Baseball Magic Returns to St. Louis as Cardinals on verge of Wild Card spot

Red-hot Redbirds look strong as regular season winds down

Even though I readily admit giving up on the St. Louis Cardinals too soon this year, I am not surprised by their late season surge. From the beginning of the 2021 season, they had all the ingredients for an exceptional season. It just took some time for everything to shake out.

As of Sunday afternoon, when the Redbirds crept closer to the second National League Wild Card spot with a 3–2 win over the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field, the red-hot Birds on the Bat had won 16 games in a row — two more than the previous franchise mark set in 1935. Their 16-game winning streak is the best in Major League baseball since the 2017 Cleveland Indians won 22 in a row.

Going into the 2021 season, the Cards had everything in place to field a contending team. If not the favorite to win the N.L. Central, they were certainly expected to be in the mix. In fact, they led the Central by half a game over the Cubs on May 30, two days before ace Jack Flaherty suffered an oblique injury that would sideline him a lot longer than the original 10-day projection.

Throughout the summer, St. Louis managed to stay in the mediocre range without either charging for the division lead or fading away. Players like Nolan Arenado, Paul Goldschmidt and Tyler O’Neil — along with longtime stalwarts Yadier Molina and veteran hurler Adam Wainwright — continued to play steady, consistent baseball. Meanwhile, the Milwaukee Brewers played very good baseball and began to widen their division lead until the best the Cardinals could hope for was a wild card.

Beginning Sept. 11, with a 6–4 home win over the Cincinnati Red that lifted their record to 72–69, the Cardinals lit a fire under that hope and have since posted a winning streak for the ages. With six games remaining, the Cards stand at 87–69.

With a loss apiece by the Philadelphia Phillies or the Reds, or at least one win out of their remaining six games, the Cardinals will secure the wild card spot that seemed like a mere object of wishful thinking a little less than three weeks ago.

Assuming they do make the one-game wild card playoff, the Redbirds will face the unenviable task of playing either the defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers or the San Francisco Giants in a win-or-go-home game to see which team advances. Regardless of they draw in the wild card game, the Redbirds will be facing a team with more than 100 wins.

But, as noted at the beginning, the late season success of this team does not surprise me — even if the length of the current winning streak does. Even though the Dodgers or Giants would have to be considered favorites, the Cardinals have proven they can hold their own and then some. As the late, great announcer Jack Buck used to say when things looked bad but the Cardinals and their fans still had hope, “Stranger things have happened.”

The Cardinals baseball family lost two cherished members last year with the passing of Lou Brock and Bob Gibson, leaders on the two St. Louis teams that won World Series championships in the 1960s.

And 2021 marks the last season longtime Cardinals broadcaster Mike Shannon will have a seat in the broadcast booth. Shannon’s connection to the Cardinals goes back to the early 1960s, and he hit a home run in the 1964 World Series to help lead the Birds to a seven-game win over the New York Yankees.

All season long, I’ve had it in the back of my mind that this year’s Cardinals would put together something a little special for Shannon and the memories of Brock and Gibson. They’ve done that with the winning streak. But things could get even better if this sizzling pace continues through October and early November.

Just as the hashtag #11in11 is now identified with the 2011 Cardinals, who won the franchise’s 11th World Series in that year, the hashtag #12in21 certainly has the potential to earn its place in Cardinal history if the Redbirds play as well in the postseason as they have been playing in September.

Those of us who were fortunate enough to tune in to the broadcasts back in the heyday of Jack Buck and Mike Shannon bringing Cardinals baseball into our homes, cars and bars know very well that words can sometimes conjure magic. Could the Cardinals actually win the World Series?

“Stranger things have happened.”

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