JUPITER, Fla. — What is true for major-league spring training is also true in minor-league spring training: The statistics are the ends, and often the means are more important.

Consider Adam Ottavino’s day.

The former first-round pick had a garish line from Monday’s game against Class AA Jacksonville. It read:

4.2 IP, 7 H, 6 runs, 2 BB, 4 Ks

But there is a story behind the numbers. Five of those six runs were unearned, and he was darn…

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. — 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…

JUPITER, Fla. — Big-bonus import Roberto De La Cruz made his spring game debut Thursday with the St. Louis Cardinals Low-A affiliate, and he rapped a couple hits, including a double. Just because the Dominican Republic teen is with a full-season squad to open the spring, doesn’t mean he’ll be with one when the season starts. De La Cruz received a record bonus, the highest ever given by the Cardinals to an international free agent,…

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. — After his first workout with the Dominican Republic national team Monday at Roger Dean Stadium, Florida Marlins shortstop Hanley Ramirez — one of four All-Star shortstops on the Dominican roster — was asked in Spanish what position he expected to play in the coming World Baseball Classic.

He looked to the English-speaking reporters for a lifeline. “Next?” he said.

Dominican Republic manager Felipe Alou isn’t sure how he’ll shakedown his middle infield yet, saying only that…

JUPITER, Fla. — The fortunes of Blake Hawksworth as a St. Louis Cardinals minor leaguer can be traced by the injuries as they traveled up his right side or the prospect lists as he dropped down them. Once the organization’s top prospect — not just top pitching prospect — Hawksworth will make the first start of spring training today, against Florida at Roger Dean Stadium.

He feels fortunate just to be around.

If he wasn’t slowed by ankle surgery…

TOWER GROVE — Chicago Cubs manager Lou Piniella, who guided the denizens of Wrigley Field to a league-best 97-64 record and their first back-to-back playoff appearances since 1908, won the National League Manager of the Year award in a vote of baseball writers announced this afternoon. The award is Piniella’s third Manager of the Year award, putting him one behind the record — jointly held by St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa and Atlanta…

TOWER GROVE — Back in 1997, a young shortstop named Edgar Renteria was still a few days away from a defining moment in his career — that title-winning single to center field in the 11th inning of the World Series’ Game 7 — when he took a seat at a press conference. Renteria and the upstart Florida Marlins were the surprise winners of the National League pennant, the wild-card team made good, and  they came…

SOUTH GRAND — While first baseman Albert Pujols continues his postseason looting of baseball’s various trophies, outfielder Ryan Ludwick scored a nod for his breakout — perchance, breakthrough — season with the St. Louis Cardinals.

Ludwick, a National League All-Star this past summer, was selected to Sporting News’ National League All-Star team, the magazine’s editor announced this afternoon. The Sporting News, which used to be based in St. Louis, selected Pujols as the All-NL first baseman…

TOWER GROVE — On Friday night in Miami, New York Mets center fielder Carlos Beltran creamed a pitch from Marlins closer Kevin Gregg for a two-out, last-strike, game-winning grand slam. Then in the afterglow of his big hit in a big moment for the October-chasing Mets, Beltran marked his celebration with an admission.

He said he still thinks about Adam Wainwright’s curveball.

“As a player, you always dream to be in a situation like that,” Beltran reportedly…

FORT LAUDERDALE — The Cardinals’ reluctance to “anoint” Chris Perez as closer seems downright quaint compared to the seesaw Adam Wainwright is riding as he prepares this weekend for his third, and possibly last, rehab appearance.

To start, or not to start, that is the question.

Whether ’tis nobler in the ninth to close and take up an arm against a sea of troubles or … Oh, I’ll stop there before the allusion goes too far afield. But…

JUPITER, Fla. — With one of the myriad channels offering Olympic coverage on in the background, Cardinals prospect Colby Rasmus spoke about being here instead of over there and the knee that cost him more than a stamp on his passport.

He shrugged.

“I’m not really thinking about it,” Rasmus said. “It would have been a great opportunity. It didn’t happen.”

Rasmus sprained his knee while making a check swing back in late July. He offered at a…