Making his St. Louis debut in 1945, the switch-hitting second baseman played 15 seasons with the Cardinals, including in the 1946 World Series. The 10-time National League All-Star also appeared in two more Series while with Milwaukee.

Red coached in St. Louis from 1961-64 and in 1965 began a 12-year run as Cardinals manager, exceeded in duration by only Tony La Russa. His clubs won the 1967 World Series and the NL pennant the following season. Red also served as interim manager in 1980 and 1990.

He was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1989 and his uniform was retired by the Cardinals in 1996. Red remains a special assistant to the general manager. When reporting to spring training next month, I am expecting to see number 2 in uniform with fungo bat in hand or heading between fields in a golf cart.

Today, February 2, Schoendienst celebrates his 89^th birthday. In recognition of a great Cardinals hero, I am sharing a dozen photographs of Red provided by the Cardinals Media Relations department. If you are interested, join in the discussion below to help identify and date some of the photos.

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In the 2011 Baseball Hall of Fame voting announced Wednesday, former St. Louis Cardinals home run hero Mark McGwire saw his total drop under 20 percent for the first time in his five years on the Baseball Writers’ Association of America ballot.

In the 12 months since the previous vote, McGwire had been more active than in the previous four years combined. He came out of a long seclusion, admitted steroids use in his past and returned to the game as hitting coach for the Cardinals.

So much has already been written on the subject that I had not planned to add to it today. However, I read a pre-announcement piece by Derrick Goold at the Post-Dispatch today that moved me to comment.

Goold analyzed the McGwire situation, past and present, in considerable detail, but in my view, painted Big Mac’s steroids admission and reaction to it in black and white terms.

My read is that by insisting that his steroid use did not affect his results on the field, McGwire left a gray area, effectively negating his admission. The way his words were chosen was seen by some as being less than fully sincere and honest. There was also no mention of the carefully-crafted public relations campaign behind McGwire’s return.

These important aspects of the situation and their potential impact on Hall voters were not explored in Goold’s article.

The 2011 Hall of Fame results would seem to confirm that coming out – or at least the way McGwire chose to come out – was ineffective in terms of him gaining support among the ten-plus year members of the BBWAA.

Goold also discusses Houston’s Jeff Bagwell, suspected by some of steroid use, but never caught at anything. Bagwell recently felt the need to come out and deny the rumors directly, something Big Mac and Rafael Palmeiro once did as well.

The writer predicted that due to the suspicion alone, Bagwell would only “get a slim percentage of the vote” this year, his first time eligible. That did not turn out to be the case.

Bagwell received 41.7 percent support. While far short of the 75 percent needed for election, it was a solid showing. McGwire finished with 19.8 percent, a drop of almost four percent from 2010. Interestingly, former Cardinal Larry Walker debuted at 20.3 percent, just ahead of Big Mac.

Palmeiro, with Hall of Fame-caliber numbers, but also a failed drug test and a hollow denial as major black marks against him, had just 11 percent support in his first year on the ballot.

Had McGwire been a normal case, one would have expected to see his vote total rise over time, but as we know, this is not business as usual. It is a very unique situation, different from Bagwell, Palmeiro and all the others.

There is one fact that cannot be debated. McGwire’s Hall trajectory is not positive. He seems to be running out of chances to try to make it right.

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Over on the main The Cardinal Nation site on Sunday, the feature article was from friend and fellow SABR member Bill Gilbert. It handicaps the chances of the former Major League Baseball players on this year’s Baseball Hall of Fame ballot using Bill James’ Win Shares.

Four ex-St. Louis Cardinals are among the 33 names competing for votes, but Gilbert forecasts that none of the four will be elected into the Hall of Fame in 2011. Two are holdovers in Mark McGwire and Lee Smith and two are first-timers, Larry Walker (pictured upon his induction into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame) and Tino Martinez.

Let’s look at each of the four.

Mark McGwire

By all measures, McGwire would seem to have the on-field credentials for Hall election. Voters have been torn over his candidacy due to the steroids issue and that may continue indefinitely.

