extra innings. Then in 2006 in the first round of the WBC, Canada pounded Team USA starter Dontrelle Willis for five runs on six hits in 2.2 innings, and held on to win 8-6. Even though the loss didn’t end up costing Team USA the chance to advance to the second round in Anaheim, it didn’t sit well with the team, and was the first sign that the Americans could be beat. All three teams – Mexico, Canada and the USA – ended up with 2-1 records in that opening round, but Canada lost the tiebreaker.

In the last five years, the games between these three countries have continued to be very tight. In the 2007 Pan Am Games Olympic Qualifier, Team USA had a tough time and barely snuck past Mexico in the semifinals, with a 2-1 victory. Then in the 2011 Pan Am Games, Mexico returned the favor once again and beat the Americans during pool play, 3-2. Canada then dispatched Mexico in the semifinals 5-3, while Team USA was upsetting Cuba in the other semifinal, 12-10. With the Americans looking to capture their first Pan Am Games gold medal in over 40 years, Canada shocked them in the final, dealing them a bitter 2-1 defeat.

So, as you can see, nothing can be taken for granted, when it comes to these three teams playing one another in international baseball events, with professional players. I don’t imagine the Americans having much trouble with Italy, but it wouldn’t surprise me at all if Torre and company dropped a game in Phoenix to either Mexico or Canada. Neither one of those two teams will be afraid of the USA. If they do lose a game, they’ll be in real danger of losing that tiebreaker to advance to Miami, and it could all be over in a flash for the Red, White and Blue.

David Fanucchi is the author of “Miracle on Grass” – How Hall of Famer Tommy Lasorda led Team USA to a shocking upset over Cuba, capturing the only Olympic gold medal in USA Baseball history. He was the official Team USA Press Officer for both the 2000 USA Baseball Olympic Team and the 2006 USA World Baseball Classic Team. More information about Fanucchi and Miracle on Grass can be found on his website at www.davidfanucchi.com.  

I enjoy this time of year as a writer. Part of the reason for that is the United Cardinal Bloggers and their Roundtable project.

The project itself is interesting. One person asks a question and, this year, 30 writers from around the internet chime in with their opinions. All of the responses get gathered and posted onto one of the United Cardinal Blogger sites. Anytime you get that many opinions, you come up with some great material, some fun debate, and every once in a while another idea comes up.

I credit this year’s roundtable for this article.

Throughout the many discussions I have heard about Tony LaRussa over the last week, it seems that most of the fans out there have a large amount of respect for the man, even if they did not necessarily like him a whole lot. What I hear quite often, however, is how fans were not sure if he was the right man because of his complete opposite approach to the game from former skipper Whitey Herzog.

Fans remember The White Rat fondly and rightfully so. The decade of the 1980′s were a remarkable one for St. Louis. In his tenure, Herzog put three new pennants firmly in place in St. Louis and followed one up with a World Championship. Herzog’s has a spot on the wall for the Cardinals and a spot in most fan’s hearts.

The problem is, as much as we would all like to forget the time period between them, Tony LaRussa did not take over the team from Whitey Herzog. Whitey resigned from the Cardinals in 1990 and LaRussa took his position at the helm to start the 1996 season. Between them, as most of us know, whether we want to admit it or not, was Joe Torre.

Torre took over as skipper for the Cardinals with 58 games left in the 1990 season. In September of 1989, the Cardinals laid to rest one of their greatest fans. August “Gussie” Anheuser Busch Jr, who was instrumental in buying and keeping the franchise in St. Louis, had finally reached the end of his 90 year old life.

When 1990 rolled around, the ownership of the franchise had lost interest in owning a baseball club and it became apparent on the field. Free agents were not being attracted to the team, the goal had become very business oriented, and Torre was the figurehead that most fans seen as the problem.

The years that Torre was in charge would see the Cardinals finish second in their division one time and then never finish above third place again. Amazingly, Torre was able to produce a 351-354 record in his tenure with the team, playing the game with very little star power outside of shortstop Ozzie Smith. That’s not to say that the team did not have some quality players, but our friends at Baseball Reference list the top player in each of Torre’s years as follows: Willie McGee (1990), Ozzie Smith (1991), Bob Tewksbury (1992), Greg Jefferies (1993), Mark Whiten (1994), and Brian Jordan (1995). Not exactly the best players in the league at any point.

Torre was a good baseball man with a strong history in the game that was stuck with an ownership group that would not put the right pieces on the field for him to manage. His first full year in charge of the team they would finish 84-78 and in second place, the best finish of his tenure. He would be the first manager in St. Louis with at least five years as their manager to not make the World Series since Branch Rickey ran the team from 1919 to 1925.

