A Page From The Cardinals' Playbook

By Joe Janish
Posted Friday, August 17, 2007

Soon after the Mets swept the St. Louis Cardinals to open the 2007 season, Chris Carpenter was placed on the disabled list, and Tony LaRussa was manning a quickly sinking ship. Meanwhile, the Mets were marching to another runaway lead in the NL East, as the Cardinals plummeted further and further behind the surging suds known as the Milwaukee Brewers.

That was April, and most of May.

Fast-forward to the present day, and ... lookee here: the rebuilt Cardinals, fresh off the heels of a three-game sweep of the first-place Brewers, have snuck into third place, within three games of the leaders. As Yogi Berra might say, it's deja vu all over again.

In contrast, the Mets have seemingly moved backward since May -- though the standings don't necessarily prove that overall "feeling." Looking back to June 1st, the Mets were 34-19, with a .642 winning percentage, and 3.5 games ahead of the second-place Braves. As of this writing, the Mets are 67-53 -- dropping almost a hundred percentage points to .558 -- but are still 3.5 games ahead of the Braves. The only difference is that the Phillies are the team in second, behind by three. So in reality, while the Mets' ability to win has decreased, their ability to stay on top of the standings has remained, more or less, stagnant.

Last year at this time, of course, there were no worries about second- or third-place teams. The Mets had ripped out their rear-view mirror in late July, flipped on the cruise control, and coasted into the postseason. Though injuries to El Duque and Pedro made them underdogs, the Mets made mincemeat of the Dodgers in the first round, and as a result were expected to do the same with the Cardinals, arguably the "worst" first-place team in MLB.

However, the Cardinals had something going for them that the Mets did not: momentum. The 2006 NL Central title race was one of futility; it appeared that the team to lose the least would stumble away with first place and a playoff appearance. Like the 2007 Mets, the 2006 Cardinals held a precarious, inconsistent lead over the rest of division for much of the season. The pesky Astros and surprising Reds put up a good fight throughout August and September, with Houston the more tenacious of the two, down to the wire. In fact, as late as September 28th, the 'stros were a half-game from first place, with an 81-78 record to the Cards' 81-77. St. Louis, however, prevailed, by winning two of their last three games while Houston lost two of their last three. Fresh off the dramatic finish, St. Louis moved on to mow down the Padres in the first round of the playoffs, needing only four games to eliminate them. The ensuing seven-game series against the Mets was a hard-fought, nail-biting, dramatic week, and a microcosm of their regular season. Though St. Louis seemed to be running on fumes when they faced the well-rested and heavily favored Tigers (who made quick work of the Yankees and A's), the Cardinals continued to ride the wave of momentum and stunned Detroit in five games.

Meantime, the 97-65 Mets sat at home and watched it all unfold on television. There they were, easily the best team in the National League over the full season -- perhaps one of the top three teams in all of MLB -- as spectators, rather than participants, in the World Series. It didn't seem fair, or correct. Where had they gone wrong?

Despite the injuries to Pedro and El Duque, it wasn't the pitching. The Mets received outstanding performances from everyone on the staff not named Steve Trachsel. Their defense was as solid as it was in the regular season, as well. If anything, you may point out their offense, which was overpowering all year but could muster only a .231 batting average in the NLCS. In other words, they slumped -- at exactly the wrong time.

In 2007, we can all agree that the path to NL East title will be no cakewalk. The Mets have to fend off both the Braves and the Phillies, and face a very real possibility of looking up at the leaders within the next week or so. That's not to say the Mets won't be at the top of the division in October. Rather, it looks as though whichever team can get hot in September, is the one most likely to take the crown.

Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

Maybe the Mets can take a page out of the St. Louis Cardinals cookbook, and put together a recipe for a late-season surge. As fans, we've been waiting for the Mets to "bust out" since that opening-series sweep in St. Louis -- the Mets have yet to string together more than four straight wins this season. Though it's made us frustrated and downright angry at times, perhaps their recent faltering is the best thing for the Mets in the long run. Sometimes a team needs to take two steps back before it can move forward -- or at least, that's what "they say." Perhaps the Mets need to be bitten by the dogs of Atlanta and Philadelphia, and pushed out of first, to get their engine going. I, for one, would be fine giving up first place at the end of August, if it meant finishing with a flourish at the end of September and re-taking the NL East flag --- and perhaps riding that momentum into a World Series appearance.

We can only hope that the Mets are able to find the "ON" button.