Big Mac’s admission last winter that he used steroids in an attempt to recover from injury during his playing days but his denial that those substances boosted his on-field performance did not help his standing with the voters. In fact, he was one of the few players on the 2010 ballot whose support dropped from year to year. McGwire garnered approximately 23.5 percent of the vote in both 2008 and 2009, but slipped to just under 22 percent approval in 2010.

With no significant new revelations about the steroids era this past year, one might look at any uptick or downturn in McGwire’s 2011 votes to be a reflection of feelings over his return to the game. He is of course heading into his second season as the Cardinals hitting coach. At the time of 2010 balloting, there was still considerable concern over the media circus that might ensue over McGwire’s baseball re-entry. That was handled without significant incident and has died down to almost nothing since.

Lee Smith

Smith was one of the dominant relievers of any era, though his then-record of 478 career saves is downgraded by some as being a by-product of the evolution to the one-inning specialist.

Until another former Cub-Cardinal, Bruce Sutter was inducted after tossing just 1,042 career innings, no pitcher with fewer than 1,700 frames had made it to Cooperstown. Smith finished with 1,289. At this point, only five in the Hall are considered to have been primarily relievers – Hoyt Wilhelm, Rollie Fingers, Dennis Eckersley, Goose Gossage and Sutter.

Smith’s voting support has slowly crept up into the upper 40 percent range, but is far away from the 75 percent needed for induction. Despite being eligible to remain on the ballot until 2017, he is going to need a much more aggressive push of support to make it.

Larry Walker

Walker is an interesting case. Gilbert’s Win Shares score places him third among first-year candidates behind Rafael Palmeiro and Jeff Bagwell and just ahead of John Olerud. Gilbert sees Walker securing more than the five percent of the vote needed to remain on the ballot, but fall short of the needed 75 percent for induction.

The former MVP (1997) has three Silver Slugger Awards, was a five-time All-Star and owns seven Gold Gloves, yet his Hall candidacy seems in a gray area.

Of the ten players listed at Baseball-Reference.com as having the closest career similarity to Walker, only four are in the Hall. They are Duke Snider, Joe DiMaggio, Johnny Mize and Chuck Klein. On the other hand, two of the top four are Walker’s former teammates, Ellis Burks and Moises Alou, players seemingly destined to land in the Hall of the Very Good, not Cooperstown. Contemporaries in the top ten include some other borderline candidates, Vladimir Guerrero, Edgar Martinez and another duo of ex-Walker teammates, Jim Edmonds and Todd Helton.

As a point of comparison, Martinez garnered 36.2 percent of the vote in 2010, his first year of eligibility.

Tino Martinez

Needless to say, Tino Martinez is a celebrated New York Yankee who found himself in St. Louis for two unhappy late-career seasons, 2002 and 2003. Having been a very good player during four World Championships with New York means Tino may pick up a handful of recognition votes, but his numbers, including 339 home runs, are not Hall-worthy. Interestingly, among those in Tino’s top ten similarity scores is another former Cardinals and Yankees first sacker, Jack Clark.

Bios of all 33 candidates can be found at the Baseball Hall of Fame website. Results of the 2011 vote taken by 10-plus year members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America will be announced on January 5 and winners will be enshrined on July 25 in Cooperstown, New York.

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The annual Baseball Hall of Fame ceremony was held on Sunday afternoon and three headliners were inducted – former Cubs and Expos outfielder Andre “The Hawk” Dawson, ex-Cardinals and Royals manager Whitey “The White Rat” Herzog and retired umpire Doug Harvey. Congratulations to them and the other new Hall members. (Link to induction speeches.)

I’ve had two Hall-related thoughts in my head about the day that I want to share here.

First, I am ashamed of Major League Baseball. I am ashamed of them for continuing to schedule a full slate of Sunday afternoon games during the Hall of Fame induction.

It wouldn’t have to be. The date is set long in advance – the last Sunday of July.

Why couldn’t and shouldn’t all MLB ballparks be dark on that one Sunday afternoon each summer? Encourage all baseball fans to take in a day of history. Move all the games to that night.

Why won’t it happen? Some owners somewhere will complain about a loss in revenue with a Sunday night gate compared to an afternoon and we all know exactly how the commissioner works.

I think it is incredibly disrespectful of the history of the game and especially a slight to the most worthy inductees each year.

Sticking with the money theme leads me to my second thought.

