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The St. Louis Cardinals aim for their fourth straight victory tonight, as they welcome the Washington Nationals to Busch Stadium for the opener of a four-game series.
St. Louis is coming off a three-game home sweep of Pittsburgh. Albert Pujols drove in the winning run in the bottom of the ninth as St. Louis edged Pittsburgh, 4-3, in Wednesday's finale.
Pujols finished 2-for-3 with two walks for the Cardinals, who also won for the sixth time in their last seven games. Juan Encarnacion, Scott Spiezio and Aaron Miles each drove in a run, while David Eckstein score three runs, including the game-winner.
Mark Mulder pitched well but failed to pick up his 100th win, giving up two runs over 7 2/3 innings of work. Jason Isringhausen (1-2) took home the win despite giving up a home run to Jose Hernandez in the top of the ninth to tie the game.
Meanwhile, the Nationals have dropped four in a row and were just swept in a three-game series by Cincinnati. Bronson Arroyo tossed one-hit ball and struck out eight over eight scoreless innings to lead Cincy to a 5-0 win in the finale segment of the series Wednesday at RFK Stadium.
Ryan Zimmerman's single was the only hit of the game for Washington.
Ramon Ortiz (0-3) surrendered five runs -- four earned -- on seven hits with three walks and six strikeouts over 6 2/3 innings for Washington.
Sidney Ponson will try to nail down his third win in as many starts today, as he toes the rubber for the Cardinals.
Ponson is 2-0 with a 3.31 ERA on the season and is coming off Saturday's victory over visiting Chicago. He surrendered just one run and six hits over five innings of work. The Aruba native did walk four batters.
The 29-year-old is 1-3 with a 4.50 ERA in four career starts against the Nationals, but he also has a pair of complete games.
Michael O'Connor will counter for the Nationals in his major league debut. The 25-year-old lefthander has no record and a 2.41 ERA in four starts with Triple-A New Orleans this season.
St. Louis took four of six matchups with the Nationals last season and have won six of the last eight meetings overall. This will be Washington's first game at the new Busch Stadium.
Saint Louis starter Sidney Ponson allowed two runs and four hits in five solid innings and the Cardinals beat the Atlanta Braves 11-2 on today.
Ponson, who signed with Saint Louis in the offseason, walked two and had one strikeout. Josh Hancock, Ricardo Rincon, Jeff Nelson and Brad Thompson each threw one perfect inning as Saint Louis retired 12 straight batters to close out the game. Hancock and Nelson each recorded two strikeouts.
The two right-handers continue to battle for spots in the Cardinals' bullpen. Rincon recorded two groundouts in his inning. It was his first appearance since playing for Mexico in the World Baseball Classic. Tim Hudson started for the Braves and went five innings, allowing four runs on four hits with four walks and three strikeouts.
Scott Rolen went one-for-two against Hudson. He had an R-B-I groundout in the first inning and a two-run single in the third. Skip Schumaker also went two-for-four with an R-B-I and a run scored for Saint Louis and John Gall hit a three-run home run to left field in the eighth inning.
Ricardo Rincon finally made it to the St. Louis Cardinals' spring training camp Monday, and he immediately began throwing live batting practice.
The 35-year-old left-handed reliever, signed to a two-year, $2.9 million free-agent contract in December, had been a no-show, fighting visa problems in his native Mexico. Rincon wasted little time in meeting with manager Tony La Russa to smooth any hard feelings.
"I talked to Tony and he's happy now," Rincon said.
La Russa said Rincon has been workout out in Mexico, so he decided to have him throw live batting practice. He threw to a group that included Albert Pujols, Scott Rolen, David Eckstein, Junior Spivey, Chris Duncan and Rick Ankiel.
"He has been working, but there's a difference between throwing to friends at home and our guys in camp," La Russa said.
The workouts on Monday were the last before the Cardinals begin exhibition play Tuesday against Florida Atlantic. The first game against a major league team is Thursday against the New York Mets in Jupiter.
Rolen, coming back from a shoulder injury that forced him to miss most of last season, continued to show good progress and could play by this weekend, La Russa said.
"I think he's doing everything at the plate ahead of what we expected," La Russa said. "I haven't really talked to him about this weekend, but my guess is he'll probably play."
