You might have thought that once Mark McGwire had faded off into the sunset, he would stay there. A non-Hall of Famer quietly living out his days in a beachfront shack somewhere, wearing sandals to the grocery store and learning to play the accordion. Instead, he's decided to follow the playbook of any smart scandal-ridden athlete looking to get back in the public's good graces. First, find a respected citizen to vouch for you, then take a job that seems beneath your (former) stature. Since Tony Dungy and a third-string quarterback position were both unavailable, his old pal Tony La Russa has agreed to hire him to be the new St. Louis hitting coach.

La Russa was thought to be on the verge of retirement, but has agreed to come back for one more big score, possibly because it gives him a chance to help resurrect his friend's baseball career. McGwire has been quietly working behind the scenes as a for-hire hitting instructor, but who else would be willing to take a chance on him as a fully-formed, on-the-bench coach? (They're a package deal. Neither one could [or would] come back without the other.) Once fans get used to seeing him in that Cardinal uniform again, they'll remember how much they loved watching him smash those home runs and that nostalgic joy will make them realize they don't really care how he did it.

Then, after a few well-placed quotes from Albert Pujols about what a great influence the old slugger has been, he'll hold a press conference, say whatever needs to be said about his steroid use and we'll all move on. As Buster Olney points out, that strategy has worked wonders for Alex Rodriguez (the World Series visit helped) and if Mark McGwire's advice makes the Cardinals even slightly better, then he easily becomes that "good guy" again. (It's already working.) Three or four more years go by and bingo—75% of the vote.

It's just crazy enough to work.

McGwire's return to Cardinals as hitting coach makes sense [Post-Dispatch]
Stunner: McGwire back in baseball? [SF Chronicle]
McGwire's back, and there's nothing wrong with it [Fox Sports]
Cardinals schedule midday news conference [AP]
Keep the head down and inject 2 cc of nandrolone: Mark McGwire to be hitting coach at St. Louis [Steroid Nation]

There are some other differences from the Red Sox sisters' fight. For example, this time it's pretty clear who's escalating things. (Hint: In these situations, it's always the person who won't turn around.) And the boyfriend really just wants to watch the game, as his mortification seems to overwhelm his protective instincts.

While the climax of this battle can't top the Tasering of a Sox fan, this woman being pushed/falling down the stairs does wrap things up pretty nicely before security arrives.

And how about Angelenos, putting the lie to misconceptions of their passion as fans? I suppose the Laker riots gave us a taste of what gracious winners they can be.

These are culled from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's coverage, Cards Clubhouse, Viva El Birdos and Twitter.

1. DENIAL

Mulliganstew:

I... can not believe that happened

I just can't

glamberson:

asdgkf;ghfd;ljgsf;hghjdgjd

prophetjohn:

mother fuck

glamberson:

Shitsticks!

cloistermaximus:

WHAT THE
FUUUUUCK

Paulspike:

Fuck this shit…. I cannot believe Holliday did not make that catch… MY FREAKING GOD… you send Franklin out there to get two outs… TWO FUCKING OUTS…. ugh… year is over, this is what a crappy september causes…

2. ANGER

Paralaranoid:

MOTHERFUCKER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Alxfritz:

Crap! Boobs!

Power Slurve:

Ryan Franklin: Fuck you; Matt Holliday: Fuck you.

rencelas:

Fuck my ass two ways from tuesday

jxmetal1:

eat my dick franklin

glamberson:

I hope it really got him in the nads.

Grrr.

Paralaranoid:

Choke yourself, Matt.

Evilfrog:

FUCK!

YOU SUCK FRANKLIN!!!!

Power Slurve:

FUCK YOU HOLLIDAY!! FUCK YOU!!

king geedorah:

holliday played that

like a swedish girlscout

Holliday road to the AL:

Matty won't lose his focus in the lights on trying to get a fat contract next month. I'm sure he just pissed away $20 mil a year. He looks like he could care less. He dropped a ball a Little Leaguer coulda caught. He was daydreaming of how he would look in pinstripes. He can't wait to get out of STL. Bos/NY can have him!

LSH0905:

Mark it something is not right in this dugout and I suspect Holliday is a dark horse put in play to foal the playoffs for Cards…So much for the big pay day except for the team that put him in the cards dugout. Check the bank accounts of Holliday..something smells fishy - ChiSox remind you of anything???

Still Puking:

There once was a poser named Matt
Who came to town with his bat
But missing that catch
He made us kavetch
And showed he sucks, worth nothing flat.

Don't dare sign this DH, and I mean it both ways– designated hitter, and d#%K HEAD

twhetsel:

I never want to see him again

darkvenom1972:

Holliday i never want to c him again, and now i have to c him in person, GREAT

PujolsFan4Life:

GO AWAY HOLLIDAY, GO AWAY

jimmy ballgame:

I think he choked on sunflower seeds while trying to catch the ball with his stomach.Sickening loss. Adios, Matt.Thanks for the one good month of baseball.

williamfleitch:

Anyone have a screengrab of Holliday popping those sunflower seeds in his mouth seconds after the error? I hope he enjoyed those.

