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 — While the St. Louis Cardinals have plenty to busy themselves with in the final five games of the regular season — see today’s game story for, oh, a few things to be spruced-up — and no reason to look beyond October, there are traces of 2010 in many of the comments coming from the club.

The front office and chairman Bill DeWitt Jr. have talked about the importance of re-signing outfielder Matt Holliday, sure, but…

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The best way that St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa believed he could keep Skip Schumaker’s bat in the lineup was to put his glove to use elsewhere.

The official pronouncements came in the past week from GM John Mozeliak and La Russa that Schumaker will open the regular-season as the Cardinals’ starting second baseman — will, in fact, be now designated on the roster as a capital-I Infielder. Schumaker openly…

JUPITER, Fla. — However the St. Louis Cardinals third base position shakes out at the major-league level, it seems certain that first-round pick Brett Wallace will begin this season at Class AA Springfield. Few think that he will stay there for long.

Though given barely a second glance at the major-league camp this spring, Wallace has clicked along at his usual 3-for-5, 2-for-5 pace during minor-league games. On Saturday, he broke loose.

Wallace, a third baseman, went…

JUPITER, Fla. — One of the tricky things about reading box scores from spring training back there in the northern tundra is the inability to see the defensive side of the game. It’s impossible to know how Skip Schumaker is adjusting to second base this late in the camp or how he and Khalil Greene are clicking as a double-play combo without the benefit of something beyond the box score.

Ditto with the minors — only…

JUPITER, Fla. — There is little doubt that Mark McCormick has the arm that merited a big signing bonus and early selection in the 2005 draft. He just hasn’t been able to do much with it. Injuries have hurt his development, but so has his inability to rein in that right arm.

Last season was billed as a pivotal one for the righthander. This one just better be a productive one.

McCormick, a starter since his days…

JUPITER, Fla. — Take a moment to do some math. Pull out a calculator and consider if St. Louis Cardinals leadoff hitter Skip Schumaker had just 11 more hits against lefthanded pitching last season. Just 11. Say, maybe four bloop singles to left field, four grounders that found holes, and three well-struck liners, maybe even a couple for doubles.

With those 11 hits — just 11 — Schumaker would have finished the season with a modest…

JUPITER, Fla. — The plan was to play Curt Smith often, but not necessarily every day. Then Smith got in the lineup, his manager at Johnson City told me this past fall, and it was impossible to take him out. He just kept hitting. He hit his way from Johnson City all the way to the league’s Player of the Year award. He hit his way from that hardware all the way to Low-A Quad…

FORT MYERS, Fla. — As the position-by-position tour of the St. Louis Cardinals’ prospect depth continues, no spot on this virtual diamond is as ripe for a prospect to emerge and take the top spot as shortstop. The Cardinals are, to put it mildly, hankering for a middle-infield prospect worthy of the job in the majors.

It has taken first-round pick Tyler Greene about a year longer than hoped t reach major-league camp, and while he’s…

JUPITER, Fla. — A staple of spring training coverage here in Bird Land since 2006, the Vuch Report is a detailed look at the performances on the backfields of the St. Louis Cardinals facility here at Roger Dean Stadium. The major leagues get all of the ink, but there are some bytes left over around here to cover the minor-league games that begin, in earnest, on Thursday.

Cardinals director of minor-league operations John Vuch compiles the…

CLEARWATER, Fla. — Pity Pete Kozma. Through no fault of his own he’s spent the first few years of his professional career doing exactly what was expected. Good glove. Consistently improving bat. Agility in the field that portends of a major-league shortstop with the potential for a reliable, average-oriented bat. That’s why the St. Louis Cardinals drafted him with their first pick in 2007.

The trouble is … He’s not Rick Porcello.

The story has now lapsed…

JUPITER, Fla. — There aren’t many players here early this morning at Roger Dean Stadium, what with it being one of the many off days of this spring training. But right now, as I type this, out in the cages that are adjacent to the clubhouse is one of the prospects who has shined this spring: Tyler Greene.

To think his status as a prospect was on tilt just 12 months ago.

Greene was a first-round pick…

JUPITER, Fla. — Six-time All-Star and twice a winner of the Silver Slugger, Moises Alou sat in the dugout this afternoon before starting in left field for Team Dominicana and said he has to listen to his body, and his body is hinting this tournament will be the last swings of his career.

“I’m going home after this,” Alou told a group of us reporters before playing the St. Louis Cardinals at Roger Dean Stadium in…

JUPITER, Fla. — For the St. Louis Cardinals, the plan is to never need a prospect to fill the position of first base — at least not for another decade or so — but that doesn’t alter the value of having some options at the position and the possibility to deal a player or two for help elsewhere.

The Cardinals depth chart at first base has one prospect likely be moved there, another prospect who started…

JUPITER, Fla. — With the first off day of spring training here for the St. Louis Cardinals, there’s time to ride some tangents — when you’re not riding the birthday boy’s “tsunami,” that is.

While working on a blog entry that you will see up in this space shortly about outfielder Colby Rasmus and how to read the recently released Baseball America Top 100 Prospects, I was intrigued by how BA took the depth charts us correspondents file…