Where did the time go? It’s hard to believe that 2015 is almost over. In just three days, a new year begins. It’s time for the December United Cardinals Blogger project, which is to write about what we feel are the top 5 Cardinals stories of the year.
This year was certainly an interesting but frustrating year for the Cardinals. Here are my choices for the top 5 Cardinals stories of the year. They aren’t in any particular order.
The hacking investigation. This was likely the most bizarre Cardinals story of the year. It was discovered that someone from the Cardinals organization had hacked into the database of ex-Cardinals employee Jeff Luhnow, now general manager of the Astros. The hack was traced to a house in Jupiter, Florida, which is where the Cardinals staffers hold spring training. Eventually, Chris Correa, the former director of scouting for the Cardinals, was fired. The FBI investigation of the hacking incident is ongoing.
Adam Wainwright’s Achilles tendon injury. Once again, Adam missed almost a full season of baseball, although this time the injury was not to his pitching arm. It was predicted that Adam would miss the whole season, but he made an amazing comeback and pitched a few innings as a reliever at the end of the season. The Cardinals would have won even more games if Adam had been healthy, but his absence as a starter was most felt in the NLDS. Adam would have likely started Game 1 and Lackey would have then started Game 2. Garcia would have felt well enough to start Game 3 in Chicago and the Cards may have won the NLDS.
The Cards win 100 games for the first time since 2005. Despite all the injuries and all the drama, the Cardinals managed to win 100 games in the 2015 season and won the NL Central for the third year in a row, which is a lot better record than most other teams had.
John Lackey and Jason Heyward defect to the Cubs. I figured that Lackey would sign with the Cubs to go hang with his BFF Jon Lester. But when Jason Heyward signed with the Cubs (and took a doggone long time to do so, prompting the Twitter hashtag #thingsfasterthanHeywooddecision), Cardinals fans felt like a bride jilted at the altar. We had hoped that Jason would stay around a while. He seemed to understand the Cardinal Way. In the end, however, Jason was a one-year rental. And his explanation that he didn’t want to be “the man” once Yadi, Adam and Matt retire rings hollow. The loss of Oscar Tavares stings even more now.
The early exit from the playoffs. The Cards made the playoffs for the fifth year in a row. However, the Cards couldn’t beat the Cubs in the NLDS, winning only Game 1, which is the playoff game I attended. This was highly disappointing, not only for me since we had tickets to NLCS Game 7 but for all Cardinals fans, especially losing to the Cubs. Hopefully, next year the Cards will go further in the playoffs.
That’s all for now! This will probably be my last blog post for 2015 unless something exciting happens that I just have to post about. So I wish all my loyal readers a happy, healthy prosperous 2015 and may the Cardinals win their 12th World Series next year!
Diane