Sunday afternoon, my friend and Cubs Scout.com counterpart from InsideTheIvy.com Steve Holley wondered out loud why the far-below .500 Cubs were selected by ESPN to play on the Sunday night national broadcast for the third consecutive week.

It seemed clear as day… er night to me – ratings.

After all, we have the team of Herzog taking on Dawson’s club. (I also pointed out to Steve that the Expos were unavailable.)

The worldwide leader had previously lost out on their normal gig televising the induction to the in-house mouthpiece MLB Network. By picking this game, ESPN can take advantage of Hall of Fame Sunday as much as they can.

I don’t see that as a particular problem – just pointing out the possibility of something that seemed obvious to me.

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The St. Louis Cardinals have a similar problem, retired number inflation. It seems when anyone from the current generation enters Baseball’s Hall of Fame and sometimes even when they have no chance of election (Willie McGee), the retired number drums beat long and hard across Cardinal Nation.

The most recent example:

In his congratulatory post for the much-deserved selection of Whitey Herzog into the Hall on Monday, the Post-Dispatch’s influential columnist Bernie Miklasz took the lead in pushing for the St. Louis Cardinals to retire Herzog’s number 24.

In the linked post, the primary reasons offered in support of Whitey are as follows:

• “he’s officially a Hall of Famer”
• “He pulled the Cardinals out of the baseball depression of the 1970s” and “completelu (sic) revitalized the franchise”
• “put together a roster that won three NL pennants and a World Series in the ’80s”
• “did so with a unique style” that was “grand entertainment”

Let’s take them one at time with my personal commentary.

• Whitey is a Hall of Famer. That cannot be debated. Thankfully, there are substantially more Cardinals in the Hall than there are retired jerseys, however. In fact, I am not alone in believing there are other more deserving Cardinals Hall of Famers whose numbers are not retired. Examples include Jim Bottomley, Frankie Frisch and Ducky Medwick. Common thread – current Cardinals fans and writers never saw them play.
• Herzog revitalized the franchise. Very true but so have others at different times. Branch Rickey’s “number” isn’t retired, for example, and he is the greatest Cardinals executive ever, bar none. Before Rickey arrived, the Cardinals had spent two consecutive decades in the second division.
• Whitey put together the championship roster. Also valid. He should get extra points for having been the general manager. So should Rickey, who is also number six on the club’s all-time list for managerial wins.
• Herzog had unique and entertaining clubs. Agreed, but so were manager Frisch’s Gas House Gang teams of the 1930’s. I would not give extra style points consideration here.

Though I am not seeing enough uniqueness in his above arguments, Miklasz went as far as to make the assumptive statement that he is “confident that the Cardinals will get it done” for Herzog this coming season.

24’s recent history

In a possible indication of how the organization might feel about the matter, let’s consider how number 24 has been handled since Herzog’s departure.

It has been worn by at least nine Cardinals since 1992, from the famous (Don Baylor, Dmitri Young, Eric Davis and Bobby Bonilla) to the obscure (Bryan Eversgerd, Tom Urbani and Rick Croushore). Most recently, bench coach Joe Pettini and free agent outfielder Rick Ankiel sported number 24 jerseys.

Conversely, other prominent numbers, such as Mark McGwire’s 25 and McGee’s 51 (with one very brief exception) have remained out of circulation since the respective days each player retired. (For the record, I am not in favor of retiring either of these numbers. Just pointing out the differences.)

Avoiding temptation

Especially after seeing recent decisions by the franchise, I would be strongly in favor of a five- or perhaps even ten-year moratorium on retiring numbers after Hall induction. When a new Hall of Famer from the current generation is inducted, the strong temptation is to bow to sentiment and immediately retire that individual’s number. That expectation should not be created.

This would have to be a self-imposed ban, however, as ownership makes the call on what numbers to retire and when based on whatever criteria they happen to favor at that particular moment in time.

The need for greater restraint became painfully evident when the number 42 of Bruce Sutter, who spent all of four seasons with the Cardinals, was retired to celebrate his 2006 induction.

Just imagine how many retired numbers there would be if the club did that for every Hall of Famer who was a part of one World Series champion, played four years with the Cardinals or was employed by the club that length of time? Every season, the team would have players in the triple digits on the field and the entire outfield wall would be covered with “honorees”.

