This is the fun one, because somehow really thinking hard about a franchise I've never rooted for (unlike the Sixers, Orioles or Packers), or hated (Reds), or lived around (Red Sox and Redskins), I've come to appreciate them more.

One can argue that if the Yankees have been the sport's dominant team, and obviously the American League's as well, that the Cardinals or perhaps the Dodgers, while not reaching historical equivalency (no team can), vie for the same honor in the Senior Circuit.

In this era, it all began with a simple trade-- Ernie broglio to the Cubs, Lou Brock to the Redbirds. And then the fuse was lit.

Quick aside: the Cardinals won the pennant and then defeated the Yankees in a classic 7 game series, the first of three dominated by the redoubtable Bob Gibson. But for many-- including all of us who lived anywhere near the City of Brotherly Love-- 1964 will always be remembered for the collapse of the Phillies. 6 and a half up with 12 to play, and they lost 10 in a row and watched the Cardinals blow right past them.

But that doesn't diminish the quality of that Cardinal team. It was branch rickey's last edifice, and it featured a bunch of players who made their mark. Gibson-- the fierce leader and perhaps the most intense competitor the sport has ever seen; McCarver, his bright young catcher who would go on to catch another Hall of Famer and then parlay his career into a very successful broadcasting tenure; Brock, the dynamic left fielder with blinding speed and uncanny baserunning ability; Boyer, the consummate third baseman; javier the slick fielding second sacker; and then in 1967 Cepeda-- "Cha-Cha"-- the offensive force that drove them to even greater heights.

And quick? who played right field for the Cardinals in their pennant winning teams of 1967-68??

Roger Maris, that's who-- away from the bright lights of Gotham and doing what he always did-- play a superb right field.

And then there was Curt Flood, the proud center fielder-- one of the best defenders in history-- who when my Phillies decided they couldn't stand Dick Allen's (we still called him Richie back then) attitude and antics, refused to go to Philadelphia in the trade. He stood up against baseball's reserve clause, and as a result he basically squandered the remainder of his career. But all the players who make millions today, who can elect to choose free agency, who can veto a trade-- all of these guys owe a debt of gratitude to Curt Flood.

The cards won a great Series in 1967, lost an equally great one to the Tigers in 1968, and then disappeared.

But Gibson-- who had posted perhaps the greatest single-season pitching performance in the Modern Era with his 1.12 ERA in 1968 (and do you realize that Gibby lost 9 games that year. he averaged giving up 1 run a start and yet still lost 9 times as his team couldn;t score enough)-- remained for several more seasons.

(Gibson memory: 1973-- early May; gibby pitching the 2nd game of a doubleheader (they did schedule them back then) at the Vet vs. the Phillies. Cards lead 3-2 into the 9th, and yes, Gibson is still out there. allows one baserunner than a ballyhooed Phils' rookie comes to plate, after struglling in both games. My friend the Cincinnati fan mocks me: "This guy stinks. He's supposed to be so good- but what has he done today? Nothing, that's what. he is overrated, this Mike...."

and boom- schmitty took Gibson's over the left field wall for the win and I left the ballpark thinking maybe that guy's gonna be good after all.

the Cardinals took a backseat in the 1970s to the reds, Dodgers, Pirates and Phillies, but then they scored a coup, hiring Whitey Herzog, the long time manager of the Kansas City Royals, to skipper the club.

And under Herzog the Cards won pennants in 1982-85-87 and a world series over the Brewers in 1982 before losing two dramatic Series to Kansas City and Minnesota. They had the game's greatest defensive shortstop-- the Wizard of Oz-- a great base stealer in Vince Coleman who couldn't dodge a tarp; and quality hitters such as Jack Clark and Willie McGee. Their pitchers were not that memorable but they were good enough-- and oh yes, the 1982 team was anchored by recent Hall of Fame inductee bruce Sutter.

And now comes one of the strange aspects of the Cardinal history. Think of how closely linked they are to most of the great controversies of the sport in this era.

It was a Cardinal-- Curt Flood-- who set the chain of events in motion that would lead to free agency.

It was a Cardinal manager-- Whitey Herzog-- who had to deal with the scourge of cocaine that threatened to undermine the sport in the early 1980s, including dispatching star players out of St. Louis (Ted Simmons, Keith Hernandez).

It was the Cardinals who suffered perhaps the most egregious harm at the hands of an umpire-- Don Denkinger's "safe" call in game Six of the 1985 WS that opened the floodgates for the Royals-- in a sport that still refuses to use instant replay.

And it of course was in St. Louis that the obscene rise in power reached its natural culmination as one newly adopted Redbird-- andro-juiced Mark mcGwire-- in competition with another enhanced player-- bested the record of another player adopted by this midwestern burg at the end of his career. Mcgwire's 62nd would be tarnished by revelations to follow and his own unwilligness to fess up, instead insulting his Congressional audience by saying he would not "talk about the past."

