The St. Louis Cardinals’ 50 greatest players

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#11 Joe Medwick OF

The dude played his first game in 1932, so pardon me if this is a far off look at a legendary Cardinal. When you look at Medwick’s stats, it’s hard to not be impressed with this guy.

This ruffled hairy armed New Jersey native played 16 seasons in the Majors, and 11 of them in St. Louis. He started with the Birds before departing to play elsewhere and returning in 1947 to finish his years in red.

What did he do? Well, what did he NOT do is more like it. These days, 100 RBI is respectable and nice for most players. Medwick was a run driving in monster, driving in nearly 570 runners in just four seasons.

He drove in 154 in his MVP season in 1937, slashing 97 extra base hits (56 doubles, 31 homers) in a single season. Some players do that in two. Joe got it done in one. He also won the Triple Crown award, the last National League player to do so.

The Triple Crown award goes to the player who leads the league in home runs, RBI and batting average. The last player to do it was Miguel Cabrera in 2012 and before him, it was Carl Yastrzemski in 1967.

Medwick’s lifetime .917 OPS as a Cardinal and 8.3 fWAR in 1937 are legendary marks, as is 11th best fWAR of 39.4 and when you consider most in front of him have at least 300 games on him, he’s definitely one of the best.

You may or may not have seen Medwick play (hat tip if you did) but the man could hit. He wasn’t a good defensive player, but Medwick was the signature left fielder power hitting type who was versatile with his array of hits.

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Dan Buffa