Mapping Cardinals Nation
DENVER — Not too far from where Coors Field is now, just down the Boulder Turnpike headed toward Boulder Valley and the mountains is the “Scenic Overlook” that was a landmark of my youth. It’s a quick pull off Highway 36 and it offers a panaromic view of the signature Flatirons and the valley.
It’s also high enough to be one of several places you could tune in KMOX.
Had the phrase existed years ago it would have been called a Cardinals Hot Spot.
So many places have one.
The Stan Musial Society was created at the footsteps of the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., because the founders started recognizing cars that came to the high point to tune in Cardinals’ games. In New Orleans, KMOX came in loud and clear and a pocket of Cardinal Nation received sustenance on the porches of the Garden District. From Boulder to the bayou to even Baraboo, Wis., a region of fans was planted and cultivated by the reach of KMOX.
Even today, Extra Innings packages on TV and the ever-expanding MLB.com universe allows the Cardinals’ diaspora to turn on, tune in and drop Shannonisms. In New York City, Dewey’s Flatiron — a bar in the shadow of Manhattan’s Flatiron Building — has become a hub for Cardinals fans to gather and watch games, as they did packing the place during 2006 playoff run, which came through their backyard.
So, what if there was a map, a redistricting of the United States not by red states and blue states but by Reds states and ‘Birds states? How vast would the Cardinals Nation be? The size of Texas? Larger.
Nike attempted to answer that question:
Found the above map while searching for a birthday gift for the little man. A larger picture of it is available here at Strange Maps, where I first came upon a discussion about its arbitrary take on each team’s fanbase. (Seriously? The Dodgers tightly bunched in on the left coast; like Massachusetts of the western divisions?) You’ve probably stopped reading already and are right-clicking it onto your desktop.
It’s a beauty, to be sure.
But it looks more like a broadcast coverage map than a true charting of fanbases. Where’s the Yankees’ stronghold in Florida? The Cubs hold on Las Vegas and the little island around Ho Ho Kam Park there in Arizona? The map was the illustration developed by Nike and MLB.com for their The United Countries of Baseball campaign, which was conducted last year. There’s a poll there designed to use Zip Codes to map allegiance, and if you haven’t done so already there’s a much larger picture of the above map there designed for desktop use.
It’s an unscientific poll — as much a piece of artwork, like this baseball map, as true cartography — but the span of Cardinals Nation has to surely take shape with the information provided. (There is, after all, a Cardinals’ blog based in Ireland!) One Web site attempting to do just that. Collect enough information to create what will be a census of fandom.
The Commoncensus Sports Map Project is gathering votes to define the geography of every fan base, from MLB to NFL to even college football. Nearly 26,000 fans have participated in the MLB voting at the Web site. Updated in August 2007, this was map produced:
Another page on that Web site allows for a detailed breakdown on different regions. Consider the 200-mile-diameter region that would include the “Scenic Overlook” described early. The Cardinals received the fourth-most from the straw poll in that region:
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Colorado Rockies … 205
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Boston Red Sox … 43
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Chicago Cubs … 29
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Cardinals … 23
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New York Yankees … 18
A few years before the Colorado Rockies came to the Time Zone Baseball Forgot, The Denver Post ran a poll of its readers to adopt a baseball team. The Cubs were the odds-on favorite. Because WGN was available here, if you watched a game on TV it was probably on most days a Cubs game. One of the reporters who worked on the project said the response was so overwhelming it fritzed the phone system a few times. The overwhelming winner was a surprise to some.
The adopted team was the Cardinals.
So it’s with little surprise that last night in the press box a few of its denizens were discussing the partisan crowd that has come for a midweek series in Denver. School is still in session. It’s the middle of a work week. You wouldn’t think Cardinals’ fans are migrating just yet. So, why red-tinged and hearty cheers Monday when Albert Pujols slid home with the game-winning run? Just another Cardinals Nation annex.
Call it unincorporated.
Any other maps out there? Any precincts yet to report? Any other outposts to be counted?
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Derrick Goold said he was going to Mizzou for capital-J journalism, but after growing up in the Time Zone Baseball Forgot he was really drawn to MU sitting between two major-league cities. Goold joined the Post-Dispatch in 2001 after working for The Times-Picayune and Rocky Mountain News, covering sports from LSU to NHL and every level of baseball in between. 