Cards_Champs_47:

To keep the posting clean, screw Holliday. This was all on him. Bottom of the 9th, two outs. You're looking for $18-$20 million a year and I wouldn't give you crap for you now. After your blunder, you have the Audacity to roam out there bagging sunflower seeds. How does a pitcher recover from that kind of error in a playoff game with EVERYTHING on the line? It's not on Franklin. Let Holliday go to the Yankees next year. He's dead to me.

vivaelpujols:

He's just a retard.

Mulliganstew :

I hate Franklin

I can't respect anyone who doesn't like creamsicles

Mulliganstew:

Fuck Franklin

dcfcblues:

what a fucking terrible baseball team

i fucking hate you Ryan Franklin and Matt Holliday

Grizzled Vet:

Thanks Tony

thanks for taking out Wainer you fucking overthinking overmanaging fucking fuckwad fuckhead.

king geedorah:

I would apologize

but I'm not really sorry. Yet, in order to hopefully remain un-banned, I promise after this post to never mention a pl#ne cr@sh on here again.

I would also like to convey that by mentioning a pl#ne cr@sh could potentially occur, thereby placing the Cards automatically in the next round, I was not saying that I wished it would happen; call it an observation. If the Dodgers tonight visit a local watering hole and an escaped Plaxico Burress drops a bazooka down his pant leg and it goes off repeatedly, this could also place the Cards in the playoffs. I will once again reiterate that this is an observation, not a wish.

It is also in no way a death threat, seeing as how I have no psychic abilities that could down a pl@ne. Nor am I God; what I say does not magically occur. Sleep well.

3. BARGAINING

RollBirdsRoll:

At least college football season gives me hope, since the redbirds decided to shit themselves the last three weeks.

VolsnCards5:

At least the colts are 4-0

jd is legend:

I want Brett Wallace back

CodyG:

Refund!!!!

williamfleitch:

On the bright side, maybe this makes Holliday cheaper to sign? Uh ... [aims gun at brain]

4. DEPRESSION

TBender:

Forfeit Game 3

jxmetal1:

kill me

cardfan124:

i fucking quit

Mulliganstew:

I quit

I seriously quit

joker24:

I fucking quit

5. ACCEPTANCE

hr:

see you all later in 2010

No, not the hate crime bill. Over there in the corner. (Click to enlarge.) It seems someone on the Washington Post web staff—who may or may not be a fan of The Wilbon—jumped the gun on the Cards-Dodgers final last night. I mean, there was pretty much no way for the Cards to lose that one. No way at all. Unless....

It's no Dewey defeats Line Drive, but I'm guessing Matt Holliday will probably want to stay hidden under the covers this morning.

[Photo grabbed by reader "Boon Doggle"]

* * * * *

So they're tearing down Giants Stadium and Bruce Springsteen wrote a song about it. Why didn't anyone ever write a song about the Kingdome?

Here are facts about the Cardinals' first game this season, a 6-4 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates.

**** The cleanup hitter was shortstop Khalil Greene, who might be a lesbian.
**** The third baseman was Brian Barden, who won the Rookie of the Month award for April and now plays catch with his daughter.
**** The left fielder was Chris Duncan, who had disc replacement surgery on his spine. By the July, the Cardinals were so eager to get rid of him that were willing to trade him for the least popular Red Sox player in recent history and totally infuriate the team's pitching coach.
**** The closer was Jason Motte, who gave four runs in the ninth inning to cost his team the opener.

To be a fan of any sports team involves an endless amount of rationalization and compartmentalizing. On July 2, 2009, the Cardinals were tied for first place, and I could not have cared less about Julio Lugo, Matt Holliday, Mark DeRosa and John Smoltz. I hoped the Cardinals could go get themselves some help to surround Albert Pujols' historic season and the career years from Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright, but that was only a theoretical notion, a plea for a deus ex machina to come and save us, to vanquish the looming Cubs dragon.

And then the reinforcements came, and suddenly, the nearly 34 years I've spent obsessing over the St. Louis Cardinals — making them the centerpiece of every human interaction, every event on the social calendar, every moment of walking around and breathing — coalesced in these new fellows. I've watched at least 130 Cardinals games this season, and you get to know the new guys. I can impersonate perfectly Holliday's little leg kick he uses to generate power, I can pinpoint exactly why DeRosa plays third base like the second baseman he is, I can recognize Lugo's absurdly scrawny arms from 500 yards away, and I can tell the exact parameters of Smoltz's epic bald spot. These guys, in the span of two months, have become members of my family.

Yet it still feels a little untoward. The Cardinals do not have a long history of mercenaries — ignoring, conveniently, that pretty much every baseball player is a mercenary by nature — and it feels a little like cheating, in the same way that the surreal lottery ticket of Jeff Weaver that came up in 2006 felt like cheating. (Seriously, his ERA that postseason was 2.42 in five absurdly stressful starts against the best lineups in baseball. It is unfathomable that that happened.) It is possible, probably even likely, that Holliday, DeRosa and Smoltz will all be playing for other teams next year (or, in Smoltz's case, golfing). We are making one run with them, and then we will send them on their way, a one-night stand that pops up every few months or so, the kind you nod to briefly, a nod both of you hope nobody noticed. There are no overarching storylines, no 24 years between titles, no long-suffering superstars making one last lap for that elusive ring. This is a moth-ridden quilt with temporary patches. The Cardinals will be a good team next year, and for a few years after that, perhaps even in perpetuity. But this Holliday/DeRosa/Smoltz business is a one-shot deal. How much did you root for Karl Malone and Gary Payton when they made their desperate attempt at a title. More to the point: How much did Lakers fans care? I love cheering for Matt Holliday; I even, stupidly, bought a Holliday 15 jersey. But I'm aware I won't get much use out of it. We're renting him.

