St. Louis Cardinals: 6 MVP candidates in Cubs series sweep

The St. Louis Cardinals have been on a historic run with 16 wins in a row. Here are six players who have really stepped up.

The St. Louis Cardinals are on an unbelievable run in the month of September. With 16 wins in a row and four series wins in a row, the Cardinals seem to have accomplished the unthinkable from a month ago. They are in the second National League wild card position going in the final week of the season.

If you told me this would be the case back in August, I would be seriously concerned about you. And what you’re ingesting.

The Cardinals took a doubleheader Friday winning the day game 8-5 and the night game 12-4. The Cardinals won Saturday 8-5 and on Sunday 4-2.

This steak has seen some thrilling moments throughout, but it felt amped with this series against their rival Chicago Cubs.

Nothing was more exciting than Saturday afternoon’s double play to end the eighth inning.

Rafael Ortega hit into a fielder’s choice double play. The ball was hit to Paul Goldschmidt who threw home to Yadier Molina who threw to Nolan Arenado who threw to Tommy Edman who threw back to Molina who threw to Harrison Bader manning the second base who threw to Paul DeJong. David Bote was out at third and Trayce Thompson was out at second.

You just have to watch it:

You can watch it several times and still not believe what you are seeing! The whole team was in on it. Tyler O’Neill just watching and T.J. McFarland just taking it all in, capping it off with a fist pump. What a play by the Cardinals. Unbelievable, indeed.

Another wild play happened in the ninth inning of Sunday’s game. With Giovanny Gallegos on the mound, Frank Schwindel popped out to third on an infield fly rule. MLB.com explains, “An infield fly is a fair fly ball which can be caught by an infielder with reasonable effort, when first and second … are occupied, prior to their being two outs.”

Now, during the play, Arenado appeared to have lost his footing and fall back. The rule was called at this time. But, Arenado was able to get the ball and toss it to Paul DeJong, who threw to Tommy Edman to tag Rafael Ortega out. None of this was necessary due to the infield fly rule but the umpiring crew did confuse the matter by calling time out. Manager Mike Shildt got heated as he thought the game should have ended there with a double play. Shildt was ejected from the game by home plate umpire Bill Miller.

Here’s a look at the ejection from the Bally Sports Midwest twitter feed.

Gallegos subsequently struck out Ian Happ, earning his 14th save of the season.

Baseball is a wonderful distraction from all of life’s crazy times. To see this team play so well down the stretch is wonderful. Here’s hoping this amazing run can them far into October. The Cardinals have a three-game set at Busch Stadium with the Milwaukee Brewers and the final regular-season series of the year with the Chicago Cubs.

This series had many MVPs, let’s discuss a few of them.

Dakota Hudson

On Friday evening, we saw our first start in some time from Jack Flaherty. Coming back from yet another setback, Flaherty was on a strict pitch count. He didn’t even make it through the first inning, going one-third of the inning, giving up a walk and two hits including a home run to Patrick Wisdom.

While he did strike out one, the Cardinals saw enough of their one-time ace. What the Cardinals did next seemed equally as shocking at the moment.

Dakota Hudson came into the game, taking the mound for the first time in two years.

The way Hudson pitched, it was a relief.

He pitched 3.2 innings, giving up four hits and two earned runs. He was able to strike out two batters, inducing three swing and misses.

For his first time back out on the mound after two seasons and Tommy John surgery, this was great to see and promising for Hudson’s future. It was an absolute confidence booster for the young pitcher and a pitching staff that could use some good news looking to next season.

It’s unclear at this time, when or if we will see him again this season, but it’s good to see him maybe an option going forward.

Paul DeJong

Edmundo Sosa had seemingly taken over the role of shortstop for the season. On Friday afternoon, his take-over hit a bump as he exited the game in the sixth inning after being hit in the hand by a pitch from Tommy Nance.

Paul DeJong entered the game as his pinch-runner and retook his role at shortstop.

Luckily, DeJong shines at Wrigley Field.

In the third inning of Friday evening’s game, DeJong hit a 410-foot home run to right-center field off Michael Rucker. This was his 18th home run of the season.

On Saturday, DeJong hit a sacrifice fly to center field scoring Harrison Bader.

In the ninth inning, DeJong knocked his 19th home run of the season, a 425-foot blast to center field, allowing Nootbaar to score.

He hits so well at Wrigley, it’s awesome that he got a chance to shine.

While Sosa has been at great at shortstop during DeJong’s struggles it’s good to see DeJong has been prepared and stepped up to capitalize on his opportunity. Considering how well he did this weekend, don’t be surprised if we see more of DeJong.

Harrison Bader

Potential Gold Glove center fielder Harrison Bader was huge in this historic stretch run for the team. He also had a huge series against the Cubs.

On Friday evening, Bader singled in the first inning to center field to score Nolan Arenado. In the seventh inning, he hit his 13th home run of the season on a 453-foot blast to center field and out of Wrigley

On Saturday, Bader hit his 14th home run on a 386-foot blast to right-center field.

In the seventh inning, he singled on a grounder to left field, scoring Nolan Arenado and moving Molina to second base. In the ninth inning, Lars Nootbaar struck out swinging but the pitch was wild allowing Nootbaar to go to first and Bader to dive into score the Cardinal’s sixth run of the game. Bader was pumped after the play and you can understand why!

In the eighth inning of Sunday’s game, Bader hit his 15th home run of the season on a 427-foot blast to left-center field.

What an amazing stretch of play Bader has had during this 16 game winning streak of the Cardinals. It’s absolutely amazing. He is such a spark plug for this team, it will be great to watch this continue.

Paul Goldschmidt

Paul Goldschmidt had a huge series for the Cardinals this weekend.

Goldschmidt got things started with his 30th home run of the season on Friday afternoon a 402 foot fly to center field, scoring Tommy Edman.

In the sixth inning of Friday afternoon’s game, he knocked a single to right field scoring Lars Nootbaar and moving Edman to second. In the seventh inning, Goldschmidt knocked a double to right field, scoring Paul DeJong.

On Sunday, Goldschmidt hit his 31st home run of the season of a 464-foot blast at 109.1 mph to dead center field.

Beautiful shot!

During this winning streak for the Cardinals, Goldschmidt has been key on offense and defense. He has been tremendous for the team. Here’s hoping he keeps it up through October.

Tyler O’Neill

Tyler O’Neill was huge for the Cardinals this weekend versus the Cubs.

In the fifth inning of Friday afternoon’s game, O’Neill knocked his 30th home run of the season with a 454-foot fly to left-center field, scoring Tommy Edman.

That wasn’t it for the big guy on Friday.

On Friday evening, O’Neill knocked a 381-foot blast to center field for his 31st home run of the season to score Dakota Hudson and Paul Goldschmidt.

On Saturday afternoon, O’Neill hit his 32 home run, a 412-foot blast to left-center field.

On Sunday, while O’Neill was at-bat in the ninth inning, Codi Heuer through a wild pitch allowing Andrew Knizner to score and move Lars Nootbaar to third and Goldschmidt to second. O’Neill eventually grounded out to first but Nootbaar to score the fourth run of the game.

O’Neill has been a real spark plug for this offense and tremendous presence in the outfield and clubhouse.

It will be great to see Bro’Neill continue into October! Could we have BRO-TOBER? Too much? OK, that’s fair. But I do see him keeping up this tremendous effort for The Boys.