Old timers are old news

When 1940’s manager Billy Southworth was enshrined in Cooperstown in the summer of 2008, there was no groundswell of demand that his number be retired. There wasn’t even a ceremony at Busch Stadium to mark the occasion. For the record, Southworth enjoyed greater success at the helm of the Cardinals than Herzog (two World Championships and a .642 winning percentage vs. Whitey’s one and .530).

Any one who knows anything about Cardinals history would place the accomplishments of any of the three Hall of Famers of Bottomley, Medwick and Frisch ahead of McGee, yet it is the latter who today’s fans want recognized.

This is why I think there should be a substantial waiting period – to ensure the honorees’ feats truly stand the test of time. For this franchise more than most any other, the bar should remain extremely high.

The Cardinals aren’t being “cheap” here as they already have 12 retired “numbers”, counting Rogers Hornsby and Jack Buck. That is the second-most in Major League Baseball behind the Yankees (15 numbers for 16 individuals). The Dodgers have ten.

A potential solution

Rather than just complain about the problem, I offer a potential solution.

While the mistakes of the past cannot be corrected, I believe one solution is to establish a Cardinals Hall of Fame, Level of Excellence, Ring of Honor or choose your term. It would be a way to celebrate the top individuals in the history of the franchise without having to make irrational and convoluted number-retirement decisions.

In my humble opinion, this would have been a better way to acknowledge special non-uniform personnel like Gussie Busch and Buck. It could also offer a way to recognize favorites that just don’t measure up to Hall of Fame and/or retired number status, such as McGee. By definition, it could encompass all the Cardinals Hall of Famers, including Herzog and those former greats seemingly forgotten over time.

In the future, if it is deemed some of the Ring of Honor individuals warrant retired number status, they could always be given an upgrade.

For now, instead of bowing to inflation, why not institute a two-tiered structure that keeps the retired number honor for the very best of the best?

The others previously enshrined are Red Schoendienst (as a player), Billy Southworth, Charlie Comiskey (as an executive), Branch Rickey (executive) and Frankie Frisch (player).

The other missing name of course, is the incumbent manager, Tony La Russa, tops on the list with 1,232 franchise victories and counting.

When Joe Torre (ninth in Cardinals managerial victories) and La Russa eventually go in, and both will, nine of the top ten St. Louis managers in terms of wins will be enshrined.

Of the nine present and future Hall of Famers, only La Russa, Herzog and Southworth will have been enshrined primarily due to their results managing the Cardinals.

No matter how you count it, it is an impressive total for an impressive franchise.

Managerial record by wins and Hall of Fame status, St. Louis Cardinals, career

Two others have ties to the club including former first baseman Bill White, nominated for his term as National League president and ex-general manager Bob Howsam, who made his fame as the architect of Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine.

The other seven are also very qualified: Gene Autry, John Fetzer, Ewing Kauffman, John McHale, Marvin Miller, Gabe Paul and Jacob Ruppert. I could build a case that most all of the ten should be enshrined, but that isn’t going to happen.

The voting is a similar process as for the managers, but with fewer voters. A candidate must receive 75% approval from 12 voters (as opposed to 16) who are given up to four votes each.

While already-enshrined Branch Rickey receives proper credit for turning the Cardinals from a weak also-ran into a perennial powerhouse, as an active owner, Breadon deserves a large share of credit as well.

Self-made through ownership of automobile dealerships, Breadon purchased his initial investment in the club in 1917 and became the majority owner in 1920. In the 28-year history of the National League to-date, not only had the Cardinals never won, they had only three finishes in the first division, none as high as second place.

Breadon (shown here on the right with Dizzy Dean and Frankie Frisch left and center in spring training 1935) bankrolled Rickey’s idea to purchase minority and later majority interest in their minor league affiliates. The Cardinals were at the forefront of the movement, which gave them a huge competitive advantage for over 25 years.

By the start of World War II, the Cardinals’ empire had grown to 32 minor league clubs, of which at least 15 were 100 percent owned by the organization. Amazingly, there were 20 Class D leagues in the US in 1940 and the Cardinals had a team in every one of them.