That is to say: A championship always means something different to fans than it does to a team. If the Cardinals win the World Series this year, it'll be a joy to be shared with my fellow Cardinals fans, with my family, with all the souls who followed the ups-and-downs of a Frankenstein monster of a team, one that put it all together for one crazy August and was mostly listless (outside of Pujols, Wainwright and Carpenter, of course) the rest of the way. It'll be something we'll always remember. It'll be something that changes us forever. For Holliday, Smoltz and the crew, they'll have spent three months the best possible way one can spend three months, and they'll have made themselves a helluva lot more money. That's great.

But I think our way, the way fans do it, is way better.

I can't wait. And neither can Charles P. Pierce, who remains America's best sportswriter no matter what Rick Reilly writes over and over on his Trapper Keeper:

I first became aware of this particular blight when he worked in Oakland a decade or two ago, back in the days before Beane turned the A's into a mirror with which to show himself his true genius. First thing you heard was that La Russa had a law degree. This was meant to portray him as something of a baseball intellectual, which heretofore had been defined as someone who spit tobacco on his own shoes and not yours. I was fascinated by the fascination with this; I mean, the world is full of lawyers. (So, for that matter, are various low-security prisons, but that's another story.) I wondered how many of his acolytes would hire Tony La Russa and his law degree to defend them on a capital-murder charge. Not many, I reckoned.

Then there was the ballet school T-shirt. La Russa used to wear this all the time in his post-game interviews. This was meant to portray him as something of a baseball aesthete, which heretofore had been defined as someone who put something larger than a $1 bill into the stripper's G-string. This particular bluff worked until the night when, while wearing the ballet-school T-shirt, La Russa bum-rushed an elderly reporter from his clubhouse. This is not something Diaghilev would have done - not even to people throwing apples at his head.

With La Russa's contract set to expire after the season, it's pretty much a given that teevee people will sing hosanna after hosanna to his steel-jawed genius. And if the Cardinals advance past the first round, we could be in for the most insufferable postseason since 2006. Let us pray it doesn't happen. Baseball has enough dilettantes hanging around the ballpark as is. The last thing we need is yet more undeserving praise for a guy who waves around his law degree and demands a Fields Medal because he occasionally bats the pitcher in the eight hole.

The Smartest Man in Baseball Is an Idiot [Esquire]

St. Louis Cardinals pitching coach Dave Duncan sure thinks so! Smoltz had only walked three batters since coming to St. Louis in August, but walked five in just two innings last night. He complained during and after the game that the baseballs were too slick because they had not been rubbed down beforehand. (The home team's clubhouse attendants—in this case the Reds'—are responsible for that traditional duty.) However, the Reds starting pitcher went 8.1 IP and only walked one. So what's Duncan's theory on Arroyo's success? Pine tar.

I'm sure he had pine tar on his cap. He didn't have any problem getting a grip. Balls like that can generate a lot more movement than a slick ball that hasn't been rubbed up ... I've been around for 40-plus years now and I've never seen a major-league baseball game played with balls like that.

Duncan added that he saw Arroyo go to the his cap on nearly every pitch, and this AP photo (click to enlarge) seems to suggest that there was something under there that maybe shouldn't be. (Update: Arroyo's response—Yeah, I grab my (crotch) and do 8,000 other twitches. What you want me to do about it? That's how I pitch.") However, Duncan and manager Tony La Russa somehow think that pointing out that someone is breaking the rules is "gamesmanship" so they didn't say anything. (You're welcome, Kenny Rogers.) Also, the three Cardinals pitchers who came after Smoltz did just fine so maybe the bellyaching is just a cover for a lousy performance.

Yet the question still remains—were balls being rubbed, properly or improperly? And will we ever be mature enough to not make jokes likes this?

Balls.

Duncan says pine tar gave Reds the upper hand [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
Pine tar incident [Cincy Enquirer]

Smoltz's tenure with the Red Sox could not have gone much worse than it did. He gave up 25 runs in his last four starts before Boston pulled the plug, signaling what looked like the end of his career. So St. Louis rolled the dice on him and then quickly solved his pitching difficulties with a revolutionary training technique known as watching him pitch.

Coaches noticed right away his foot was slipping off the pitching rubber, so they told him to stop doing that. Then starter Chris Carpenter noticed that Smoltz was tipping his pitches on the mound. So they told him to not do that either. The result? Five scoreless innings, no walks and nine strikeouts, including seven in a row. Was that so difficult?

In an interview with Dan Patrick today, Smoltz graciously did not blame the Red Sox for his sucking, nor did he point out that the Cardinals are eight games in front of their division while the Red Sox are 7.5 games down in theirs. I'm sure these many things are not related.

John Smoltz says he was tipping his pitches [Dan Patrick]

"Hey, want to go down to the Cardinals game tonight? I've got box seats, right next to the dugout. They aren't in the very first row, but still close enough to smell the pine tar. Should be a great night!

"What's that? A giant hulking monster sitting right in front of us? But St. Louis doesn't even have an NBA team! I think that scenario is pretty unlikely, don't you? There is nothing that can ruin this grand time at the ballyard! Nothing, I say!"