The practice was concluded with an intrasquad scrimmage in which two teams of 10 players received two at-bats in a simulated game format against pitching instructor Mark Riggins. Skip Schumaker, Duncan and Ankiel all homered in an 8-8 tie.
La Russa said Ankiel will start in center field against Florida Atlantic.
"I'm excited for any type of game competition we can give him," La Russa said. "He's been looking aggressive and for opportunities to swing. He jumped into live pitchers right away. Whenever we can get him playing time, I'm excited with it."
Most of the Cardinals regulars will sit out Tuesday's game and start against the Mets. Jeff Suppan will start on the mound for St. Louis. Cy Young winner Chris Carpenter will start Friday against the Mets in Port St. Lucie, Fla.
Sutter seemed in a state of shock Wednesday, one day after he was elected to the Hall.
"It's something I thought was never going to happen," he said. "I'm humbled. It still doesn't sound right: Nolan Ryan, Sandy Koufax, Bruce Sutter."
He spread his fingers across the baseball, index all the way to one side, middle finger all the way to the other, thumb positioned under it.
And that, he explained, is how he gripped the split-fingered fastball, a pitch that made life miserable for hitters and one that Sutter rode into the Hall.
Sutter developed the splitter out of necessity when an elbow injury and surgery after just two minor league games threatened his career. He used the pitch to save 300 games as the dominant closer of his time and was elected to Cooperstown in his 13th year of eligibility.
Sutter received 400 votes (76.9 percent) of the record 520 cast by members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America and was the only candidate with the required 75 percent needed for election. Slugger Jim Rice was second with 337 votes (64.8), followed by reliever Goose Gossage with 336 (64.6).
He becomes the fourth relief pitcher elected, joining Rollie Fingers, Hoyt Wilhelm and Dennis Eckersley, and is the only player in the Hall who never appeared in a starting lineup. Sutter's job as a closer was to finish what others started.
He is proud of his craft and its practioners.
"You can't compare us with starting pitchers," he said. "Bert Blyleven had more innings pitched and more strikeouts than me and Goose and Lee Smith together. But we had to be prepared to play every day. We're out there every day. The game's all set up to get to us. There was a good chance you'd be warming up and a good chance the ball would end up in your hands."
And when it did, Sutter would spread his fingers across it and throw that maddening splitter, a first cousin of the old forkball, a pitch that would be delivered with a wicked spin that caused it to drop out of the strike zone at the last moment. Batters rarely could adjust in that split second.
Sutter said relievers bring a special mind-set to their task.
"I was always confident in my ability," he said. "You're not afraid of any situation. We didn't always get them out. You've got to have the feeling that you're the best. Everything is to get the ball to you. If you did your job, the game was won and that was great. If you didn't, the whole game was wasted and that's a horrible feeling. It's a position of highs and lows."
Sutter credited two baseball journeymen, pitcher Fred Martin and catcher Mike Roarke, both pitching coaches in the Chicago Cubs organization, with helping him master the splitter.
Signed for $500 in 1971, Sutter came into baseball able to throw fairly hard. "They tried to teach me the slider and I hurt my elbow," he said.
He was advised to rest it but decided on his own to have surgery. When he got to spring training in 1973, his fastball was gone. Martin, a Cubs minor league pitching coach, introduced him to the new pitch.
"Most everyone, the middle finger is dominant. With me, it was this one," Sutter said, holding up his index. "That made it easy to throw. I got it to break real quick."
By 1976, Sutter and his splitter were in the majors. He was 6-3 with 10 saves and a 2.70 ERA as a rookie and then emerged as baseball's best closer, saving 31 games and posting a 1.35 ERA the next season.
When he ran into trouble, Roarke would fine tune his mechanics, picking up where Martin had left off. "I owe a lot to those two, " said Sutter, who won the Cy Young Award in 1979 and led the National League in saves five times.
There was a long-term price, though. "I ended up with three shoulder surgeries," Sutter said.
And a ticket to Cooperstown.
Scott Rolen did his best to set the minds of Cardinal Nation at ease on Monday. Rolen, appearing at the 10th annual Cardinals Care Winter Warm-Up, said that his surgically repaired left shoulder is recovering fine, and he expects to be at full strength in time for the start of the 2006 season.
"Right now I'm turned loose and I'm hitting off the tee and playing golf, running, lifting, strength training, lifting as much as I want to lift," Rolen told reporters on Monday afternoon. "I'm not restricted right now. In my range of motion, I'm right at the very end of everything -- five degrees is what they're telling me."
