JUPITER, Fla. — A year ago at the Civil Rights Game, a Cardinals fan — a man Adam Wainwright knew only through his father — approached the Cardinals righthander about giving him a gift. He wanted him to have a baseball, a prized ball, one of two he owned.

It was signed by Johnny Sain.

The phrase scrawled in Sain’s handwriting near his autograph says it all:

“First to pitch to Jackie Robinson. Last to pitch to Babe Ruth.”

“I had kept the baseball for over 10 years with the idea of donating it for a charity auction, or giving it to the ‘right’ person,” Harry Truman Moore wrote in an email to me this morning. “After Adam’s performance in the post-season, I thought about giving it to him. My decision was finalized when he was selected to pitch in the first Civil Rights game. I actually gave him the ball in St. Louis on ‘ring night’ in 2007, as I wanted to do it when his father could be with us.”

Moore has followed Wainwright’s career studiously. He was there in Memphis when Wainwright made his Redbird debut, and drove up from his Arkansas home to attend Wainwright’s first game at the new downtown stadium. He is trying to score tickets for opening day — the righthander’s next big-league milestone.

He’ll have to make many more pilgrimages after today’s news.

Wainwright assured his future with the Cardinals today when he and the club finalized a four-year, $15-million deal that includes an option that keeps him in St. Louis through 2013. Wainwright gets a $750,000 signing bonus and a $500,000 salary for this season. His deal than escalates from $2.6 million to $6.5 million over the course of the guaranteed years of the contract. The option, which is a two-year option, is worth $21 million total.

Moore, a former sportswriter who lives in Paragould, Ark., met Wainwright’s father in college. As soon as he heard about the 2003 trade that sent Wainwright to the Cardinals from Wainwright’s boyhood team, the Atlanta Braves, Moore dialed up Wainwright’s dad. Moore barely knew the kid, but he knew the team.

He’d grown up a Cardinals fan.

And he’s told Wainwright all about that during their brief conversations. When they first met, Wainwright didn’t quite know how to react.

“When my dad first told me he was a Harry Truman Moore, I was like c’mon,” Wainwright said earlier this spring. ”But that’s his real name.”

“H.T”, as his friends call him, grew up across the street from former big-league pitcher Sain and remained in touch with the 139-game winning righthander. The two lived in Walnut Ridge, Ark. Moore used to see Sain as the big leaguer traveled back and forth from Chicago to Arkansas through the years. Sain would swing by Paragould for a visit.

Sain’s place in baseball history is a remarkable one.

Sain is the pitcher whose last name makes the famous Boston Braves’ rhyme work: “Spahn and Sain and pray for rain.” Jim Bouton idolized him in Ball Four. As a couch, Sain molded some fine pitchers and influenced one of the last decade’s finest pitching coaches in Leo Mazzone. He had a fine career for several teams, and he posted a 3.49 career ERA. But he remembered less for the sum of his pitches than two of his pitches.

Sain was the last pitcher to throw to Babe Ruth.

He was the first pitcher to throw to Jackie Robinson, when the Dodgers’ rookie broke the game’s color barrier with an at-bat. That pitch — what it could have meant had it been anything but what it was — is the subject of a book Lou Brock has been working on. The history Sain made by delivering that pitch fascinates the Cardinals Hall of Famer, he said.

Before his death in 2006, Sain signed two baseballs for Moore. Both have the same phrase — last to Ruth, first to Robinson. And now one is Wainwright’s.

The Cardinals young righthander has a collection of baseballs signed by Hall of Famers. He has around 40, he said.

Sain came up short of being in the Hall of Fame.

But his baseball belongs.

“It is,” Wainwright said, “one of my prized balls.”

***

The Wainwright contract puts the Cardinals in an interesting situation with as many as five starters already signed through the 2009 season and the possibility of three starters signed through the 2012 season. General manager John Mozeliak said Thursday morning that the Wainwright deal did not paint the Cardinals into a financial corner when it comes to pursuing free agents.

It’s the options on Mark Mulder’s and Matt Clement’s deals that will determine how much the Cardinals have to wade into the coming free agent market. Mulder’s option for next season could be worth $11 million, and Clement’s is good for anywhere from $9 million to $11 million, though it would take a top-five Cy Young vote to get him to the top end. (It’s more likely he hovers in the $9 million to $9.5 million with 160 to 180 innings pitched.)

The rundown of the pitchers currently considered starters and their contract status:

• Chris Carpenter, RHP, 2011 (team option 2012, $15 million)
• Adam Wainwright, RHP, 2011 (team option for 2012-13)
• Mark Mulder, LHP, 2008 (team option 2009)
• Matt Clement, RHP, 2008 (team option 2009)
• Joel Pineiro, RHP, 2009
• Todd Wellemeyer, RHP, 2008 (arbitration eligible)
• Brad Thompson, RHP, 2008 (arbitration eligible)
• Anthony Reyes, 2008 (arbitration eligible)
• Braden Looper, RHP, 2008
• Kyle Lohse, RHP, 2008

***

Shortstop Cesar Izturis’ plus-minus is back to even. He committed an error in this afternoon’s game and now has seven errors to match his seven hits this spring.

***

Some surprises among the players cut from the Cardinals minor-league camp this morning. They included RHP Dennis Dove – who is less than a year removed from catching Dave Duncan’s eye for his rare power arm — and LHP Eric Haberer, the Southern Illinois University alum who once seemed destined to be the kind of lefty reliever the Cardinals are looking to add for depth this season.

The others cut: 1B Mike Ferris, OF Will Groff, C Chris Grossman, C Gerard Haran, RHP Steven A. Hill, 2B Brandon Johnson, LHP Marcus Markray, OF Jose Ramirez, C/1B Christian Reyes, C Robert Sanzillo, INF Jared Schweitzer, RHP Ray Silva and C Scott Thomas.

***

Intrepid Yahoo! reporter Jeff Passan – who usually elicits an exclamation of another kind from me when I read his stuff — files a story from Japan today about former Cardinal Larry Bigbie, the inside man for the Mitchell Report. The article confirms what we’ve all come to know: Bigbie played his season with the Cardinals not only struggling through injury but also shadowed by the Feds. He was both informing and rehabbing.

***

Sporty news writer Jake Wagman, he of the ongoing Ballpark Village coverage and fellow Maneater alum, asked me to pass along the following question to the readers:

Will the Highway 40 closure effect how you get to Busch Stadium? Have you decided to go to less games because of the road construction - or none at all?

If so, message reporter Wagman at jwagman@post-dispatch.com.

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