I hope you enjoyed that little play. I wrote it myself.

Sitting Behind Shaq Sucks [Riverfront Times]

* * * * *

Thursday. Shit. I'm still only in Thursday. Every time I think I'm gonna wake up back in the jungle.

Meat-beating in St. Louis: This is less about the stadium itself than about the fans who fill the stadium day after day, the best fans in baseball, who are so self-evidently the best fans in baseball that in the old Busch Stadium one could find a billboard in center proclaiming the fans to be the best fans in baseball. Why are Cardinals fans the best fans in baseball, you ask? I don't know, exactly, but one possibility is that the best fans in baseball clap loudly for sacrifice bunts and players named Skip. That's what baseball fans do, when they're the best fans in baseball. And you can tell it's true because people keep repeating that Cardinals fans are the best fans in baseball. "The best fans," Andy Van Slyke said in 1987, en route to Pittsburgh. "Best fans in baseball," Gerald Perry said back in 1990, as a new Cardinal (and it would be ungenerous to point out that, as a .250 hitter with no pop, he had good reason to butter up said best fans in baseball). "Best fans in baseball," Albert Pujols said the other day. "Best baseball fans in America," said Mark McGwire. "Best baseball fans in the world," said Rex Hudler (and it would be ungenerous to point out that Rex Hudler is an idiot).

But don't think it's just players who think St. Louis has the best fans in baseball. People from St. Louis also think St. Louis has the best fans in baseball. Why, here's a letter from one Matt Dwyer of St. Louis, written to USA Today in 2004 in response to the loutish celebrations in Boston after the Red Sox won the World Series:

As a 36-year-old male, born, raised and still living in St. Louis, a devout Cardinals baseball fan, I have a few comments concerning Jon Saraceno's column ("Real sports fans don't celebrate wins with drunken hooliganism," Oct. 25).

We here in St. Louis have grown accustomed to the "nicest fans" and "best baseball fans" slogans and tags over the years.

But guess what?

We also have the largest brewery in the world in our backyard, Anheuser-Busch, and we have yet to riot, loot or have anyone killed because of a win or loss of a Cardinals baseball game. St. Louis and Cardinals fans are class acts.

You "assume" that these "fanatics" who celebrate a win/or loss of the big game are drunk.

Maybe they were on drugs, maybe they were just stupid teenagers in a mass of people wanting attention. Or maybe, just maybe, they were like the hundreds of people who rioted, looted and a few even beaten to death after the O.J. Simpson verdict was read.

My point is, don't assume that "drunken hooliganism" is associated with celebrating a victory/loss.

Maybe it's just some people's outright stupidity and their blatant disregard for the consequences that their idiotic actions cause.

Understand? The best fans in baseball do not kill people.

St. Louis is baseball's Shangri-La. I know this because Joe Buck says so, and he is my baseball sherpa. And because St. Louis is baseball's earthly paradise and therefore populated only by the pure of heart, the thought has never occurred to me that maybe there is a hint of rebuke in the phrase "best fans in baseball," that maybe the best fans in baseball think the rest of us are poor paste-eating slobs who don't appreciate baseball the way they do because we don't have full-body orgasms whenever a guy named Skip moves the runners over, that maybe the best fans in baseball have fetishized the idea of playing the game "the right way" as a way of clinging desperately to some lost and imaginary ideal of the past, that maybe the phrase is actually a sign of an ugly regional chauvinism, not to mention a deep-seated insecurity, and that maybe there is a serious pathology at work here, a sort of civic narcissistic personality disorder.

No, sir, that thought has never occurred to me. St. Louis. Best fans in baseball.

The view from the stands (everything sic'd): Note: A couple responses concerned the old Busch Stadium, but I've included them anyway.

"I admire the Cardinals fans' loyalty to the team, and 95 percent of the stadium is wearing red. However, of that 95 percent, 95 percent of them are wearing a lousy 11 dollar 'uniform t-shirt' that looks like it comes from K-Mart's sale bin. And the majority of those bear the name and number of some mediocre white player from the Cardinals' recent past, like David Eckstein or Scott Rolen. You see more of those than you see Pujols or Molina jersey-shirts. But then again, what do you expect from a team that hasn't had a black player since Ozzie Smith retired?" (Jeff P.)

"When you talk about Busch Stadium III, don't forget to mention the big storm they had there back in 2006 that almost killed a bunch of fans. Here's a link if you don"t remember. I wasn't there, but I've heard through the grapevine that the ushers had absolutely no idea what to do in the event of a violent thunderstorm or tornado blowing through. But that's okay, I guess, because they rarely get those in St. Louis..." (Andrew R.)

"About 1987, when I was in between 7th and 8th grades, my parents took me to a Pirates game at the old Busch (old Busch - that sounds nasty). I bought a Pirates hat at a kiosk vendor outside the stadium, and as my Dad was paying, the college-age kid working took his cup of soda and threw it on my shoes. You stay classy, STL." (Doug E.)

"Why Busch Stadium sucks: September 8th, 1998 at 8:18 p.m." (Charlie J.)

Photo via Jeremy Plemon's Flickr account.

Next up: Miller Park. Got any horrible experiences to share? Send them to craggs@deadspin.com.