Rolen missed much of the 2005 season after sustaining a shoulder injury in a collision with Hee-Seop Choi. He came back briefly, but never returned to his expected level of performance, and eventually shut it down for the season. He said the rehabilitation process was much more extensive than what he endured after a 2002 collision and shoulder injury.
"This is a longer process, no doubt," Rolen said. "This is a more serious rehab. There it was kind of a healing time, and once I was done healing, then I could just strengthen and come right back. I had no loss of range of motion or anything like that. My range of motion was almost zero after this surgery, so I had to come all the way back."
Cardinals head athletic trainer Barry Weinberg said earlier in the weekend that Rolen would be unrestricted at the beginning of Spring Training -- but that the club reserves the right to back Rolen off if he has any setbacks.
No restrictions: Right-hander Braden Looper pronounced himself fully ready to go despite offseason shoulder surgery. Looper had a relatively minor procedure in his throwing shoulder.
"I'm going 100 percent right now," Looper said. "I'm not throwing 100 percent, but I'll probably start bullpen [sessions] this week. I'm on my normal schedule of what I would do to get ready for Spring Training on a normal basis. I feel great. The surgery went great. I saw the doctor at the beginning of January, my final 'You're OK, go get 'em' type of thing. I'll be ready to go."
Looper endured a substandard 2005 season, but he declined to attribute his drop in performance to any soreness.
"I said when it came out at the end of last season that it was something I had been dealing with all year that I didn't want it to be known, because I didn't want to be a guy that had a crutch in any way," Looper said.
Flores feeling fine: Left-hander Randy Flores reported that he came through offseason elbow surgery with flying colors. Shortly after the season ended, Flores underwent a procedure to remove bone spurs from his pitching elbow, but he said he's very close to his normal winter throwing schedule.
"Everyone says it's a minor surgery until it's your own," Flores said. "But the rehabilitation has been going great. Dr. [George] Paletta did a great job, from what I hear from everyone who has looked at my arm since then. I'm looking forward to going strong in Spring Training."
Flores enters Spring Training with more Major League job security than he's ever had before, following a strong season and some impressive showings in the postseason. He's taking nothing for granted, but he knows he's in a better position than he's been in previous years.
"To go into this season with a bit of success in the big leagues last year, it's a different feeling than the Spring Training before that," Flores said.
"There's nothing guaranteed. You have to compete. You have to keep your spot, and I'm looking forward to the chance to do that again this spring."
Suppan's journey: Jeff Suppan enjoyed what surely was one of the most memorable offseason experiences of any Cardinals player. The right-hander visited the Vatican for almost a week, even meeting new Pope Benedict XVI. Suppan hoped to take a Cardinals jersey to the pontiff, but his luggage got lost on the way.
"I called Rip Rowan, who is our clubhouse manager, and he got us a jersey and I was very excited and nervous," Suppan said. "More importantly, just to meet the pope was phenomenal, and then to be able to offer him what I thought was a creative gift. And then my bags didn't make it. So I didn't have anything to offer him."
That didn't dim the moment for Suppan, however.
"It was a phenomenal experience," Suppan said. "I got to shake his hand. I kissed his ring. ... You're jelly-legged. I was nervous, but I was nervous in a different way. I couldn't really describe it. My heart was super pounding. I knew what I was being a part of. To actually be there, in Rome, and to get an opportunity like that, I felt very blessed. It was great."
Missing Mo: Chris Carpenter no longer counts Matt Morris as a teammate, but the two right-handers remain friends and workout partners. Morris left as a free agent to join the Giants.
"It's going to be strange," Carpenter said. "He's the guy that, when we go on the road, we go to lunch together, we go to dinner together, we hang out in each other's hotel rooms together after the game.
"He's a friend of mine, a good friend of mine. He's a guy that I enjoy hanging out with in the clubhouse, playing cards, whatever we feel like doing. We work out together. We worked out together last spring and we worked out together the spring before that."
Welcome, ex-Rox: Former Colorado Rockies Aaron Miles and Larry Bigbie both got their first taste of Cardinal fandom this weekend, and both were impressed. Miles and Bigbie, acquired in the trade that sent Ray King to the Rockies, are in somewhat similar spots going into camp. Neither has a guaranteed job, though Bigbie is very likely at least to make the team, if not to start.
