Print it, Miss Candy, the Cardinals are Central Division champs

With the Houston Astros’ loss to the Braves on today, the Cardinals for the 20th time in franchise history will be headed to the postseason.

The Cardinals lost today 5-3 to the Brewers, but they did what they had to do in order to win the division over the hard-charging Astros, a game that I followed on Turner South this afternoon.

The Astros won one of three against the Braves while the Cardinals took two of four from the Brewers, back-to-back wins on Friday and Saturday in dramatic fashion over the Brewers proved to be just enough for the Cardinals to capture their third Central Division championship in a row and the sixth postseason appearance in the last seven years for the Cardinals.

Up next for the Cardinals will be the Padres on Tuesday afternoon, Chris Carpenter will get the start for the Cardinals (he was scratched for today and would have been the starter had the Cardinals lost today for the makeup game against the Giants on Monday afternoon) in Game 1 of the Division Series while the Padres are undecided on who they will have as the starter.

Most likely it will be Jake Peavy or Chris Young, who was lights out in the recent series the Cardinals had with the Padres last week.

But that will be a different story once everything has been settled after Monday.

Magic number?4

The Cardinals at long last brought their magic number down to 4 as they beaat the Padres 4 to 2 a few minutes ago in St. Louis. Mr. Pujols hit homer number 47 to give the Cardinals a win and snap their seven-game losing streak with four more games to play against Milwaukee beginning Thursday night in St. Louis.

In Pittsburgh, it’s still a tie score in the bottom of the 12th inning as Pittsburgh and Houston are tied at 6. Jose Castillo is batting for the Bucs and Nieve is pitching for the Astros at PNC Park.

Should the Bucs win tonight, the Cardinals’ magic number will reduce to three games and should the Astros lose tomorrow and the Cardinals win tomorrow, the magic number will be one going into Friday’s game.

Magic number:11

After tonight’s win over the Giants, the Cardinals’ magic number towards clinching their third straight NL Central championship shrunk to 11 although the Reds beat the Chicago Cubs earlier today in Chicago.

Yes,Miss Candy, it was definitely a magical ending to a magical summer

If you would have told me that in a course of one day, the Redbirds would close out the summer of Doc Hancock and Miss Candy with a win, Gary Bennett of the Cardinals would win the game in St. Louis with a grand slam to complete a three-game sweep of the Cubs, and then at midnight, my fantasy baseball team secures a playoff spot and as luck would have it, a picture of myself and the chocolate cutie holding a baseball appearing on my desktop at the exact moment, I would have laughed my tail off at you.

And fall out of the chair.

At approximately 1:39 p.m. CDT Sunday afternoon, I was on the pregame show with David Kelly doing an interview with him and repeating the same thing that I said when Bo Hart hit his game-winning homer on July 30th against Colorado Springs.

“The 2-1 to Hart………….Swing and a long one to left field………………..Goooodnight, Miss Candy, it’s………a……………….Goner and a winner!!!!!!!”

Over 50,000 watts of pure unadulterated funk.

Skip that part.

Six minutes later at 1:45, I was killing time in the Boardwalk when Michelle (the one I went to school with), Sharika, and myself got in a picture together.

It was also at the same time when the guy who patrols the Pimp Avenue gate at South Third Street recognized me as the object of a girl named Candance.

Of course, it took me a minute to realize who the guy, Michelle, and Sharika was talking about until Michelle uttered those two words that I know the chocolate cutie by.

“Miss Candy.”

Aha!!!!

Since July 4th, the talk of the entire Ballpark Gang has been the eleven or so minutes that the chocolate cutie and myself shared on the air.

Which is now part of Memphis professional baseball history as the first broadcaster’s crush to ever grace their chocolate and cute presence in the broadcast booth.

Of course, Michelle’s response to this was that myself and the chocolate cutie are the hottest near-couple in the Redbirds organization.

Aha!!!!!!

To be honest, I wasn’t really surprised by the fact that the chocolate cutie liked me anyway.

Not at all.

Even the wise Fantasy Baseball Guru himself knew as well as Amber.

And according to him, he’s just smart.

Same thing he said on July 20th, when we had “The Spook”.

Around 4:08 p.m., I was sitting in the broadcast booth while my guest partner (the guy was more organized than I was) and I did the station break and go over notes on the Sounds and Redbirds.

When a giant gust of wind blew through our broadcast booth, causing a flurry of rosters, lineups, and scorecards to go around the broadcast booth.

And the same gust that blew my hat off my head on August 20th.

At 4:49 p.m. Mike Rose (the same guy who hit that home run that prompted me to say the now famous and cute home run call) makes an out to close out the summer at Autozone Park and me breaking down in tears during the sign-off.

