TOWER GROVE — Scanning the message board, Cards Talk, this morning, I saw a subject line that piqued by interest: “Cards to Get 10,000th Win in August.” Well, that really depends on who you ask.
Early this past season, the Chicago Cubs became the second team in baseball history to reach 10,000 franchise victories. The San Francisco/New York Giants had done it earlier, and of course the Philadelphia Phillies were the first to reach 10,000 losses. The race for the third franchise to reach 10,000 victories in its history is between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Los Angeles/Brooklyn Dodgers.
Sort of.
I wrote a note about this back in April for the Sunday feature, Hot Corner:
CROOKED NUMBERS: The 10,000 Club
After the Cubs became the second franchise in baseball to reach 10,000 victories, the race is on between two venerable clubs to be the third. Either the Cardinals or the Los Angeles Dodgers will be next. Both teams will probably get to 10,000 wins in 2009, though the Dodgers have a 29-win lead on the locals. The Cardinals will be the second team to have those 10,000 wins without moving to another city. The all-time standings, ranked by wins (records through April 25):
TEAM … WINS-LOSSES … WIN % … EST.
San Francisco Giants … 10,195-8,737 … .539 … 1883
Chicago Cubs … 10,000-9,467 … .514 … 1876
LA Dodgers … 9,886-8,895 … .524 … 1884
Cardinals … 9,857-9,205 … .517 … 1882
Atlanta Braves … 9,708-9,728 … .499 … 1876
Cincinnati Reds … 9,681-9,391 … .511 … 1882
Pittsburgh Pirates … 9,633-9,399 … .506 … 1882
NY Yankees … 9,395-7,174 … .567 … 1901Source: Baseball-Reference.com; Post-Dispatch research.
The trouble with the above record for the Cardinals is the Cardinals themselves don’t recognize it. According to the Cardinals media guide, the team’s acknowledged history began in 1892, when owner Chris Von der Ahe moved the team into the National League after the American Association folded. That would put the Cardinals’ all-time record at 9,148-8,839 through 2008, or about a decade away from the 10,000-win mark.
Former P-D baseball writer Mike Eisenbath’s priceless The Cardinals Encyclopedia chronicles the team year-by-year back to 1882, when Von der Ahe’s Browns (Brown Stockings) — which would later become the Perfectos and later the Cardinals — began play at Sportsman’s Park. That is the year that Baseball-Reference.com marks as the beginning of Cardinals’ time and, therefore, puts the record at
9,929-9,271
… Or within reach of 10,000 this next season. Others mark the beginning of Cardinals history as 1899 when the Cleveland Spiders moved into to town with new ownership, the team became the Perfectos, called Robison Field home, had Cy Young as the ace and so on. That would further shave the record down and move the Cardinals further away from 10,000.
I find it an interesting element of the coming season. Do the Cardinals adopt this year as the year they win 10,000 or do they hold to the NL timeline and celebrate the mark a decade or so from now? What they would give up is being the third or fourth team to reach 10,000 and the second team to do so all within the same city.
That achievement might be worth rewriting history.
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Thanks to Ruffster22, whoever you are, for bringing the topic up in the boards this morning.
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