We have since watched Joe Torre move on and accomplish great things in New York and perform adequately in Los Angeles before taking a position with Major League Baseball. We know he is a good manager and a capable baseball mind.

The brewery sold the franchise to a group of investors prior to the 1996 season. Torre had been released the year before and the new ownership group brought in manager Tony LaRussa to lead the team, which immediately made the playoffs that season. Brian Jordan was once again the best player on the team that season, but a transition was starting to happen under the new leadership. The ownership would invest in the ballclub and LaRussa would lead them.

Joe Torre was simply a victim of circumstance. A guy that was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

It is a shame that his time is all but forgotten because of it.

Bill Ivie is the editor here at I-70 Baseball as well as the Assignment Editor for BaseballDigest.com.
He is the host of I-70 Radio, hosted every week on BlogTalkRadio.com.
Follow him on Twitter here.

The St. Louis Cardinals were coming home from a disappointing east coast road trip. They went 7-5 over the twelve games, but had dropped two of three in the final series to the first place Cincinnati Reds. It was more than losing two games to the Reds, it was how the last game ended that could have sent the team into a prolonged slump.

Rookie sensation, Dick Hughes, had taken a perfect game through a rain delay and into the eighth inning. A couple of bloop hits later, the Reds had a lead. The Cardinals didn’t give up and did mount a rally in the ninth inning, getting the tying run on third base with nobody out. Then came the play nobody expected – a game ending triple play. I can still hear Harry Caray grasping for words to describe what he had just witnessed.

This game on the following day was just what the Cardinals needed – one so strange that they could forget all about the base running blunder in Cincinnati.

Denny Lemaster

For this one game series against the Atlanta Braves, the visitors would go with one of their left handed veterans, Denny Lemaster. Lemaster was an innings eater, but was susceptible to the long ball and that kept him from stringing together a significant number of wins. He would generally keep his team in the game, but not dominate.

For the Cardinals, a home town favorite would be on the mound: Ray Washburn. For trivia buffs, it was Ray Washburn that threw out the first pitch in the new Busch Stadium a year earlier. Washburn was a tremendous talent, but a series of injuries had kept him from putting together that season we all knew he had in him. In just a few days, another freak injury will cost him a month on the disabled list, but he had a game to pitch tonight first.

Don’t Mess with Hank

The game started off like many others against the Braves in the 60s: two quick infield groundouts and then one mistake to Henry Aaron for very loud 1-0 Braves lead. That didn’t bother the Cardinals veteran starter. Washburn responds by striking out Mack Jones to end the inning.

Lemaster would also have a typical first inning with Julian Javier reaching base on an error by Clete Boyer and a walk to Orlando Cepeda, but the inconsistent Alex Johnson fails to extend the inning.

A case against the Designated Hitter

It looked as if Washburn would have a quick second inning, striking out Joe Torre strikeout and getting Felipe Alou to ground out. Clete Boyer would atone for his error in the first inning by pulling a double into left field. The Cardinals would play the odds by walking eighth place hitter Dennis Menke to get to the Braves pitcher. Denny Lemaster would only get 7 hits in 1967 and should have been over-matched by Washburn, but he would hit a bloop single to center, driving in Boyer for a 2-0 lead.

As he did in the first inning, Washburn would bear down after limit the damage to just the single run. Not just this inning, the next five. Once in a groove, Washburn was nearly unhittable. Ask the San Francisco Giants whom he would no-hit in 1968.

Lemaster would continue to struggle, retiring the Cardinals in order only once – the 7-9 hitters in the fourth. With all of these base runners, the Cardinals had to break through, eventually.

They did in the fifth inning. After two quick outs, a walk to Curt Flood would come back to haunt the Atlanta hurler. 1967′s NL MVP, Orlando Cepeda, would rip a double into the left field corner putting the tying runs in scoring position. The light hitting platoon outfielder Alex Johnson would get another chance, and this time he would deliver, lining a single to center scoring both Flood and Cepeda for a 2-2 tie.

Both pitchers would put up zeros in the sixth inning with the Cardinals pulling off a nifty double play started by Cepeda and a strong relay throw by Maxvill to Washburn covering first to complete the twin killing. The Cardinals infield defense was the best in baseball – Maxvill and Javier being one the best middle infield combinations in team history.

Late Inning Trouble

The Braves would regain the lead in the top of the seventh inning.

Against a tiring Ray Washburn, Felipe Alou would hit a one out double in the right field gap. Clete Boyer again would hurt the Cardinals with a single up the middle. Javier was able to get to the ball but unable to throw Boyer out. Alou held at third and things momentarily looked good for the Cardinals. Washburn had already induced three double plays and he would try for his fourth. And he almost did. Charlie Lau hit the ball slowly to Maxvill who made the force throw to Javier but Lau beat the play at first and Alou scored the go ahead run.