No, this is not a Leitch relative who escaped his bone-littered Mattoon cave to root for the Redbirds last week, but we do get this report from the brave individual who managed to snap pictures of this man-beast at Busch Stadium without being eaten:

I saw this guy at a Cardinals-Giants game at Busch Stadium on July 3. He had a number of tattoos on his head, including what appears to be some sort of tribute to the Rams (horns on both sides) and a skeleton hand grasping the back of his skull.

To top it off, he was wearing an Albert Pujols jersey-shirt.

These tattoos are serious. They just scream "I've been to more than 80 Venom concerts" or "I've staked puppies to a tree and set them on fire" but, like most Midwestern Cardinals fans, we'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he's a real sweetheart.

Scary, though.

******

Good morning! It's Monday. It's not even 9 a.m. but, to paraphrase Tom Robbins, you can already sail toy boats in my boxers. Summer's finally come to Brooklyn, screaming for vengeance.

Clark played for the Cardinals from 1985-87, three glorious years that saw either the Cards or Mets on top of the division. That also meant Cards and Mets sharing space on the All-Star team, which was a perfect opportunity to snub his exhibition teammates. Jack reminisced about those good 'ol days on KTRS-AM radio this morning.

I didn't want to let them know I was glad to be there with them, or wanted to be on any kind of team or be a teammate with them. We were going to battle."

Battle? At the All-Star Game? But that time it didn't even count!

I think they felt the same and if they didn't I made sure at least they felt it from me.

Yeah, it might have been just you, Jack. However, Clark also wanted take the opportunity to remind people that Howard Johnson was a cheater and that Gary Carter was an "disgusting" attention whore.

On Carter: "He couldn't stand it. Whoever was talking to somebody else, he'd have to go over there to the media, and try to get in there because he wanted to be the one that the whole game was all about. Which was pretty sickening and disgusting to everybody else. ... We didn't have to see him with his white shoes on, being sad and acting like he was somebody special ... He talked his way more into the Hall of Fame than actually deserving it."

Was Ho Jo's bat corked?: "Yeah, it was. That just goes to show those guys were trying to cheat, you know, and it didn't end up working for them anyhow. If his was corked, I'm sure a few other guys' over there were corked, also. It didn't make any difference to us."

Yeah, they only won one World Series! Shows you what cheating gets you!

Jack Clark, a Cardinal of the 1980s, Disdains the Mets of That Era [NY Times]

The great Bernie Miklasz touched on this in his column yesterday, but I think he was soft-pedaling it a little bit, lest your average St. Louis Post-Dispatch reader try to drown him-or-herself in his/her oatmeal. Pujols leaving wouldn't be as damaging as LeBron James leaving Cleveland — we at least have won a couple of World Series over the last 40 years — but it would be close. And it might actually be more likely to happen. It's the most terrifying notion imaginable to any Cardinals fan, and, all told, if you were to ask me to set odds on it, I'd say it's 50-50. And that's probably being optimistic.

Pujols isn't a free agent until after the 2011 season, though that's somewhat misleading: The Cardinals will have to take care of his contract situation long before then. He has a $16 million option for that season, one the Cardinals would obviously pick up. But $16 million is nothing: That's $2 million less than Andruw Jones is making this year. If the Cardinals let it go long enough to the point that they're picking up that option, Pujols is as good as gone already.

Here's how it might go down:

The Cardinals are currently a game out of first in the NL Central, but that's far from some grand accomplishment. Their offense has imploded — the one Cardinals win against Cleveland over the weekend was a 3-1 victory behind two Pujols solo homers and a wild pitch — and Pujols has zero protection in the lineup. Every Cardinals hitter has regressed, from Skip Schumaker to Ryan Ludwick to the injured Troy Glaus to, yes, Rick Ankiel. (This season, Ankiel has transformed into Rob Deer ... except he only has four homers. It's possible he's playing so poorly that he priced himself back in the Cardinals plans next year.) Pujols is walking more, yes, but more to the point, he's straining to make something happen, swinging at pitches outside the strike zone and overextending himself in a way that, say, Barry Bonds was just patient and blase enough never to do. When you're constantly batting with no one on base, and you're bored with walking, you start swinging at anything. Only pitchers as sloppy as Tomo Ohka are throwing him strikes.

His frustration is palpable, but that's nothing compared to Tony La Russa, who is in the final year of a two-year contract. La Russa — who has been in St. Louis 13 freaking years now — was the last management piece left standing last season when Cardinals brass embraced the scouting stathead types like VP Jeff Luhnow and general manager John Mozeliak and allowed old GM Walt Jocketty to leave for Cincinnati. In theory, the owners made the right decision: Jocketty mostly ignored the draft (a slight oversimplification, sure) and stocked his triple-A squads with veteran fill-ins like Roger Cedeno, Timo Perez, Brian Daubach and Larry Bigbie, where as Mozeliak and Luhnow use the minors, you know, to develop talent. But so far, none of that talent has turned into Albert Pujols, and La Russa, who was close to Jocketty, is frustrated: He feels like there are no reinforcements coming, and that ownership is being purposely cheap. He might be right. He might not be. All that matters is that he feels that way.

