Cardinals: How Paul Goldschmidt made history against the Pirates

St. Louis Cardinals slugger Paul Goldschmidt made history against the Pirates as his MVP case continues to grow stronger.

By all accounts, Paul Goldschmidt is having an MVP-caliber season. He’s hitting an absurd .349/.431/.642 with a 1.073 OPS, 16 home runs and 56 RBI through 61 games. Those are essentially the equivalent to video game numbers and makes you wonder just where the St. Louis Cardinals would be without the slugger.

And in two days (three games) against the Pittsburgh Pirates, Goldschmidt made history. He became the first player to have 9+ hits, 9+ RBI, 6+ runs scored, 5+ extra-base hits, 4+ home runs with 0 strikeouts over a two-day span since Ty Cobb did so from May 5-6, 1925, according to Stats by STATS.

Absurd. Goldschmidt has finished second in MVP voting twice and third once – and his latest two-day stretch further strengthens his candidacy for finally winning the award. Just look at what he did against the Pirates in the doubleheader:

Game 1: 2 for 4 with one home run and three RBI.

Game 2: 4 for 4 with two home runs and five RBI.

There are not enough adjectives to properly describe just what Goldschmidt is doing this season. The Cardinals, despite a poor last month from Nolan Arenado and season-long struggles from Tyler O’Neill, rank fourth in baseball in runs (307). Their OPS still ranks 11th in baseball (.720) and is the best in the National League Central.

It will be difficult for Goldschmidt to maintain these numbers through the 162-game season, but his current slashline is similar to peak Albert Pujols. He’s been that good. And with Goldschmidt performing at this level, and Arenado and O’Neill surely set to bounce back at some point, the case for the Cardinals making a deep postseason run grows even stronger.

Especially with the rotation, led by Adam Wainwright and Miles Mikolas, set to get its ace, Jack Flaherty, back starting on Wednesday.