The Braves would extend their lead in the next inning. Woody Woodward would lead off with a single to left field. The Braves would play for the single run and sacrifice Woodward to second base. Up to the plate steps Henry Aaron, and not wanting to repeat the first inning, Aaron is intentionally walked to set up another double play chance.

Cardinals manager, Red Schoendienst, would play this conventionally going to his bullpen with the hard throwing young left-hander, Larry Jaster, to face the left handed hitting Mack Jones. The Braves would counter by pinch hitting with Rico Carty – one of the best pure hitters of the era. Carty would miss the entire 1968 season fighting tuberculosis and would put up huge numbers in 1969 and Pujols like in 1970. But this was 1967 and Larry Jaster would win this battle, for now. Carty hit the ball back to Jaster and the Cards would turn a nifty 1-6-3 double play – their fourth of the evening.

A Wild Wild Wild Ending

This brings us to the ninth inning, and not even Barnum and Bailey could dream about what happened next.

Larry Jaster was brilliant in the eighth but quite the opposite in the ninth. Joe Torre would lead off with an infield single. I’m not sure what was moving slower, the ball off the bat or the future Cardinal star running down the first base line, but when the dust cleared Torre was standing on first.

After an Alou fly out to Lou Brock in left field, Jaster would lose his control. He would walk Clete Boyer and Marty Martinez, loading the bases. Red would again go to his bullpen for his big right hander Ron Willis. Willis would get the Braves pitcher to pop out to second, but Woody Woodward would battle Willis eventually drawing a walk, giving the Braves a 4-2 lead. Frustrated and not wanting to see the heart of the Atlanta order, Schoendienst went back to the bullpen for his closer, Joe Hoerner. Hoerner would only face one batter as he struck out Gary Geiger to end the inning.

For most other teams, the game was essentially over. But these were the 1967 Go Go El Birdos and they weren’t going down without a fight. And some serious entertainment along the way.

Journeyman and backup catcher Johnny Romano would lead off the ninth inning by reaching base on Clete Boyer’s second error of the game. His wild throw allows Romano to advance to second base. Lemaster had gone about as far as he could and the Braves went to their bullpen.

You cannot believe what would happen over the next five minutes.

The first strange move goes to Red Schoendienst. He pinch runs for Johnny Romano with Dick Hughes. Yes, Dick Hughes, the pitcher. The pitcher who took the hard luck loss the day before. Hughes was one heck of an athlete, and could run as well as any of the hitters left on the bench, so why not ?

Phil Niekro

Strange move number two goes to the Braves for bringing in knuckleballer Phil Niekro to close out this game, or at least try. The Cardinals had great success with a knuckleball closer earlier in the decade, but this was an unusual move to say the least. There was one player on the field that hated the knucklball more than all of the Cardinals hitters – poor Joe Torre. He hated to catch a knuckleballer. And would hate it even more before this inning was over.

Niekro immediately threw a wild pitch allowing Dick Hughes to advance to third base. Lou Brock actually hit one of Niekro’s floaters, far enough out to center field to score Hughes and cut the Braves lead to 4-3.

Julian Javier just stood in the batters box while Niekro threw floater after floater. Javier knew he wasn’t going to hit Niekro’s knuckleball, so he took his chances that Niekro would walk him, and Javier won that battle.

This is when Cardinals radio announcer Harry Caray asked “He wouldn’t throw a wild pitch would he?” As if Niekro was listening to Harry, a pitch scooted past a frustrated Torre with Javier taking second base.

Again Caray asks, “He wouldn’t do it again, would he ?” And yes he would. Another floater that evades the glove of Joe Torre and the tying run in now standing on third.

The patient Curt Flood then delivers with a line drive single to left field and the game is now tied 4-4.

Beginning to worry about running out of players, Red Schoendient pulls another switch that not even Tony LaRussa would consider. He pinch runs for Curt Flood using Al Jackson, who had been warming up the Cardinals bullpen.

Future Cardinal pitcher Clay Carrol would strike out Orlando Cepeda and get pinch hitter Roger Maris to fly out to end the inning, but the never say die Cardinals had tied the game and into extra innings we would go. But not for long.

A Walkoff …… Triple ?

Al Jackson would take the mound and Roger Maris would go into right field. This is exactly the opposite of how you would do this. Jackson was a starter and Maris would be taken out of games late for defensive replacements. But this was the carnival of June 1, 1967 and the normal rules do not apply.