Because no matter what your thoughts on Tony La Russa are — and I love him — nobody's closer to La Russa than Pujols. In Pujols' second season, La Russa said El Hombre was the best baseball player he'd ever managed, and though that seems obvious now, back then it was a shocking statement from a grouchy manager known for openly disdaining young players. Pujols and La Russa both have a lot of Bob Knight in them: They're surly, singularly focused on winning every game, in any possible way, and if you are in the way of that quest, you must be destroyed. Pujols is not one of those Bonds-esque superstars who does his own thing and sits idly by: His passion to win, at any means necessary, rivals La Russa's. The two men were born to work together. If Pujols had come up with any other system, under any other manager, he's not the player he is now, and if Pujols doesn't arrive, La Russa would have been gone seven years ago. At this point, they're nearly the same person.

So if La Russa decides these new front office folks don't have The Right Stuff, that they're not as brutally committed to winning as he is, he will leave. I'm not sure where he'd go next — maybe he'd just co-manage the Tigers with Jim Leyland; awesome idea for a bromantic comedy! — but he would, without question, leave. Every game the Cardinals lose 3-0, every solo homer Pujols hits, every heralded Cardinals prospect that disappoints (the "Faberge Eggs," they're called), brings him a little closer.

And have no doubt: If La Russa leaves, Pujols probably isn't far behind, because the only reason La Russa would leave is the same reason Pujols would leave: This Franchise Does Not Have What It Takes To Win. The Cardinals simply cannot afford to pay what Pujols is worth on the open market, something Pujols is aware of; he's always said as long as the Cardinals remain "committed to winning," he'll stay. But what if, say, the Red Sox, or the Mets, offered him $25 million a season, and La Russa is already gone? What is keeping him in St. Louis? Nothing. He's not money-crazed by nature, but he's also not a moron.

Miklasz encourages the Cardinals to try to extend Pujols now, but that seems unlikely, not from their perspective, but from his. Why would he agree to spend the rest of his All-World career — seriously, I get to watch Ted Williams every time I turn the Cardinals game on — on teams like this one, teams that have no hitters other than him? Even though the Cardinals are considered one of baseball's jewel franchises, St. Louis is not a major metropolis (it has fewer people than Kansas City) and doesn't have a lucrative cable deal. (CLARIFICATION: The St. Louis metro area, of course, has far more people than Kansas City's metro area; the comparison was meant merely to remind that St. Louis is thought of as a larger sports franchise city than it is. But I should have been clearer.) And the city itself is struggling financially; wait, come All-Star time, for all the reports about the empty lot next to Busch Stadium that was supposed to house "local businesses." Not even Anheuser-Busch is owned by St. Louisans anymore. The Cardinals could turn into the Royals, the Reds or the Orioles quicker than you think, once-proud franchises decimated by money worries and a heartbroken fanbase. (You can take a look at their payroll through Cot's Baseball Contracts.) That very well might happen if the Cardinals lose Pujols. It's more possible than anyone realizes.

The Cardinals are counting on cheap young players, and right now, those cheap young players are not hitting. Pujols is going to look to La Russa on this one; if La Russa can be convinced that the Cardinals can surround Pujols with quality hitters, he'll stay, because you only get to manage an Albert Pujols once in your lifetime. And much of that, much of La Russa's decision, is going to come down to the next month-and-a-half of baseball. If the Cardinals continue to not hit, and they don't trade for someone to help Pujols out, La Russa will have his answer, justified or not: They're not serious here, not anymore. And Pujols will follow, as soon as he can. (Again: If this isn't resolved by the time Pujols' option is up before 2011, he's gone.) Only through La Russa do the Cardinals get the hometown discount. And that only happens if they start hitting, immediately. I'd argue that the next month-and-a-half might be one of the most critical timespans in Cardinals history. We're gonna know, real quick.

When I talked to people about all this this weekend, non-Cardinals fans, they looked at me like I was crazy: It was difficult for them to imagine the Cardinals losing their franchise player, their whole identity. But it could happen. It really could.

So when you watch Pujols' moon shots evaporate into the St. Louis night at the All-Star Game next month, bathed in the adulation of 47,000 red-clad corny Cardinals souls, realize that it could all end, that he's not tied to St. Louis forever, that, yes, he could be yours. If you want Albert Pujols to be your first baseman — and, of course, you are a fan of the Red Sox, Mets, Cubs (gasp!) or, if Mark Teixeira dies, the Yankees — you need to start rooting against the Cardinals, right now, this second. We'll know very soon.

Gary Bettman. Dash knows hockey far better than I do, so I'll cede to his knowledge, but I'll say I found his description of how Gary Bettman was received after Game 7 of the NHL Finals kind of sad: "How many times can Gary Bettman walk on the ice-in any and every NHL city-to a chorus of merciless boos before he gets the hint? You're there to oversee the biggest moment of the year for your industry and the only thing everyone can agree on is that you are a villainous bum. What is he hanging on to?" Obviously, Bettman hasn't exactly run the NHL as a well-oiled machine, but the grief we give him and Bud Selig, and the slack we give Roger Goodell and (especially) David Stern, seem a bit out of proportion. The NHL has teams go bankrupt and sell off players, and it's just one more example of how much of an idiot Bettman is; when that happens in the NBA, hey, those franchises are stupid! Major League Baseball is about to pass the NFL in total revenue ... but boy, Bud Selig sure does look like a clueless car salesman, doesn't he? I think it's just because we like to make fun of dweeby-looking people. Which is fine, of course!

