He's been in 69 fights in his NHL career, and he's aware that baseball brawls are mild compared to hockey fights, but still Blues enforcer Cam Janssen said that he's not sure he would have wanted to be in the middle of what occurred Tuesday night between the Cardinals and Reds.

"To me, it's pretty scary when you've got guys hitting you from behind and there's 40 guys out there throwing punches and you're not looking," Janssen said. "You get blind-sided and all of the sudden you're down in the pile getting kicked in the face. It's a scary thing, but sometimes it's kind of humorous when you see some of those guys try to throw punches."

Comments made by Cincinnati's Brandon Phillips, calling the Cardinals a bunch of whiners among other things, is what instigated Tuesday's fight. One day after Phillips' comments, Cards catcher Yadier Molina objected to Phillips giving him a friendly tap on the shin pads, and that's when the dugouts emptied.

"That was great that Yadi did that," Janssen said. "He's not going to take that from him, and why would he? The Cardinals are a great organization. They've got a great team, and they're classy. If someone was calling the Blues that, there would be hell to pay when they got to Scottrade Center, I'll tell you that."

But Janssen followed by saying, "In hockey, no one would do that because they know there's consequences on the ice. That's why hockey players have respect for one another. If you're going to run your mouth like that, then you're going to be called out on the ice. And I'll tell you what, there's nobody going to be breaking that up for a while."

Of Johnny Cueto's kicking, Janssen said: "That's gutless, completely gutless. Some of those (baseball players) are warriors, don't get me wrong. But some of them aren't. To see a guy getting kicked ... it's a scary sight to see. But that's why I play hockey. There's a lot of respect and if someone wants to run their mouth, they're going to get called out in the middle of the ice and nobody is going to break it up."