In the previous five seasons the little left hander would lose 20, 17, 16, 20 and 15 games. Not too many pitchers lose 20 games in a season, Jackson did it twice. On this evening, and for the duration of a single inning, Jackson pitched like Sandy Koufax making quick work of the heart of the Braves order with the ball never leaving the infield.

The bottom of the tenth inning would go even more quickly.

Bobby Tolan

After an infield ground out by Tim McCarver, the light hitting utility infielder Phil Gagliano would hit a weak grounder to third and beat the throw for an infield single. Gagliano barely hit his weight, but his hits always seemed to be in key situations.

After an infield pop out, Clay Carroll would face Bobby Tolan. And the game would come to an end. One of the most loved players of the era, and one that we let get away, Tolan splits the outfielders with a line drive that goes all the way to the center field wall, scoring the speedy Gagliano from first. Bobby Tolan ends the game with a walk off triple and the Cardinals would have the most improbable 5-4 win.

The Cardinals would sputter a bit over the next few days, but this win ignited a run to the pennant that would have them survive losing both Bob Gibson and Ray Washburn to broken bones. And another World Championship for the Gateway City. More important, the unusual ending of the game gave fans and sports writers something to talk about other than running into a triple play to lose a game.

Bob Netherton covers Cardinals history for i70baseball.com and writes at On the Outside Corner. You may follow Bob on Twitter here or on Facebook here.

A game that started off so well ended up being painful to watch.

Let us start with the shocking: Albert Pujols grounded into three double plays yesterday. Three. First time in his career he’s ever done that. According to various reports, the Cardinal record for hitting into double plays in on game is 4, held by Joe Torre. Joe Torre did indeed ground into 4 DP’s in one game, but as a New York Met (21 July 1975). Reported on twitter by me, but I’m willing to bet Derrick Goold beat me to it. No doubt someone will have figured that out by now. Four is the Major League record.

The Cardinal record is indeed 3, which Pujols tied today. It’s been done twice before, by Scott Rolen, and Orlando Cepeda. Interestingly St Louis won the game that day in 1966 when Cepeda did it, but that may be because Bob Gibson was on the mound.

The other aspect of Pujols’ day that will have folks concerned is his oh for 2 with RISP. He also came up with a total of 5 guys on and didn’t drive any of them in. Good thing Matt Holliday had a big day, or this game might not have gotten to extra innings. It is only one game, but one wonders if all the contract talk weighs on him a little bit.

Despite the errors and lack of hitting – they ended with 12 hits but only 3 runs – this was a game they should have won. They did enough. We can blame Ryan Franklin for surrendering the bomb to Cameron Maybin in the ninth that tied it, and Ryan Theriot for taking his eye off Jon Jay’s throw in the eleventh that allowed Padre catcher Nick Hundley to scamper home with the go-ahead (and eventual winning) run, but that is not really fair. This game was lost when the Cardinals left 8 men on in the first 9 innings, when they had Tim Stauffer on the ropes while putting the first three men on the fourth, and the first two in the sixth, yet only scored one run total in those two innings.

Chris Carpenter looked good, and was efficient. Seven innings, 98 pitches, two earned runs (although by rights it should have been only one; how Skip Schumaker does not get charged with an error in the fifth when he didn’t hold the ball while tagging Ryan Ludwick out stealing is beyond me). Miguel Batista was Miguel Batista. Both Trever Miller and Brian Tallet pitched well. Augenstein struggled but that’s somewhat understandable for his first game back in the majors in over a year (and his defense betrayed him too).

We ought to tip our cap to the Padre defense. Rightfielder Will Venable made several outstanding plays in the field. The new Padre keystone combo looked mighty good turning 4 double plays, and they individually made several solid plays. This game is put away early on without the stellar glove work by San Diego.

The Cardinals get an off-day tomorrow, then return to action Saturday, when Jake Westbrook squares off against Clayton Richard.

During the offseason we have been taking a look at the past, giving readers a timeline of St. Louis baseball throughout history. Last time we learned about the some tough times for the Cardinals as the roster was weak, the front office was in shambles, and the team was going nowhere fast. In 1995 Anheuser-Busch put the team up for sale and the team finished the season without a manager. Who was coming in to take over?

Walt Jocketty wasted little time trying to turn things around after taking over as general manager of the Cardinals. He had to show a little patience, however, to get the manager he wanted. Joe Torre was out after roughly five rather lackluster years, and at the end of the 1995 season Jocketty got his man. He called up good friend Tony LaRussa and lured him to the Gateway City after spending ten years in Oakland, picking up three AL pennants and one World Series title.