The Cardinals used their system to not only fill their own player pipeline, but also accumulated an estimated $2 million in cash between 1922 and 1942 by selling their excess players to other organizations.

By the time a cancer-stricken Breadon sold the club in late 1947 for a then-record price of $4 million, the Cardinals had accumulated their first nine NL pennants and six World Championships.

I firmly believe Sam Breadon belongs alongside Rickey in Cooperstown.

The others are Davey Johnson, Billy Martin, Charlie Grimm, Tom Kelly, Gene Mauch, Danny Murtaugh and Steve O’Neill. This group of nominees increases to ten with the inclusion of former umpires Doug Harvey and Hank O’Day.

To get in, a candidate must receive 75% of the vote from 16 voters who are given four votes each. The winners will be announced at Baseball’s Winter Meetings on December 7 and inducted next July 25 in Cooperstown, New York.

Herzog, 78, last managed in 1990 when he resigned from the Cardinals in mid-season. Whitey has been on numerous Hall ballots before, but has always fallen short. His competition remains tough.

Career managerial stats of the eight nominated skippers sorted by win percentage with leaders in bold:

	Years	Wins	Losses	Pct	League	WS
Davey Johnson	14	1148	888	0.564	1	1
Steve O’Neill	14	1040	821	0.559	1	1
Billy Martin	16	1253	1013	0.553	2	1
Charlie Grimm	19	1287	1067	0.547	3	0
Danny Murtaugh	15	1115	960	0.540	2	2
Whitey Herzog	18	1281	1125	0.532	3	1
Gene Mauch	26	1902	2037	0.483	0	0
Tom Kelly	16	1140	1244	0.478	2	2

Herzog is sixth of eight in win percentage, with Johnson the leader. Whitey is tied with Grimm for the most pennants among the group with three. Murtaugh and Kelly each picked up the most world championships with two each. With 26 years, Mauch managed longest, collecting the most wins and losses, but none of his 26 clubs reached the post-season.

For more details on the nominees and voting, click here.

12 months ago at this time, I was in Cooperstown, New York, attending my first-ever Baseball Hall of Fame induction ceremony. That class included Goose Gossage, Dick Williams, Peter O’Malley and former Cardinals manager Billy Southworth.

It was a special time for me – a beautiful Sunday afternoon setting, just about perfect in every way, but one thing really bothered me.

I had to give up the final installment of a Cardinals-Mets series, my and the team’s last-ever game at the old Shea Stadium, to head up to Cooperstown. Why did I have to decide between the two?

This year, I had the benefit of watching Rickey Henderson’s acceptance speech on one of the press box monitors during the Cards-Phils game. But what about the 45,000 baseball fans in this park and hundreds of thousands more across America?

I do give the Phillies credit in that they announced that ticket stubs from Sunday’s game can be redeemed for a free Hall of Fame admission in the next 12 months. A nice gesture, but not enough.

Why doesn’t MLB show more respect to their greats by not holding games during the induction ceremony? Schedule all the Sunday action in the evening, for example.

Better yet, take a day off. Don’t you think Tony La Russa would like to have traveled to Henderson’s ceremony? Don’t you think most of the dignitaries still active across the game would like to be there?

Do we see the NFL having their yearly Canton, Ohio ceremony on a game Sunday? Heck, they don’t even hold it during the season.

Of course, in MLB, we are talking about a league that didn’t even think to cover their own draft live until 2007 – a league that starts their post-season games so late in the evening that the next generation of fans they should be cultivating cannot even watch.

It is about time Major League Baseball wises up and celebrates their heritage instead of relegating it to second-fiddle status. Sadly, probably the only way to get their attention is to prove to them by doing so, they will make more money.

Congratulations to new Hall of Famers Jim Rice, Henderson, the late Joe Gordon, broadcaster Tony Kubek and writer Nick Peters.

I began to read the four-page article with a healthy dose of skepticism. “So what if a stats guru had finally decided to break his silence about the steroid era? What possibly could he say that is new?” I thought to myself. By the end, James’ practical arguments had me in agreement.

Rather than recap it, lest I leave out important supporting points, I offer the link for you to read it in its entirety.

“Cooperstown and the ‘Roids” by Bill James, courtesy of ACTA Sports.