Fast forward six hours later to when of all people, Gary Bennett, hits a game-winning grand slam to win it for the Cardinals in the bottom of the ninth inning.

To beat the Cubs.

And move three games up on Cincinnati.

At approximately 12:02 a.m., I woke up to change the CD in my CD player when I found out that my fantasy baseball team made the playoffs and to top it all off, a picture of myself and the chocolate cutie holding a baseball together on August 20th appears on my desktop.

And left me with a wide smile and a blush redder than the Cardinals’ red caps.

Awwwww……………………………

At last, a win in the Windy City

The Cardinals picked a perfect time to face the Chicago Cubs as the wind blew out at Wrigley Field by beating the Cubs 11 to 3 behind the strength of home runs by Chris Duncan, Scott Rolen, Preston Wilson, and Gary Bennett and Jason Marquis’ first win since being moved down the rotation chart.

On tomorrow, Chris Carpenter will face Carlos Zambrano in the second game of the three-game series in Chicago.

Edwin Encarncion:Portrait of a Reds slugger

When you think the Cardinals can finally put together some wins, you run into Edwin Encarncion, the past week’s National League Player of the Week.

And he lived up to that moniker tonight by driving in four runs on the strength of two homers and three more dingers from Adam Dunn, Ken Griffey, and Rich Aurilla as the Reds beat the Cardinals tonight in St. Louis 7 to 2 to move within a game and a half of the Cardinals, who have lost four of their last five and 9 of their 14 meeting this season with the Reds.

There’s also been a change in the rotation. I said on Wednesday morning that the Cardinals will send Jason Marquis to the mound tomorrow but instead will send Jeff Weaver to the mound against Kyle Lohse for tomorrow’s rubber game in St. Louis. This was reported just before tonight’s game.

Dreamin’ through this

The Cardinals, after being swept away by the lowly Bucs, realized that this series with the Reds was the most crucial of the 2006 season for both the Reds, who was leading the wild card by a half game going into Tuesday’s game and only a game and a half behind the Cardinals.

But on last night, the Cardinals tacked one more game to their lead by shutting out the Cincinnati Reds 5 to 0 behind masterful pitching by Chris Carpenter and two RBIs by Rafael Belliard and a home run by Chris Duncan (thank God I picked this guy up for my fantasy league team) in the fifth inning.

All this happened as I slept through the third to ninth inning, dreaming about something that I will not discuss in this game wrap from the first game of the “Rumble on the Mississippi”.

Going tomorrow to the mound for Cincinnati will be Bronson Arroyo and former Redbird Anthony Reyes will go to the mound for the Redbirds in St. Louis.

On Thursday, Kyle Lohse will be on the mound for the Reds and Jeff Weaver will be on the mound for the Cardinals in the series finale between the two.

I also would like to add that the wise centerfielder himself, Skip Schumacher, will be playing for the USA team. His last game of the season was on Monday night, a 5-1 Redbirds win over the Iowa Cubs and he didn’t disappoint the hometown fans here as he made one of his patented catches in centerfield.

So the only way that he’ll hear about what’s going on between the chocolate cutie and myself is through the blogs that I own.

This can’t really be the worst team in the NL Central

The Pirates allowed ten hits to the Cardinals yet the Pirates (yes, the Pirates), swept the Cardinals by winning 7 to 0 behind homers by Jason Bay and former Memphis Chick Joe Randa.

To make matters worse, the Reds defeated the Phillies in 11 innings by the score of 7 to 5 on back-to-back-to-back homers by Adam Dunn, Edwin Encarncion, and Rich Aurila.

So to sweeten the pot, whoever gets the edge in the Reds-Cardinals series will leave with the NL Central lead and be in the driver’s seat for the National League Central crown.

This can’t be the worst team in the NL Central

The Cardinals lost their second straight to the Pittsburgh Pirates by the score of 3 to 2 although the God Hitter hit his first home run since August 5th against Milwaukee and saw their lead in the NL Central shrink to two and a half as Cincinnati defeated Philadelphia 9 to 6 in Philly.

The Cardinals have one more with Pittsburgh and a travel day on Monday and then open a three-game series with the Reds in St. Louis beginning Tuesday night at Busch Stadium.

While I was sleeping……………..

The Cardinals missed a good opportunity on padding their lead in the National League Central as the Reds lost to the Phillies 6 to 5 in 14 innings.

Right now this is how the National League Central standings look going into this morning.

Cardinals 62-53 –
Cincinnati 59-57 3.5
Houston 57-58    5
Milwaukee 54-61  8
Chicago Cubs 48-67 14
Pittsburgh 43-71 19.5