Tony had his own way of doing things, and many fans initially balked at some of his decisions. The number one choice? Choosing to give a stronger portion of playing time to young shortstop Royce Clayton rather than stalwart and fan favorite Ozzie Smith. Ozzie still had a strong year at the plate, hitting .282/.358/.370 over 82 games, and his competition was weaker. Clayton had a .277/.321/.371 line.

The turnover in players between 1995 and 1996 was startling. The pitching rotation added Andy Benes and Todd Stottlemyre in the rotation as well as closer Dennis Eckersley, while the starting nine saw newcomers Gary Gaetti, Ron Gant, and old friend Willie McGee. The biggest switch on the field for the year was the actual field – the team returned to natural grass after using Astroturf since 1970.

The team started slowly, going just 41-40 in the first half. After the All-Star game, they started to climb. An eight game winning streak from August 30 to September 7 took Tony’s team from 2.5 back to 1.5 up, and they never looked back. After winning the division on the backs of Andy Benes’ 18 win season, the team ran into the machine known as the 1990’s Braves in the NLCS. They battled, but could not win out over the starting rotation of Greg Maddux, John Smoltz, Tom Glavine and Denny Neagle. For a young Cardinals’ fan experiencing her first memories of Cardinals postseason baseball, this was a bittersweet end to the season. I still hold a grudge.

A 88-74 season in 1996 went almost completely backwards in 1997, as the team finished 73-89 and found themselves fourth in the five team NL Central. Rookie Matt Morris had a strong year for the starting rotation, finishing with a team best 12-9 record, 3.19 ERA, 217 innings pitched and 1.276 WHIP. This earned him second place in the Rookie of the Year voting.

Never over .500, Jocketty nevertheless made a July 31 trade with the A’s. The Cardinals passed Eric Ludwick, TJ Matthews and Blake Stein to the A’s in return for Mark McGwire. McGwire hit 24 home runs over the final two months, but only hit .253. In fact, no one on the team hit over .300 on the season. The closest was none other than Willie McGee, who hit .300 exactly. Four outfielders played in 115+ games – some things never change with LaRussa.

Does anyone remember anything about the 1998 season besides the home run chase? I do not. Considering Houston absolutely ran away with the division, winning 102 games, no one cared about anything besides waiting for Big Mac to hit his next blast. The team was already back 10.5 games at the break, and although they did put together an 18-7 September, they were much too far out of contention to ever put any pressure on the division leaders.

Yes, the real story for the Cardinals was McGwire. He and Cubs’ outfielder Sammy Sosa were neck and neck all season, trading blasts and actually becoming somewhat of friends over the course of the season. On September 7, McGwire tied the single season record of 61 home runs in a season, only to break it the next night with Roger Maris’ family in attendance, against Sosa’s Cubs no less! Baseball was on the way back up after having received such a large black eye with the 1994 strike. People were finding reasons to come back to the ballpark, and baseball was smiling again.

As for the team, 1999 was another forgetful year. I absolutely did not remember how dominant Houston was for a few years. It makes the Astros current issues that much more awful. This year did not have much to offer the Cardinals. McGwire had 65 home runs, and Kent Bottenfield had the only good year of his career, going 18-7, but this team was going nowhere fast, and no one seemed to care.

One interesting footnote to this season is 25 year old rookie starting pitcher Jose Jimenez. His season looks unremarkable, his career even more so, but for two games in 1999, Jimenez outdueled a future Hall of Famer. On June 25 in Arizona, Jimenez faced Randy Johnson and matched him out for out through the first eight innings. In the top of the ninth the Cardinals pushed a run across through two walks and a single to left. Jimenez closed out the ninth to finish a no hitter. It is not every day that a rookie outdoes Randy Johnson, but then he did it twice. Just two starts later the two squared off again, this time in St. Louis. Jimenez again came out on top of a 1-0 score, although this time the Cardinals only made him wait until the fourth to get a run, and he gave up two hits. These were literally the two greatest games of his career, and they came in the course of three games on the way to a 5-14, 5.85 ERA season.

2000 showed a team that started out very strong in April (17-8), then fluctuated for the next 4 months, playing a little better than .500 ball from May through August. However, two trades in July bringing relief pitcher Mike Timlin and veteran infielder Will Clark to the Cardinals primed the team to finish the year strong. Rookie pitcher Rick Ankiel showed his phenom status by going 11-7 with a 3.50 ERA, which earned him a second place finish in the Rookie of the Year voting. Newcomer Darryl Kile felt a career resurgence in his first year out of the thin Denver air and went 20-9, the only twenty win season of his career that ended too soon. All five starting pitchers had eleven or more wins.

On the offensive side, another newcomer in centerfielder Jim Edmonds led the team with a .295/.411/.583 batting line, racking up 103 walks, 167 strikeouts (does the term ‘free swinger’ mean anything to you?), 42 home runs and 108 runs batted in. With all that he eventually accomplished in St. Louis, it almost seems unreal that he was 30 years old already when he arrived to the Cardinals.

