TOWER GROVE — While a lot of attention was paid to the pitchers a few of the National League Cy Young Award voters did and didn’t vote for, lost in that hubbub was how much money one pitcher made because of one single vote.

By receiving a solitary second-place vote, Atlanta Braves righthander Javier Vazquez finished fourth in this year’s Cy Young voting. Per a clause in his contract with the Braves, that netted Vazquez a…

TOWER GROVE — Come Friday morning, Bryan Burwell & Company will have to find something different to ask me about and a new way to introduce me on radio shows, if they have me on at all. As of this afternoon, I no longer hold a secret ballot in one of the more talked about award votes in years.

A fellow baseball beat writer, the San Francisco Chronicle’s Henry Schulman, aptly called it “by far the…

CREVE COEUR — They are at very different stages in their careers, at very different positions and they were talking about two very different subjects, but St. Louis Cardinals ace Chris Carpenter and minor-league outfielder Tyler Henley hit on the same theme during interviews I had with them Wednesday.

In discussing how his career changed when he won the Cy Young Award back in 2005, Carpenter described how expectations changed around him. He wasn’t just the…

TOWER GROVE — Of all the statistical bubblegum that is packed into Bill James’ annual Handbooks, among the best to chew over and stretch to the point of popping is the predictions for the coming season.

ACTA Sports recently emailed me the 2010 predictions for several members of the 2009 St. Louis Cardinals — predictions that are featured in Bill James Handbook 2010 — and while it doesn’t take a “statistical oracle” (as The Wall Street Journal…

TOWER GROVE — This morning, St. Louis Cardinals starter Adam Wainwright was announced as his peers’ selection for the National League Outstanding Pitcher, as discussed over on the breaking-news blog, Cardinal Beat. The Players Choice awards, founded a little more than a decade ago by the players’ union, doesn’t have the historical oomph or bonus panache of the more revered hardware — the MVP, the Cy Young, etc. — but do they serve as indicators…

TOWER GROVE — Let the annual windfall of awards begin for St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Albert Pujols and his chip-free right elbow. Early this morning, The Sporting News continued its award announcements and revealed that Pujols, for a second consecutive year, is the publication’s choice as the Major League Baseball Player of the Year.

The magazine relied on a panel of 338 current big-league players to make the award selections, and Pujols was the choice for the…

TOWER GROVE — The first edition of this offseason’s PostCards mailbag begins with a favorite parlor game of the press box: Take the best player on the team. Put him on the trading block. Wonder just what it would take in return to make a deal happen. Stir and … Presto! Instant debate.

In the St. Louis Cardinals’ case, that’s Albert Pujols, the best hitter in the game, and a fine place to start when we peer…

DOWNTOWN — His losing battle with the mechanics of his delivery and that 105-pitch slog through Game 1 of this National League Division Series was so uncharacteristic of the St. Louis Cardinals ace Chris Carpenter that he can speak with some authority about how he’ll pitch Sunday.

“I’ll be better,” he said.

Manager Tony La Russa announced this afternoon that if Cardinals stave off elimination tonight and force a Game 4 for Sunday afternoon Carpenter will get…

LOS ANGELES –For Troy Glaus, it has been seven years. For John Smoltz, it’s 17.

The two St. Louis Cardinals veterans know a thing or seven about what it takes to be successful in the postseason, and they each have personal hardware as an October spoil. Glaus won the World Series MVP in 2002 with the Los Angeles Angels, and Smoltz, the winningest postseason pitcher ever, won the National League Championship Series MVP back in 1992….

TOWER GROVE — More than a year ago, Walt Jocketty, freshly installed as the Cincinnati Reds general manager, used an odd word to describe an upcoming series against the St. Louis Cardinals. He said he and manager Dusty Baker had chips on their shoulders. That they each had a “vendetta”.

Turns out it wasn’t that weird of a word choice at all. It was prophetic.

In 2009, the National League Central has only gotten spicier when it…

TOWER GROVE — St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa and pitching coach Dave Duncan believe not all pitches are created equal. That is why La Russa often bats away questions about a pitcher being on a short-leash with a pitch count or a pitcher being allowed to blow by the mythical (and misleading) labrum-barrier of 100 pitches.

There are high-stress pitches. There are breezy innings. They do count the same.

Both are part of the internal…

TOWER GROVE — Asked Sunday morning if his lineup would look a little different if the St. Louis Cardinals were playing a team out of contention, manager Tony La Russa paused, rolled his eyes toward the ceiling, and finally acknowledged: Probably.

If he didn’t offer a complete answer, he’ll start today.

Of the five teams either in the playoffs or in the playoff picture (looking at you Colorado and Atlanta), the Cardinals are the only team that…

DENVER — The last race left for the St. Louis Cardinals before the end of the regular season may have come to a sudden end Saturday night, too, as Adam Wainwright gained a hearty endorsement for his Cy Young candidacy.

It came from arguably his chief rival for the award: teammate Chris Carpenter.

“If that game right there doesn’t solidify him as the best pitcher in the league, then I’m can’t imagine what would,” Carpenter said, goggles…

DENVER — St. Louis Cardinals pitching coach Dave Duncan, as he is often apt to do as a Dugout Socrates, answered a question with a question.

“Let me ask it to you in this way,” he said the other day in Houston. “If we were to face Roy Oswalt at his best today and then face him again next week, is facing him today an advantage for us?”

The answer-and-question was in response to an inquiry about the pluses and minuses…

HOUSTON — With 2009 speeding to a close, discussions about the decade behind us are already popping up. Some baseball writers, like Sports Illustrated’s Tom Verducci’s have picked their Team of the Aughts, others have just explored who might be the Player of the Decade. Here we’ve been convicted of over-stating the Decade Triple Crown notion (scroll down).

Time to look at the bigger picture.

In the past week or 10 days, the St. Louis Cardinals have clinched the…