Cardinals Quickly Becoming the NL’s Team to Beat
Their roster is stacked. The Cardinals sport a perennial shoo-in for the league MVP in Albert Pujols, plus the 2007 MVP runner-up, Matt Holiday. They have a Rookie of the Year candidate in Colby Rasmus and a pitching rotation featuring a resurgent Chris Carpenter — who is quickly re-establishing himself as one of the best pitchers in the National League — another 14-game winner in Adam Wainwright and even a suddenly-effective John Smoltz. They have a Hall of Fame-worthy manager in Tony La Russa.
"Adding a couple of guys to our ballclub obviously gave us a little boost and we're pretty excited where we're at," Pujols told The Associated Press. "But there's still a lot of season left. Anything can happen."
Smoltz's start on Sunday put the icing on the cake: Nothing can go wrong for the Cardinals right now. They are eight games up on the Cubs in the NL Central, their offense and defense are clicking and in short, they're looking like the team nobody wants to run into in October. If Carpenter and Wainwright keep winning and if Pujols keeps hitting a thousand home runs a week, who can stop them? The Phillies? Maybe. The Dodgers? Maybe.
But a case can be made that the Cards are now the team to beat in the NL. Watch out.
Playoff Picture
AL East: New York Yankees (78-46)
AL Central: Detroit Tigers (66-58)
AL West: Los Angeles Angels (74-49)
AL Wild Card: Boston Red Sox (71-53)
Breakdown: Boston's chances of getting back into the AL East race were essentially squandered after the Red Sox dropped two of three to New York this weekend. That means the Sox have to focus on the wild-card race now — and with Texas breathing down their neck and Tampa Bay right there, too, it's time to get the bats and the arms on the same page for the home stretch.
NL East: Philadelphia Phillies (72-50)
NL Central: St. Louis Cardinals (72-54)
NL West: Los Angeles Dodgers (74-51)
NL Wild Card: Colorado Rockies (71-54)
Breakdown: Only a couple of months ago, the Dodgers were dubbed the best team in baseball. Now, they hold the slimmest divisional lead in the entire league. The Cards and the Phils will have to flop monumentally to surrender their first-place positions, so the pressure is on the Dodgers to hold their spot in the West. The Rockies are only 3 1/2 games back, and with the Giants looming behind them in the wild-card race, they're playing with something to prove, too.
MVP
American League: Joe Mauer, Minnesota Twins
The Twins are only 4 1/2 games back in the AL Central, and it's going to be up to Mauer to push them toward the dimming light of a postseason run. There's little more the catcher can do single-handedly: He's batting a whopping .378 with 25 bombs and 78 RBIs. This week, he hit three homers and drove in five runs in seven games against Texas and Kansas City — that's a .393 average and a .750 slugging percentage — as Minnesota went 5-2.
National League: Albert Pujols, St. Louis Cardinals
His 40 homers still lead the league, and his .317 batting average isn't bad, either. Pujols had a rough week against the Dodgers and the Padres — he batted just .167, going 4-for-24 with two homers, five runs and seven strikeouts — but St. Louis still managed to go 5-2 and nobody else managed to prove they have any hope of catching him in this race.
Cy Young
American League: CC Sabathia
Each week, it seems like someone else pulls ahead in this race. Last week, it was Josh Beckett, but he pretty much axed himself with terrible showings against Toronto and New York. Roy Halladay lost to Boston on a night when his opponent was Clay Buchholz. That leaves Sabathia, who wasn't light outs but still proved he will be a specimen to be feared in October. The powerful lefty threw 6 2/3 innings against the Red Sox at Fenway Park, allowing three runs on eight hits and fanning eight. One start before that, he allowed just two runs in eight innings at Oakland.
National League: Chris Carpenter, St. Louis Cardinals
For the sake of switching it up a bit, let's consider Carpenter this week. The 2005 Cy Young winner hasn't pitched in more than four games since 2006, but this year, he's making quite the resurgence. He's 14-3 with a formidable 2.16 ERA and he's allowed just seven homers in 145 2/3 innings. He hasn't lost since July 22, and this week, he threw eight innings of two-run ball against the Dodgers before lasting seven shutout innings and allowing just three hits against the Padres on Saturday.
Rookie of the Year
American League: Ricky Romero, Toronto Blue Jays
Despite the fact that Romero had a terrible week, he is still atop the ROY list because, simply put, there isn't a lot of competition and he's been strong all year. The starter is 11-5 with a 3.91 ERA, and he's projected to win about 18 games this year. Part of the problem this week was that he faced Boston — and while he seems unbeatable to everyone else in the league, the Red Sox have never had any trouble knocking him around. They touched him for five runs in 3 2/3 innings in an eventual 10-9 win — but Romero rebounded nicely against the Angels, throwing six innings of two-hit, two-run ball on Sunday.
National League: Colby Rasmus, St. Louis Cardinals
Given the fact that Pittsburgh's Andrew McCutchen had a horrendous week, Rasmus pulled ahead in this race. The 22-year-old right-fielder is batting .254 with 13 home runs and 41 RBIs, and this week, he wasn't particularly impressive — he tallied just one hit in four games against L.A. and San Diego — but that one hit was a home run.
Weekly Wonders
American League: J.D. Drew, Boston Red Sox
He's injured, then he isn't, then he's going deep like he's Albert Pujols. OK, it's an exaggeration, but after struggling monumentally through July and most of August — then infuriating Red Sox Nation by taking himself out of games because of seemingly insignificant injuries — he batted .353 in six games against Toronto and New York with two homers and four RBIs. Also worth noting: On July 22, Drew was batting .233. Now, about a month later, he's up to .260. It could get better.
National League: John Smoltz, St. Louis Cardinals
Smoltz couldn't buy a win in eight starts with Boston, and as soon as he hit St. Louis, he became a different pitcher. The Cardinals' coaching staff thinks it was because the vet was tipping his pitches during his stint with the Red Sox, but regardless, whatever he changed now seems to be working. In his first start in St. Louis on Sunday, he threw five shutout innings and allowed just three hits.