The team made a solid run in the postseason, pushing past the Braves in the Division Series despite a bout of wildness by starting pitcher Rick Ankiel. However, they were run over by the scorching hot Mets in the NLCS, and the Mets were the ones that went on to the Series, squaring off against the Yankees in the Subway Series.

Tony had pushed the team back into the upper half of baseball, and the team had the pieces in place to stay there for awhile. Would they?

Angela Weinhold covers the Cardinals for i70baseball.com and writes at Cardinal Diamond Diaries. You may follow her on Twitter here or follow Cardinal Diamond Diaries here.

During the offseason we have been taking a look at the past, giving readers a timeline of St. Louis baseball throughout history. Last time we learned about the “Runnin’ Redbirds” and how Whitey was leading the boys to the top. Things were changing though, starting with the last days of Gussie Busch.

Whitey Herzog had lost his edge in the Cardinals’ clubhouse. 1990 was a mess for the team, and Herzog wanted none of it. There were ten players entering their final years of their contract, and Whitey wanted to lock them up or trade them and get some value back. However, the roundtable of brewery people that he had to go through were unwilling to help him do the work he needed to put the team on the right path again.

The players were not policing themselves, bringing in entire posses of people and allowing them to go wild in the clubhouse. When Herzog tried to talk to the team and regain control, some players ignored him. The players were playing for themselves, not caring what happened to the team. At 33-47 halfway through the season, the Cards were in San Diego, and Herzog looked up and down the bench, noticing players joking around and laughing, not caring that their season was circling the drain. He quit. No one really understood why, but eventually it became clear that between the drama with the brewery and the players that seemed to be throwing in the towel, this was not the kind of atmosphere Whitey thrived in.

The team was a mess. Pitcher Joe Magrane said that it was to the point where if the team bus had broken down, 25 cabs would have shown up and gone in 25 different directions. Red Schoendienst took over the team for a short period, until general manager Dal Maxvill hired Joe Torre to take over. The former Cards’ third baseman and MVP winner had been managing since he retired, working with the New York Mets and Atlanta Braves before taking the helm for the Cardinals. He spent the rest of the season observing and planning, trying to figure out what to do to pull this team back together. They finished an abysmal 70-92, sixth in the NL East.

Joe Torre picked up the pieces over the offseason, but many of the pieces that made up the runnin’ Redbirds were gone. Willie McGee was traded to the A’s, Vince Coleman, Terry Pendleton, Danny Cox, and John Tudor were all granted free agency. The team was left with perennial All-Star and Gold Glove shortstop Ozzie Smith and the Secret Weapon Jose Oquendo. Closer Lee Smith set a team record by picking up 47 saves, but after that, it was a shell of the team that had looked so proud and mighty in the days of Gussie and Whitey.

Torre did pull out the wins, however, and the team finished second in the NL East at 84-78. Five pitchers finished with ten or more wins – Bryn Smith (12), Bob Tewksbury, Ken Hill, Omar Olivares (11 each), and Cris Carpenter (no typo – 10). Of those five, none of them finished with an ERA under 3.25 and no pitched 200 innings. On paper, this team was unimpressive. In reality, the next few years would be even moreso.

1992 had a familiar vibe to it. The team finished 83-79, a whole one game worse than the year before, and dropped to third in the six team NL East. Donovan Osborne had a solid rookie campaign, finishing at 11-9 with a 3.77 ERA and 179 innings pitched. This earned him fifth place in the Rookie of the Year voting. Fellow starter Tewksbury had a career year, finishing at 16-5 with a 2.16 ERA and 233 innings pitched. This propelled him to finish third in the Cy voting, the only time he landed in the top five in his career.

Over the offseason the Cardinals had traded pitcher Ken Hill for Andres Galarraga, hoping the Big Cat could replace an aging Pedro Guerrero at first. Instead Galarraga had a disappointing year, then moved on to the thin air of Denver, where he had a career resurgence with the Rockies. At least the team was finding a little firepower in the form of centerfielder Ray Lankford, who finished third in the 1991 Rookie of the Year voting and slugged a team high 20 home runs.

1993 was more of the same. The team was doing okay, but nothing was really notable. The team finished 87-75, again in third. Joe Magrane returned to the rotation after Tommy John surgery had wiped out most of the previous two seasons, but he was not the same pitcher who won 18 games at age 24, and found himself released in mid-August. Tewksbury again led the rather unimpressive staff with a 17-10 record, but his 3.83 ERA and 1.301 WHIP (not team bests, but very close) tells the story of why this team did not win more ballgames.