Joe Buck. You have to give it to Artie Lange, who singlehandedly turned Joe Buck's show watchable, if only briefly. I'm sure he knew it: I'm sure he was watching Buck's interview with Favre — because hey! It's HBO! It's comedy! It's Favre! — and said, "Jesus Christ, this show is horrible. I need to take it over, or no one will ever talk about it again. Besides, I'm very, very high right now." And that he did. I'm on the record as liking Joe Buck, but man, did Lange ever expose him as out of his element on that show. When Lange nuked the set, Buck was helpless; he didn't have the tool in his arsenal that would have minimized Lange and wrested back control of the show. Sure, Lange was being impossible, but Letterman could have dealt with him, Costas could have dealt with him. Buck was stuck, falling back on pre-readied "hey, see how goofy Paul Rudd and I looked when we were 18!" photos and crawling under his chair. (Spencer Hall has some fun with Buck-as-decorating-accessory.) Look, Buck seems like a genial enough guy, but the problem wasn't Lange, who, after all, is simply being Artie Lange. The problem was Buck. Hosting a variety talk "comedy" show is not something he's particularly skilled at. Lange just exposed it, in the worst, loudest and most immediate way. It's not the worst crime in the world. It happens. As Craggs pointed out this morning, Buck didn't help himself by going to his sports media buddies and apologizing for the whole episode, like it was some terrible ordeal he feels awful that children had to see. (You'd almost call it a "disgusting act.") But you think last night's episode was bad? Wait until the "safer," "friendlier" Episode Two of "Joe Buck Live." That's going to be the talk show equivalent of when, in the wake of Stephen Colbert's blistering mockery of George Bush at the Correspondent's Dinner, the White House asked Rich Little to do it. Episode Two is going to feature Troy Aikman and Billy Crystal playing checkers.

Andrew Friedman. I've always had a soft spot for the Rays ever since, before they suddenly ran to the World Series, they were good sports enough to buy themselves a fan on eBay. The whole organization seems like my type of people, and I can't help but root for them. And something else they're doing right: Annoying Murray Chass! Everyone's favorite Octogenarian (NOT A!) Blogger took the Rays general manager to task for not returning his phone call and, well, Friedman struck back (through PR flak Rick Vaughn), pointing out that Chass called him the day before the draft, when he obviously wouldn't have time to chat. Friedman was kind enough not to point another reason he didn't call Chass back: Because Chass' columns are basically conversations with the wall of his office, a sad old man still writing notes columns every Sunday, like the widower who still fluffs a pillow for his beloved even though she died 25 years ago. Chass, bizarrely, uncorks this gem while explaining his mindset:

How in the world could I expect to get the general manager the day before the draft, Vaughn asked, suggesting that the timing of the column was bad and that I should have waited to write it another time when it would have been more convenient for Friedman to call back.

Now Vaughn was not only acting as the Rays' vice president for communications, but he was also acting as my editor. One of the things I like about writing for this Web site is I don't have editors. I like having no editors. Most of them, I have found, have been useless, if not downright incompetent.

Emphasis mine, obviously. Murray Chass hates editors and thinks they're useless. But no. Murray Chass is not a blogger, not at all.

Phil Jackson. Phil Jackson has always been my favorite NBA coach, and I'm not sure why. Growing up without a team in Central Illinois, I just kind of picked my spots, and I eventually fell in love with that Bulls team that just missed the NBA Finals, the year after Jordan retired. This was Jackson on the top of his game, drawing the best from the most unlikely places — seriously, he could have won an NBA title with Toni Kukoc as the second-best player on the team — and once Jordan came back, I suspect Jackson was happy but lost a little part of who he was. Ever since then, quite reasonably, he has waited to coach supremely talented teams (and/or teams owned by the woman he's having sex with), and you get the sense that mostly, he just wants a place to sit down and rest his back during games. His pseudo-Zen ridiculousness can grate, and he's certainly more fake pop intellectual than real intellectual, but if someone was going to win 10 championships, I'm glad it was him. Surely better than Pat Riley. He'll surely "coach" one more year, then retire and spend the rest of his life on a beach, smoking old weed and having sex with younger women. (I'm assuming they'd have to be on top.) All told, not a bad life.

Michael Lewis. The author has a new book about Dads, and more power to him, Dads rule. (Though his "Today Show" interview about it struck me as strangely awkward. He was on with his wife, former MTV vixen Tabitha Soren, and, well ... I dunno ... I'm not sure those two are in complete agreement about parenthood, marriage, or anything, really. Maybe it's just me.) It will be fascinating to see how the movie version of Lewis' best seller turns out. No, no, not that one, the one with Brad Pitt and Demetri Martin and Steven Soderbergh. I mean the other one, the one coming out later this year. Somehow, everyone's being quiet about the movie version of The Blind Side, which stars Sandra Bullock and Kathy Bates. No, really: The film hits theaters in November. Obviously, football fans will rush out to see it, because nothing says Inspiration Football Movie than Sandra Bullock and Kathy Bates. Do we see Terry Bradshaw's ass in this one?

Shaquille O'Neal. I'm not sure any of us realize how fortunate we are to have Shaq in our lives. I mean, the notion of Shaq congratulating Kobe on his NBA title by Tweeting, "Congratualtions kobe, u deserve it. You played great . Enjoy it my man enjoy it. And I know what yur sayin rt now "Shaq how my ass taste" is on the good side of the force. (It was amusing to watch ESPN quote Shaq's Twitter on Sunday night but ignore the one line that actually has some funny news in it.) Also, make sure to watch Shaq challenge Jose Canseco to a fight and punch a cardboard cutout of Chuck Liddell. Sometimes I think the Internet was invented just for Shaq.

