Greatest Cardinals No. 14: 3B Scott Rolen
NOTE: The BND has endeavored to identify an objective list of the top 100 St. Louis Cardinals players of all time, based on statistical formulas developed through sabermetrics. We’ll count down the list daily, player by player, until April 4, the day of the Cardinals’ 2019 home opener. The running list and player bios can be found at bnd.com.
No. 14: 3B Scott Rolen
Scott Rolen suited up for the 2006 World Series with a big chip on his shoulder, determined to prove his manager’s folly at benching him for parts of the divisional and league-championship series.
St. Louis skipper Tony La Russa didn’t believe Rolen had been forthcoming about the seriousness of an injured shoulder, and sat his All-Star third baseman after a 1-for-11 post-season slump. Rolen fumed while baseball writers dismissed the flap as the by-product of two hard-headed competitors who had been wound extra tightly by a tense pennant drive.
The Cardinals had acquired Rolen at the trade deadline in 2002, sending infielder Placido Polanco, pitcher Bud Smith and reliever Mike Timlin to the Phillies as compensation.
It was a dream come true for Rolen, who grew up a Cardinals fan in Jasper, Indiana. The Redbirds were glad to thrilled to have filled their hole at third base with a superior athlete. The 6-foot-4, 245-pound former big-time college basketball recruit played the hot corner like Brooks Robinson, threw like Mike Schmidt and hit like Cal Ripken Jr.
It was such a happy union early on that the two sides very quickly agreed to an eight-year contract that was supposed to keep Rolen in St. Louis for life. But whether it was by misunderstanding, an actual betrayal, or just stubborn pride, the relationship soured long before that deal reached the end of its term.
The story of Rolen’s unhappy breakup with the Cardinals goes all the way back to Game 2 of 2002 National League Divisional Series against the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Left-handed reliever Steve Kline recorded the second out of the seventh inning of a 2-1 game, but allowed a base hit to D-backs catcher Chad Moeller, then walked Tony Womack. Arizona sent in speedy rookie Alex Cintron to run for Moeller, who was the tying run.
The next Arizona batter, Junior Spivey hit a ground ball on the left side of the infield. Rolen was positioned to make an easy play, but Cintron ran into him. The umpire called Cintron for interference to end the inning, but Rolen was clearly hurting. An MRI revealed a “moderate sprain” in his shoulder which knocked him out until spring, and the Cardinals lost the National League Championship Series without him.
Any lingering effects of the injury were not immediately obvious. Rolen was himself again in 2003, batting .286/.382/.528 with 29 doubles, 28 home runs and 104 RBIs for the 85-win, third-place Redbirds.
The next season, he took his spot among the famed “MV3,” the brawny Cardinals core that also included Albert Pujols and Jim Edmonds. Rolen batted .314/.409/.598 with 34 home runs and 124 RBIs — all career highs — and won his sixth career Gold Glove.
The Cardinals won 105 games in the regular season, just one short of the franchise record set in 1942, then beat Los Angeles in a four-game divisional series.
Rolen batted .310 in a dramatic NLCS against the rival Houston Astros. Edmonds forced the decisive seventh game with a two-run, walk-off home run in the 12th inning of Game 6. Rolen was the hero in Game 7, when he broke a 2-2 sixth-inning tie with a two-run blast off Roger Clemens that sent the Cardinals to their first World Series in 17 years.
Barry Bonds, with his .364 batting average, won the National League MVP Award, but each of the MV3 finished in the top five of the balloting. Unfortunately, the Cardinals were swept by the red-hot Boston Red Sox to become one of the best teams ever to not win the World Series.
St. Louis made another run in 2005 by winning 100 games and advancing all the way to the sixth game of the NLCS, thanks to Pujols’ moon-shot off Houston closer Brad Lidge in Game 5. But the Cardinals had to do with Abraham Nunez at third base instead of Rolen.
On May 5 against the Dodgers, Rolen tapped a ground ball back to pitcher Scott Erickson whose throw to first drifted into the baseline. Rolen collided with Los Angeles first baseman Hee-Seop Choi and that balky shoulder reared its agonizing head. This time, the MRI revealed a torn labrum that would require surgery and at least a six-month recovery.
He made it back in time for the 2006 opener and made a strong case for NL Comeback Player of the Year. For the season, Rolen batted .286/.369/.518 with 22 home runs and 95 RBIs, but fell off dramatically after making his fifth All-Star Game appearance. He batted just .253 in the second half and struggled down the stretch with a .225 September.
La Russa was concerned Rolen had pushed his recovery from surgery and that the season’s mounting innings were wearing him down. With just 83 wins, it took an Atlanta Braves victory over the Astros on the final day of the regular season to get the Cardinals into the playoffs.
When Rolen started the postseason 1-for-11, La Russa wrote Scott Spezio’s name into the starting lineup for the final game of the divisional series against San Diego and again in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series against the New York Mets.
Rolen was not happy, scoffing at La Russa’s excuse he was playing the matchups.
“In the Series, there’s no matchups, there are no numbers,” Rolen said. “You hammer it out on the field.”
Motivated by the squabble, Rolen was a handful for Detroit’s pitching staff in the World Series. He batted .421 with a home run, three doubles and a pair of RBIs. His opposite-field single in seventh inning of Game 5 clinched a 4-2 Cardinals win and the World Series championship.
But the champagne and parades would salve Rolen’s hurt feelings for only so long. He struggled in 2007, slumping to a .265 average with just eight home runs while still not speaking to La Russa. By August, he was back on the disabled list with shoulder trouble. La Russa was tired of the drama, a point he made to the media with unusual directness at baseball’s annual winter meetings the following December.
“I’m making it clear that I don’t understand why he’s unhappy. I told somebody the other day, I can make a list of 50 respect points that this man has been given by our organization,” La Russa said. “He’s got a contract to play and we need him to play. And he’s going to be treated very honestly.
“… If he doesn’t like it, he can quit.”
Rolen contacted Cardinals General Manager John Mozeliak — “I want out,” he said.
By Jan. 14, 2008, he was a Toronto Blue Jay, traded for fellow third baseman Troy Glaus. Rolen played five more seasons, including the last three in Cincinnati, and only twice was able to play more than 100 games.
Still, the sad split between the Cardinals and Rolen begs the following questions:
Had Cintron successfully avoided Rolen back in the 2002 NLDS, would the other dominoes — the ongoing shoulder problems, the 2006 benching, the rift with La Russa, the trade to Toronto — have ever fallen?
SEASONS IN ST. LOUIS: 2002-2007
KEY STATS
.286/.370/.510 in St. Louis | 8 Gold Gloves | 7x All-Star | RoY’97 | 25.9 WAR
TOP 100 SCORE: 4.43
This story was originally published March 19, 2019 at 5:51 PM.