Then again, the lineup was not so helpful either. Despite finishing fourth in the league in batting average and second in on base percentage as a team, the telling marks of finishing dead last in home runs and eighth in slugging shows little to no pop. The one notable game could be found on September 7 in Cincinnati, where outfielder Mark Whiten hit four massive home runs and drove in twelve runs in a single game, tying two Major League records in the process.

The real story in 1994 for the Cardinals was not the season itself, especially since they finished a meager 53-61. The news was in all of baseball, where a players’ strike halted the season on August 12, eventually wiping out the rest of the schedule and the World Series. The owners tried to impose a salary cap to make up for their mistakes over the past few years, but the players were having none of it, feeling they were pushed into striking.

During the strike the team went through changes of their own. Dal Maxvill was out as general manager, and Walt Jocketty was in, after spending many years with Oakland and Colorado as assistant GM. He knew that the team was on a slow boat to China, and knew that changes had to be made. After the strike ended, baseball was in shambles. Fans were slow to return to the ballpark, not trusting either side of the argument in the strike and deciding instead to just wash their hands of the matter. After a 20-27 start to the season, Jocketty helped show Joe Torre the door, replacing him for the rest of the year with farm director Mike Jorgensen.

The team itself was just sad. No starter had more than seven wins. SEVEN. Single digits. Best starter ERA? 3.81. Also quite sad. The offensive side of the ball was actually worse, sitting dead last in batting average, on base, slugging, hits, runs, and total bases. Outfielder Brian Jordan finally got in a full season and turned out a solid performance, turning out a .296/.339/.488 line. Second base was a mess, with four different players getting 30+ starts there. The Cardinals finished an abysmal 62-81, fourth in the five team NL Central.

At the end of the season, the brewery put the team up for sale. The Anheuser-Busch era in St. Louis was coming to an end, and there were more changes to come.

Angela Weinhold covers the Cardinals for i70baseball.com and writes at Cardinal Diamond Diaries. You may follow her on Twitter here or follow Cardinal Diamond Diaries here.

During the offseason we have been taking a look at the past, giving readers a timeline of St. Louis baseball throughout history. Last time we learned about “Cha-Cha” Cepeda and the El Birdos, Gibson’s incredible pitching which led to consecutive pennants in 1967 and 1968, before Gussie Busch demoralized the team in 1969 and caused them to stumble. Would their volatile owner hold them back?

Moral was low, emotions were high, and the Cardinals that were so good two years in a row had been cut down to fourth place in 1969. Red Schoendienst was trying to hold the team together, but then the team lost their voice. After twenty-four years in the Cardinals’ broadcast booth, Harry Caray was fired and bounced to the Oakland A’s, Chicago White Sox, and finally Chicago Cubs, where he stayed until his death in 1998. Fortunately for Cardinal fans, Jack Buck stepped in to become the voice of the franchise, and no one can argue that this was a poor choice in broadcasters!

1970 brought newcomer Dick Allen, who came as part of the infamous Curt Flood trade with the Philadelphia Phillies. Players shifted around the diamond to accommodate the slugging first baseman, with Joe Torre moving from first to catcher and replacing Tim McCarver, who had been sent to Philadelphia in the same trade. He and Torre were really the only players who could be considered sluggers on the team, as they hit 55 of the 113 team home runs on the year.

Thank goodness for Bob Gibson, as he was literally the only pitcher on the staff with a winning percentage over .500, checking in at .767 with a 23-7 record and 3.12 ERA. The team as a whole could not get it together, and sat twelve and a half games back on July 29. August, however, brought an inexplicable hot streak, as the team went 19-11 and suddenly sat just five and a half back on the morning of September 1! Stranger things had happened before…

…but not this time. Dick Allen tore a hamstring sliding into second base, and the slide extended to the team, as they finished September/October at 12-17, which left them 76-86, thirteen games back of the Pittsburgh Pirates for the NL East division crown.

Joe Torre

1971’s high points must include Joe Torre and Steve Carlton at the top of the list. Torre captured the MVP award, hitting a torrid .363/.421/.555 while making another jump in field positioning, this time to third base. Carlton showed another glimpse of what was to come, going 20-9 with a 3.56 ERA, all while picking up his third All-Star selection in his age 27 season.

The Cardinals as a whole were a contender, although the 90-72 record looks almost falsified on paper when looking at the numbers. There were no real sluggers on the team outside of Torre, who slammed 24. They were small ball players who slapped out singles and relied on stringing them together to get players home. Lou Brock swiped 64 bases, but the next highest total on the team was right fielder Jose Cardenal, who nabbed a mere 12. To be perfectly honest, this team does not look like one that should have finished second in the division, but stranger things have happened.

