St. Louis Cardinals: 125 tournament round two, part four

The St. Louis Cardinals are a massive piece of baseball lore. 2017 marks the 125th year of the Cardinals existence and contain a treasure trove of great moments.

125 years of St. Louis Cardinals baseball is a wonderful thing. To celebrate, Redbird Rants is thrilled to join our brothers and sisters through the United Cardinals Bloggers and specifically with Cards Conclave (C70 At The Bat specifically) to bring you a special, multi-site tournament recognizing the top 125 greatest Cardinals moments.

For more on this tournament, jump over to my earlier article here.

Today, we at Redbird Rants are continuing the tournament on our site and are continuing round two of the tourney. And for anyone following the tournament, we likely all saw these days coming: the days when St. Louis Cardinals greats would go up against each other.

And isn’t that a testament to the organization and its profound history? Isn’t it a strong statement that this franchise has in its historic vaults the prowess and perpetuating greatness such that fan favorites must go head-to-head?

Fast-forward then to round two, part four– the final part of this round. In this week’s competition, we see the greatness of Adam Wainwright and his shut-down closing to the 2006 World Series facing-off squarely against the greatest Cardinal of all-time: Stan Musial. Specifically, Musial’s 3,000th hit.

Here are the details. Wainwright served as the St. Louis Cardinals closer during the 2006 campaign. He was a shut-down dude in the postseason of 2006 and recorded a favorite moment of all Cardinal fans when he finished the 2006 final game for a Cardinals victory and World Series ring.

Wanna relive that moment again? Here’s the grand Waino moment:

Musial is known as “the Man” because he was an unstoppable force during his days with the St. Louis Cardinals. Let me reiterate the statements I posted about Musial during round one of this competition:

More from St Louis Cardinals History

• Reflecting on the 2013 Cardinals’ top 30 prospects
• Cardinals: The best Silver Slugger performances at each position.
• The St. Louis Cardinals are in rare company with this free agency stat
• What Happened to the 2011 St. Louis Cardinals? Matt Holliday Edition
• The St. Louis Cardinals avoided disaster with Jason Heyward

Musial seemed destined to break records and have his name enshrined in the annals of any book ever written about baseball from the first day he stepped on the diamond. His achievement earned in 1958 left no further questions as to his heading to Cooperstown and the Hall of Fame. Even more impressive? He played an additional five years after hitting number-3,000!

Before we move on, let’s revel in the fact that Musial finished his 22-year career with 3,630 hits. I’m not sure about which to be most impressed, the length of his career or his hitting abilities?!

So here we stand today, in the final part of round two seeking your voice once more to decide which Cardinals moments are the greatest. Visit our Twitter to vote!

Next: Say NO to a sophomore slump

Be sure to visit the other sites participating in the tournament as well and thanks for being loyal followers of Redbird Rants! Go Cardinals!