And it was in st. louis of all places that the Boston red Sox finally unshackeled themselves from the Curse of the Bambino.

In recent years the cardinals have taken on the visage of their newest famous manager-- Tony LaRussa. they nearly always contend, they play the game smart, but when they lose-- as has always been the case with LaRussa teams-- they are somehow wound so tight that they get swept awat. nearly every laRussa team that has lost in the playoffs has been defeated either three or four times in a row in that series. It's happening too much to be a coincidence.

But through it all this has been a great baseball town and a very successful franchise.

One more story: My team-- the Phillies- were the Cardinals' principal rival in the early 1980s. Steve Carlton-- an original Cardinal of course who came to Philadelphia in a horribly unbalanced trade (for Rick Wise) in 1972-- had always pitched best against his former team. In 1982 the Phillies were trying to chase down the Cards, and Carlton pitched a key September game at the Vet, winning it and striking out 14.

But that's not the story. The 1980 WS champ Phils had a part-time outfielder who could really hit, and also run, named Lonnie Smith. but Lonnie had two major deficiencies: the first were his defensive travails. Someone on that Philly team-- maybe it was Rose-- gave him the nickname "Skates", because if you ever saw him try to track down a ball in left field, you'd understand why the name fit. I can tell you that on multiple occasions I saw Smith dash to pick up a base hit, pivot and then watch the ball slip out of his hand and go backwards as he tried to relay it back to the infield.

Lonnie's other deficiency was that he liked th blow, and so th Phils sent him packing. But in 1982, before herzog realized he had to blow up the team before cocaine did it first, he was an offensive force leading off before Ozzie Smith.
On this particular night, Dave Raymond, otherwise known as the Phillie Phanatic, one fo the game's most memorable mascots, decided to razz Lonnie during pregame warmups. Now you have to understand that Lonnie and Raymond were actually friends-- Lonnie had not been a bad influence on the Phillies other than the drugs, he was generally viewed as a good guy, and the name "Skates" was given in good fun.

but on this night Raymond in Phanatic costume did a full-fledged Skates impression as Lonnie was shagging balls in the outfield. Well, I suspect Lonnie's "high" was pretty wired that night, and as he ran back to the dugout he managed to dash close to Raymond and clip him, knocking the mascot down and clearly causing a great deal of pain.

So then when Smith led off in the ballgame, a still hurting Phanatic jumped on top of the Phillies dugout and gave him the hex sign as Carlton struck him out. It happened again the next time up, and now the crowd was into it, egging the Phanatic on, stirring into a frenzy as Carlton fanned him again, then again as Smith struck out a third time.

Finally in the 8th with Carlton headed toward an easy shutout win, Smith finally got a base hit with two outs. On the first pitch, he stole second. On the second pitch he stole third. On the third pitch he ran 60 feet down the third base line before retreating, as if to say to the Phanatic: "mock me if you like, but I'm Lonnie "Goddamn" Smith, and I can play this game!!!

Great stuff.

FRANCHISE PLAYER: I'm sorry. i love Ozzie Smith. And Albert Pujols is the Bomb. But I gotta go Old School here; Bob Gibson.

MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT: Brock broke the single season SB record, and then got 3,000 hits. Pujols home run off Lidge last year was pretty darn impressive. Gibson's many key strikeouts in his 3 WS. The Denkinger call. it may very well live in infamy, but I have to go with the McGwire home run. Number 62-- the line shot off the Cubs.

SOMETHING YOU MAY NOT KNOW: Before mcGwire and Pujols and Edmonds and Rolen, St. Louis, and specifically Busch stadium, next to the Astrodome, was the toughest park to hit longballs in the National League.

Next: we start coming close to home.

But where's Ozzie's (who I doubt hit more than 100 HR's in his career) 9th inning homer in the '85 NLCS vs. the Dodgers.  That is my first childhood baseball memory, rooting against my dad(huge Dodger fan) although he had last last laugh with Gibson homer vs. A's in 88.

How can McGwire's tainted record setter(which was broken 2 years later) be a better(or more memorable) moment than Ozzie's homer?

Nonetheless, really starting to enjoy these diaries, looking foward to top 10.

I think given all the swirl around McGwire in 1998-- and now all the tarnish to the feat-- that that home run will linger much longer in memory than either of the 1995 blasts.

And I should have mentioned the impact that first harry Caray and then Jack Buck had on Cardinal baseball-- two great voices that really stamped the franchise-- even if Buck's most famous call had nothing to do with the Cardinals: "I can't believe what I just saw... I can;t believe what I just saw"-- neither could those of us rooting for the A's that night.

I grew up and live in Louisville, KY, where the St. Louis AAA affiliate was for several decades (The Redbirds).  So I grew up getting to see guys like Vince Coleman, Willie McGee, Terry Pendleton, Todd Worrel and the like hone their craft here in the river city.

A great franchise, for certain.