A fun tidbit? 1971 was the year that the team switched from button up uniforms to the t-shirt style tops that they would use until 1992.

Sparks flew in the offseason when contract negotiations with Steve Carlton became ugly. There was a $10,000 gap between Gussie Busch’s offer and Carlton’s demands, and Busch, citing a government-mandate that people try to cost-control wages, informed his star pitcher that he was being “unpatriotic.” Busch turned to general manager Bing Devine to trade Carlton away, and Devine, knowing it was trade the man or collect unemployment himself, sent Carlton to Philadelphia for fellow pitcher Rick Wise. A second casualty to the rotation came when Gussie Busch looked at big lefthander Jerry Reuss and demanded that he cut off his mustache. Reuss refused. See ya later. Reuss was sent off to Houston for pitcher Scipio Spinks. Spinks could have been something, but after hurting himself sliding across the plate his star faded quickly.

Because of that, the Cardinals took a rather large dip in 1972. While Bob Gibson would have perhaps his last great season (a 19-11 record with a 2.46 ERA), the pitcher brought in to replace Carlton – Wise – would go 16-16, and fellow youngster Reggie Cleveland went 14-15. Hard to replace a twenty game winner with guys floating around the .500 mark. But Busch was not about to let a young gun tell him what to do, so he let a Hall of Famer go over $10,000.

The lineup in 1972 was all or nothing. Half of the starting eight were hitting roughly .300 or better, and the other half were kind of floundering, with light hitting shortstop Dal Maxvill hitting an anemic .221/.299/.261. Want to know how to have a lower slugging percentage than on-base percentage? Ask Maxvill – he did it every single year of his fourteen year career. Singles please!

After perhaps overperforming in 1971, the team dipped back down to fourth in the NL East in 1972, rounding out with a 75-81 record.

1973 was a ridiculous roller coaster of a year for the team. After a beyond abysmal 3-15 record in April, the team found themselves already eleven and a half games back by May 15! They then turned on the jets, going 53-33 over the course of the next three months. By August 7, the Cardinals were 5 games up on the Amazin’ Mets. Of course, they then dropped eight straight games and tumbled down to second. The Mets were amazing for a reason. They hung around the .500 mark most of the year, then turned on the jets in the final month of the season, going 20-8 and taking the NL East crown by a mere one and a half games over the Cardinals.

What happened? The team’s pitching staff could go toe-to-toe with anyone in the league and come out victorious, but then their heart and soul – Bob Gibson – went down with torn cartilage in his knee, and the team folded, losing 29 of their last 47 games. An 81-81 record felt like a slap in the face to a team that had battled back from such a terrible start. They lost one run game after one run game, never having the hitter in place to knock in all the baserunners. It was frustrating to say the least.

1974 was a year for some of the younger players on the team to really get their feet wet. 24 year old pitchers Bob Forsch and Al Hrabosky were rising to the surface. Catcher Ted Simmons was only 24, but he was already going into his seventh season (fifth full season) by this time, and had already established himself as perennial .300 hitter with a decent arm behind the plate. Two more players – Bake McBride and Reggie Smith – joined the team to add both pop in the lineup and speed on the bases.

Lou Brock

Speed was one thing this team had plenty of. Lou Brock, at age 35, went absolutely crazy on the basepaths, burning up the bases like they were going to evaporate. His 118 stolen bases stood as a record until 1982, when Rickey Henderson surpassed him. McBride had 30 thefts of his own, but the team finally had a little bit of power too. Smith and Simmons both turned in 20+ home run seasons, and RBI totals were climbing out of the 50’s into a more reasonable range. The pitchers finally felt like they could give up more than one or two runs and still have a chance to win.

The team battled back and forth with the Pittsburgh Pirates all season long for the division crown. Willie Stargell led a team that could beat you eight different ways, and found ways to win late in the game constantly. It went down to the final series of the season, with the Cardinals up in Montreal facing the Expos. A freak pop-up that no one called cost the team a game. Pittsburgh lost their last game of the season, and if the Cardinals won, it would push them into a tie, and send them to Pittsburgh for a one game playoff. Unfortunately, the team was playing in 36 degree weather with sleet coming down. Gibson tried to grit out a win, but an eighth inning pitch to Expo Mike Jorgensen found the bleachers, and the Cardinals in turn found their couches to watch the playoffs on TV.

Mediocrity is maddening, but losing on the last day of the season is a wound that does not heal overnight.

Angela Weinhold covers the Cardinals for i70baseball.com and writes at Cardinal Diamond Diaries. You may follow her on Twitter here or follow Cardinal Diamond Diaries here.