The St. Louis Cardinals are on fire right now. They have won 14 games in a row and are now the new favorites to win the second Wild Card in the National League, which I predicted would happen a couple weeks ago when both the Padres and Reds were in front of them. I felt that the is team has underperformed for the majority of the season and that their talent would shine through in the last few weeks of the season and that’s exactly what’s been happening. Yesterday, they won their 14th consecutive game thanks in part to Jack Flaherty and Dakota Hudson, who are both returning from injury, making this club even better for the stretch run.
The Cardinals are now 5 games up on the second Wild Card and with a Magic Number of 7 are the heavy favorites to be in that game, which brings me to the elephant in the room – whoever does not win the National League West is going to have to play a one-game Wild Card against this team. This is something that both the Giants and Dodgers want desperately to avoid. Keep in mind, if you’re a Giants fan like I am, the G-Men lost both series this year to the Cardinals and have a season 2-4 record against them. And those games were played before they got red-hot. The Dodgers are 3-3 against them this year. In other words, literally any team can win in this Wild Card Game.
So I’m going to through a very quick recap of the last 14 games and to give an idea why this team is so dangerous. Starting with the obvious, they have Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado heating up at the same time. Yesterday, the Cards won 8-5 over the Cubs and they combined to go 3-8 with 3 RBI with Goldschmidt hitting his 30th bomb of the season in Game 1 of a double-header. In Game 2, they went 4-7 with 3 runs scored. The day before that in Milwaukee, Goldschmidt hit his 29th of the year and went 3-5 with 3 RBI and 2 runs scored. On the day before that, the Cardinals pounded the Brewers 10-2 with these studs combining to go 5-6 with 4 RBI, 4 Runs scored, 2 doubles and a bomb. This duo is one of the best is baseball and they’re not slowing down.
Nolan Arenado and Paul Goldschmidt
But this Cardinals offense has been more hot than just two guys. A rookie named Lars Nootbaar went deep twice yesterday and had 3 hits. Tyler O’Neil has 3 home runs in the last seven games. Paul DeJong, who has struggled with the bat for most of 2021 is heating up, going 4 for his last 14 with a couple bombs. Harrison Bader is absolutely on fire right now, going 20 for his last 55. Jose Rondon has been coming through with some big hits lately. Dylan Carlson has been hitting the ball well. Offensively, this team has been simply unstoppable, even against solid pitchers like Brett Anderson who they touched up for 6 runs in less than 2 innings.
When they do go up against a great pitcher like Yu Darvish or Brandon Woodruff, the Cardinals always seem to have an arm of their own that stands toe-to-toe such as the legend Adam Wainwright, who has been unbelievable this year. He is 16-7 with a 3.05 ERA and by doing more than just hanging on these last few years, he is starting earn some serious Hall of Fame talk. Right hander Jake Woodford has also been very solid and helped the Cardinals win recent games against Brandon Woodruff and Marcus Stroman. On Tuesday against Woodruff and the Brew Crew, he threw 5 scoreless innings giving up just 2 hits.
Adam Wainwright
As for their bullpen, they’ve been a bit overworked this year but have done what’s necessary lately to get the W’s. There are a lot of solid names there like Andrew Miller, Alex Reyes, Luis Garcia, Genesis Cabrera and of course Giovanny Gallegos as their shutdown closer. And once again, with Flaherty and Hudson back off the injured list, this team is going to be very scary down the stretch and especially in that Wild Card. I’ve voiced my opinion on the one-game Wild Card. I hate it as playoff baseball should not be decided in one game. Furthermore, the risk of a 100+ win team losing to an 80 something win team is a risk that should not be taken. It could happen this year. Giants and Dodgers should avoid this game at all costs, but the unfortunate reality is one or the other will have to win one game just to get in the NLDS despite winning over 100 games in the regular season. Welcome to Manfred ball.