ST. LOUIS CARDINALS

Under the Arch that signifies the Gateway to the American West, the St. Louis Cardinals have provided a Gateway to baseball excellence. From Rickey to La Russa, Hornsby to Musial, McGwire to Pujols, the Cardinals have forged a legacy of winning unmatched in the National League — seventeen pennants (most in the senior circuit), ten World Championships, nine Division Titles and thirty-seven Hall of Famers.

The Cardinals joined the National League in 1891 after a decade playing in the American Association as the Brown Stockings. They picked up the nickname of Cardinals after changing uniform colors from brown to a scarlet red in 1900. The color change didn't help. The Cards languished in the second division for twenty years. What did help was the arrival of Branch Rickey, first as manager (1919) and then in the front office (1925), where he laid the foundation for the team's success by establishing a deeply rooted farm system.

The first jewel of the system was Rogers Hornsby. Between 1920-25, this Hall of Famer hit over .400 three times (he hit .397 and .384 the other two years), and posted the 20th Century's highest batting mark — .424 in 1924. He won Triple Crowns in 1922 and 1925. He retired with the National League's highest career average (.358 — second in the Major Leagues to Ty Cobb) and seven batting titles (six in a row 1920-25).

Hornsby replaced Rickey as manager in 1925, and led the Redbirds to their first World Series Championship over the Yankees the next year. After the Series, Rickey surprised the baseball world by trading Hornsby to the Giants for Frankie Frisch, whose arrival signaled the beginning of a storied era in Cardinal history. The time of the "Gashouse Gang" was on its way. This collection of hard-nosed, slightly off-beat characters were known as much for their crazy antics as for their baseball talent. The group included Pepper Martin, Leo Durocher, Joe Medwick, and the Dean brothers, Dizzy and Daffy.

Dizzy Dean best season was 1934, when he won thirty games while his brother Daffy won nineteen. Dizzy Dean would win twenty-eight and twenty-four games in 1935-36 before a foot injury derailed his pitching career in 1937. Medwick would drive in over one-hundred runs for six straight seasons while always besting the .300 mark. His "crowning" season was 1937, when his .374 average, thirty-one home runs and one-hundred fifty-four runs batted it (not to mention two-hundred fifty-six hits and fifty-six doubles) earned him a Triple Crown.

The Gashouse Gang won pennants in 1930-31 and met the powerful Philadelphia Athletics in both World Series. They lost in 1930 but won the rematch with Martin hitting .500 and driving in five runs. Three years later, the Cards won a close pennant race against the Giants and beat the Detroit Tigers in seven wild games.

As the Gang began to run out of gas, the Cardinal farm system brought up a new generation of Hall of Fame talent, allowing St, Louis a period of National League domination few teams have matched. Johnny Mize and Enos Slaughter brought the big bats, and lanky shortstop Marty Marion anchored a dependable defense, but it was the arrival of a twenty year old outfielder from Donora, Pennsylvania in 1941 that forever changed the National League record books. By the time Stan Musial retired twenty-two seasons later, he held twenty-nine National League records and seventeen Major League marks. Among his accomplishments were three-thousand six-hundred thirty hits (the National League record when he retired), seven batting titles, four-hundred seventy-five home runs (sixth when he retired), three Most Valuable Player Awards and a record twenty-four All-Star Games.

With this talent, the Cardinals won three straight pennants (1942-44) and another in 1946. The 1942 team is one of the best in National League history, winning one-hundred six games and the World Championship. In 1943 they managed one-hundred five victories although they lost the Series to the Yankees. In 1944, they beat the cross town Browns in the only all-St. Louis World Series ever played. The 1946 Cards finished in a first-place tie with Brooklyn, and defeated the Dodgers two straight in baseball's first ever league playoff series before beating the Red Sox in seven games.

St. Louis fielded competitive teams in the 1950's but it was an infusion of talent late in that decade — players such as Tim McCarver, Curt Flood, Bill White and Bob Gibson that put the team in three Fall Classics during the 1960s. After the Phillies' monumental collapse in the 1964 pennant race, the Cards took the Yankees in seven games, and three years later, did the same thing to the Boston Red Sox. In 1968, the Tigers turned the tables with a seven game win, despite Bob Gibson's signature season in which he won twenty-two, had two-hundred sixty-eight strikeouts and an ERA of 1.12, the third lowest ever posted for a season. Gibson would close out his Hall of Fame career in 1975 with two-hundred fifty-one wins.

It would take Whitey Herzog's collection of speed merchants, know as the "Runnin' Redbirds", to put the Cardinals on top once again in 1982. In an era defined by home runs, the Cards hit a Major League low of sixty-seven, but stole two-hundred bases in sprinting their way to their ninth World Championship. Herzog's speed game, dubbed "Whiteyball,", also brought pennants in 1985 and 1987 but World Series losses.

Tony La Russa has been the Cards manager since 1996 and six times he had led them to the National League's Central Division Title (1996, 2000, 2002, 2004, 2005 & 2006), twice his team made it as far as the World Series. That was 2004, when the Red Sox finally got some revenge for 1946 and 1967 with a four game sweep. And 2006, when the Tigers were on the receiving end of revenge for a loss from 1968.

Baseball in the La Russa era has been exciting. After he came to St. Louis in a 1997 trade, Mark McGwire smashed one of the game's most hallowed records, slamming a single-season record seventy home runs in 1998. Today fans can enjoy the batting exploits of Albert Pujols, who has put together one of the best six year starts in Major League history with two-hundred fifty homers, seven-hundred fifty-eight runs batted in and a .332 batting average. Supported by solid players such as Scott Rolen, Yadier Molina and Jim Edmonds, the Cardinals look to be competitive for some time to come.