Stephen Sommers. Every summer movie season needs a big-budget full-fledged faceplant of a flop, and this summer is not short on candidates. Land of the Lost and that Eddie Murphy movie are already solid contenders, and the fact that critics aren't even being shown Year One until tomorrow, two days before it opens, is a bad, bad sign. (The NBA Finals commercials didn't help either, clearly.) But it's beginning to look like the worst film of the summer, by far, is going to be that G.I. Joe movie. The trailer looks horrible, the director (the guy who did the Mummy movies) has reportedly been canned and there are rumors that the film received the worst screening test scores in the history of Paramount studios. And those people did Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star. We have our true bomb, methinks. It's a shame too, because a G.I. Joe movie had the potential to be so much better than that Transformers junk. I just wish they would have found a way to get the William "Refrigerator" Perry G.I. Joe character in there; he was my favorite.

Peter Venkman. The wait is over: This week, the Ghostbusters video game hits stores, and from all accounts, it's really fun! Basically, you just play as a "new" ghostbuster, joining the team only a month or so after the events of Ghostbusters 2. (Maybe Bobby Brown will show up!) Not only does it have the voices of the original cast — with the exception of Rick Moranis, who "retired" from acting, but including Bill Murray! — but the story was actually written by Dan Ackroyd and Harold Ramis, which makes it, I dunno, canon or something. I mean, they made a Ghostbusters sequel, and you get to be a ghostbuster. I wasn't planning on leaving my apartment this summer anyway.

Frank Williams. Everybody misses Ralph Wiley; It's worth remembering just how amazing that ESPN Page 2 lineup was back in 2002 (Halberstam, Wiley, a limping but still potent HST, Simmons right when he was learning his fastball). One of my favorite Ralph Wiley columns was about the 2002 NBA Draft, when Yao Ming, Amare Stoudemire and Caron Butler were drafted but all he wanted to talk about was old Illini point guard Frank Williams. Of all the Illini woulda coulda stars over the last couple of decades, Frankie was the one who got away, a leisurely, winding Slinkie of a point guard who could find every gap in the lane and somehow twist his way to a bizarre layup. I loved Frank Williams but — and I have Illini sources everywhere! — even back then, he was known as a guy more interested in the gravity bong than the pull-up jumper. Thus, Frank's drug bust last week made me a little sad, but far from shocked. Clearly, because he's a failed basketball player who had "between 30 and 500 grams of marijuana" on him, his life is Out Of Control, or something. That, or, you know, he just had some weed on him. Wait: How much is 30 grams again? God I'm getting old.

Tiger Woods. It's Father's Day this Sunday, which means it's yet another Tiger Woods weekend. The U.S. Open is the signature Father's Day event, and it's the perfect opportunity for old videos of Baby Tiger palling around with his dad, and new photos of Tiger being licked by the family dog. Why hasn't Tiger come out with a book about Father's Day, and his own father, yet? That thing would sell like crazy. (I know just the co-writer.) Anyway, your Father's Day is going to be spend on the couch, watching Tiger win the U.S. Open and talk about how much being a dad has changed his life, and Jim Nantz will happily promote his own Father's Day book, while he's at it. (CORRECTION: The U.S. Open in on NBC. Maybe Nantz will just run onto the 16th green with a copy of his book.) And then you will have another nacho.

Greene first showed signs of a problem last season, as he struggled with his confidence and batted .213 with an OPS under .600. That is, until he broke his hand by smashing it against a storage trunk in frustration and missed the last two months of the season. The Cardinals, stunningly unaware of Greene's issues, traded for him in the offseason, but he hasn't gotten any better and now he's out indefinitely.

So what are those issues? "Greene's condition causes incessant anxiety based on a fear of failure that feeds his self-consciousness. Unable to channel his emotions, the resulting frustration makes him prone to physical and verbal outbursts in front of teammates." In other words, he plays bad, he can't handle it emotionally, and that makes him play worse. Not to get all Grumpy Old Man on you, but in the old days they called that being "not good" and you got cut. Now, it's a chance for rest and rehab and therapy and I guarantee that you'll be seeing a lot more of it in baseball and other sports.

I'm not necessarily criticizing this new approach to athlete care, but it does strike me as a phenomenon similar to the one that turned unruly kids from "being a spazz" into "suffering from ADHD." If fear of failure is a serious problem for you, then maybe you shouldn't be a professional athlete. However, if this trend means that a guy like Zack Greinke can go from total washout to superstar with just a little mental health, that's got to be a good thing, right?

The danger will come in a couple of years when every Chuck Knoblauch, Steve Sax, Milton Bradley, or David Ortiz ends up on the DL with "emotional problems" at the first sign of a slump. It sounds like Greene—like Greinke and Dontrelle Willis before him—does have some serious issues to work out, but how will we be able to tell the truly troubled from the guys who just suck? Maybe a more open attitude and counseling could have saved Knoblauch's career ... or maybe future victims of his ailment will be coddled well past their prime.

St. Louis Cardinals in uncomfortable situation regarding Khalil Greene [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]