Thanks for this blog entry,DG. Really interesting stuff…here is something else I find interesting…..
Izzy is killing us.The birds seem to have tried and are trying to go younger. It is time for the once great Izzy to find another spot on another club. Should Pujols take some of the blame for Wednesdays debackle?Yes.The fact is though is that there were still chances for Izzy to close out the game. Can we say…Chris Perez.
I kind of smell a catcher controversy at the catcher position. Yadi is one of my favorite Cardinals but Brian Anderson’s bat is appealing. Someone eventually will go. What do you thing,DG?
Experience tells me there is much if not more interest in the Cardinals than the Reds in southern Indiana. All of Tennessee is Cardinal territory, except Nashville, which wants to be Atlanta.
I always see Cardinals fans everywhere I go East of the Mississippi. Several older fans in the southeast have told me they have been fans since back in the 40s-50 when there were no southern teams. When I see people in MLB caps at college and minor league games in NC, I’d put Boston first, and Cardinals at least tied with Braves for 2nd most common.
I’m in Minnesota and I’ll wear my Cards gear almost anywhere. I tend to see someone else wearing Cards gear pretty regularly. And I even get a shoutout, “Go Cards!” at least twice a month!
emc, not that I wholly disagree that it will be interesting to see what Anderson does, but Anderson is an inferior catcher if Yadi is hitting .260.
Moreover, this is the same anderson that has played 6 games at the AAA level. Not sure I’m ready to jump on a bandwagon yet. I’m intrigued and excited about his coming up and playing in the coming years, but not looking for him to bump Molina anytime soon.
Finally, I’d suspect, even when he does come up, he’ll be a backup and catch 2x a week or so to spell Yadi and be a LH platoon option for TLR. But he should do good things and should fetch us some very nice free agents from some AL club that is looking for a C/DH (unless his defensive skills are that bad, then hopefully the cards would trade him to an NL team).
Then again, Yadi may get hurt, lose his effectiveness behind the plate, lose those speedy legs of his (is he the fastest in the family?), or lose that power bat that made Endy Chavez’s glove superfluous!
I’m starting to think that Chris Perez is going to get the Backup Quarterback Treatment. It’s a phenomena often found in the NFL where the backup quarterback is always beloved and desired over the starting quarterback — because the starter’s failures are heightened and the backup never gets the snaps to fail. Just my two bits.
There is a way for Bryan Anderson and Yadier Molina to peacefully coexist as catchers for the Cardinals. In fact, that tandem makes a lot of sense — not just as mentor and apprentice, but starter and backup. Molina is the superior defensive player, has proven skilled at calling games and has that arm. Anderson is a lefthanded complement with a better bat (a pinch-hitter bat) and a defensive game that won’t hurt the team if he sees regular playing time as Molina’s backup.
dg
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Just want you to know that I have been a Cardinals fan for 50 years in what you describe as “Braves Territory”………And I might add, there are many here who grew up listening to KMOX and Harry and Jack on hot summer nights in Alabama as I did!
I’m all for Molina remaining as the starter.I love the way he handles the pitchers and what about that amazing throw sunday night. I was just curious on how much compettion Anderson would provide eventually for the catching job.
I’m not giving Perez the “Backup QB” treatment. Lets trade Izzy while he still has some value and we can develop ,Perez.
I was born near Texarkana, Texas in 1961 and now live near Waco, Texas. I have very early memories of listening to Cardinals baseball on KMOX. Even though Texas had the Colt-45s (later the Astros), and much later the Rangers, the Cardinals were THE team.
The tradition continues today. My daughter, aged 23, loves the Cardinals.
Much of my whole extended family lives in the Waco, Texas area now, and at family gatherings, Extra Innings is on, or MLB.com is up so that we can all keep up with the Cardinals game of the day.
Even now, with the Astros and Rangers having gained some foothold of a fanbase here, there are still Cardinals fans to be found. I see them in numbers at Minute Maid Park.
At lunch today in Waco, I saw a kid walk in the restaurant with a Cardinals shirt on; on the back was the name Edmonds.
I thought that was so cool.