St. Louis Cardinals players focus on fun, relationships playing a kid’s game

Amid what became a 13-pitch battle against the Mets’ Jeff McNeil on Tuesday afternoon, St. Louis Cardinals hurler Miles Mikolas flopped a curveball to the plate which registered at 63.7 miles per hour.

You could practically hear Adam Wainwright’s groan from the dugout all the way back in the metro-east.

The two have been in a friendly competition to see who can set the low bar for velocity among full-time pitchers in Major League Baseball, and Mikolas’s Tuesday toss tied Wainwright’s slowest mark, set on April 19 against Miami’s Jesús Sánchez. If you discount an accidental, stumbling heave by Arizona’s Madison Bumgarner — and Wainwright has made it clear that he does — the two Cardinals are comfortably in the “lead.”

In an era of high speed everything throughout the game, it might seem preposterous for two pitchers to see who can be the slowest. Those minor challenges, though — and the fun they bring with them — are essential parts of making it through a Major League season.

A spin in the laundry cart can help, too. Wainwright and Yadier Molina were each subjected to that after setting the all-time record for team wins behind a given pitcher-catcher battery on Sunday night. As they were doused in a mixture of almond milk, Fanta, and cherry Coke, Wainwright had the realization that he’s typically the enforcer making sure everyone gets to take their spin.

He chose not to reveal who filled in for him.

Albert Pujols had his own turn as a fill-in on Sunday, making his first career appearance as a pitcher and joining Babe Ruth as the only two players in the history of the big leagues to pitch in at least one game and hit 600 home runs.

The most important thing? Relationships

No one is confusing Pujols with Ruth, who was a legitimate star as a pitcher, any time soon. And Pujols was keen to point out that Ruth didn’t exactly allow four runs in every inning he pitched.

“The most important thing is the relationships you build,” Pujols said in reflecting on Molina and Wainwright’s accomplishments together. “That’s the memory that you take with you, whether it’s winning a championship, being in the clubhouse, and just building a relationship that’ll last forever. And that’s the goal.”

That relationship build is why the reinforcements from Triple-A on whom the Cardinals have leaned in recent works have been able to stay comfortable and adjusted. It’s how a bullpen functions, even with moving parts and an ever-changing hierarchy that requires the entire unit to buoy itself even as individual players undergo the ups and downs of a season.

And it’s how Pujols found himself standing on the pitcher’s mound, casually flinging pitches with just enough speed to find the barrels of many San Francisco bats.

“We were thinking about not using another arm (in a blowout),” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol explained, “and it was between Dickerson and Dickerson. Albert was sitting there while we were talking about it. He said, ‘I’ll throw it.’ And I said, ‘what’s wrong with that?’”

Baseball can be taken too seriously

Nothing was wrong with that. With a ninth inning which started with a 15-2 Cardinals lead, those fans who stuck around got to see one of the greatest players of his or any generation unable to wipe the smile off his face, even as the Giants themselves laughed their way around the bases. They booed lustily for called strikes and base hits, and the roar that went up as Juan Yepez caught a throw from Brendan Donovan for the final out was significant.

Yepez took the ball from his glove and handed it over to Pujols, who said he plans to have it autographed by the entire team.

Baseball is a big money industry that’s desperate to hold onto its place at the heart of the culture, so it’s hardly a shock that things can be taken too seriously. In the run up to this week’s series in New York, the Cardinals faced questions about whether last month’s light rumble might spill over to Citi Field.

That included a coach who’s nearly 50 executing a wrestling takedown on an All-Star first baseman and the closer of one of the teams vaulting the right field fence as his teammates, in the background, struggled to operate a gate through which they all pass several times every day.

‘Baseball ... is supposed to be fun’

It was high comedy, farce on every level. It doesn’t feel as funny as what took place Sunday night because it might involve punches thrown and projectiles moving toward people at high speeds, but a baseball brawl often has more in common with the Marx Brothers than mixed martial arts.

A game like Sunday’s can take off several edges at once, and even for people who play for a living, it’s nice to be reminded of the reason for the season.

“Baseball should be, is supposed to be fun,” Molina said. “It’s a job for us. I mean, we take it serious. But we need fun games like this. We’re just trying to have as much fun that we can have.”