"Ultimately, everybody wants to win a starting job," said Bigbie, a lefty swinger who can play all three outfield positions. "But when you're on a team that's trying to do what we're trying to do here, it's just about what you can do to help the team win."
Miles is likely a long shot to earn a starting job after the signing of Junior Spivey, but he'll compete for the second base gig. That derby may also include Hector Luna and Deivi Cruz.
"My goal is to be the starter and to be a key part of this team," Miles said. "How Tony decides to use me, that's what I'll be happy doing. I like being a part of a winning team, and I pride myself on doing things to help teams win."
Ankiel scratched: Rick Ankiel was a late scratch from signing at the Winter Warm-Up on Monday. Yadier Molina's appearance was pushed back, but the catcher did eventually make it up onto the stage to sign for fans.
They're younger. They're probably healthier. But are they better? Heck, are they even as good?
The Cardinals have reconstituted their outfield for 2006, giving the flycatching unit one of the biggest makeovers of any group on the defending NL Central champions. Jim Edmonds returns for what could conceivably be his last year in a St. Louis uniform, but he'll be looking at new faces, or at least new starters, on both flanks come Opening Day.
"It should be exciting," said Edmonds, the longest-tenured current Cardinal. "It's tough to lose teammates each year, but it's always exciting when you have new guys who come in here and you see how much they're going to enjoy this place."
Juan Encarnacion, a relative child at 30 on Opening Day, takes over in right field. If you like batting average and RBIs, he's a pretty good analog for departed left fielder Reggie Sanders, but he lacks Sanders' power and base-stealing ability. The retired Larry Walker is the other ex-Cardinals outfielder, and there's no one in the mix who combines Walker's on-base ability, power, defense and baserunning.
But in one area where the '05 outfield fell short, the '06 unit should fare much better: health. Sanders has never topped 140 games in his career. Walker tallied a total of 573 at-bats in 2004 and 2005 combined.
Encarnacion, meanwhile, has averaged 146 games a year the last four years. And among the three candidates for the left field job -- Larry Bigbie, So Taguchi and John Rodriguez -- there's very little history of health problems. This is not a small thing. The Cardinals also do some projecting when they look at this group -- especially Bigbie and Rodriguez. In both cases, the potential is believed to exceed the 2005 performance. In Encarnacion's case, the club views him as just entering his peak years.
"He was a guy that we had rated very high in a lot of categories -- his offense, his defense, his speed," general manager Walt Jocketty said recently. "His age was where we felt comfortable that he's got several quality years left in him. He may be at a point in his career where he should start hitting his prime."
The Cards committed three years to Encarnacion, the best evidence of their fondness for him.
But the main man is still the man in the middle. Edmonds was an All-Star in 2005, and he picked up his eighth Gold Glove. But his performance at the plate, while still exceptional as center fielders go, dipped to its lowest level since he arrived in St. Louis.
Edmonds could hit .250 and still be a tremendously valuable player, thanks to his home runs, his walks and his defense. But he's shown he's capable of even more than that -- witness his MVP-caliber 2004 season. Should he even make up half the ground between his .263/.385/.533 (average/on-base/slugging) 2005 campaign and his .301/.418/.643 line in 2004, St. Louis will be much better for it.
Edmonds himself would also be better off, as 2006 is the final guaranteed year of his contract. The Cardinals hold a 2007 option, one that is much more likely to be exercised if he reaches his old offensive levels.
"Getting to the end of my career has motivated me to try to keep in shape," Edmonds said. "I get into better shape each year. It's working.
"If they don't pick [the option] up, I don't know how many opportunities there are going to be for me to play. So I'm just going to approach it that this season will be one of the last ones I have, and hopefully they'll allow me to come back. But if they don't, I've got to be ready for that. I've got to be ready for 'Plan B.'"
Though he has been a constant in St. Louis, Edmonds has seen plenty of "Plan Bs" on either side of him. Encarnacion will be the sixth right fielder to start next to him in seven Opening Days with the Cardinals. Whoever wins the left field job will be the fourth in seven years to hold that spot.
Taguchi probably has the inside track heading into spring, but the other guys will get a shot, as may players like John Gall and Skip Schumaker. Chances are, the runners-up will serve as the reserve outfielders, and a time-sharing arrangement is certainly possible.
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