Recently, I looked at St. Louis Cardinals spring training wins, losses and rankings in comparison to the regular season. I thought I might take a similar view, but this time though the lens of team batting average and ERA.

In the data below, I only have the Cardinals’ spring rankings in the last four years. Their regular season record in batting is quite amazing. In the last decade, the Cardinals have always been in the top half of the league in batting average, though their spring training hitting was not good in 2006 or 2007.

I also listed the top individual hitter each spring and regular season. We are again reminded of Albert Pujols’ greatness. Who remembered that among all the problems that Khalil Greene batted .408 with David Freese right behind at .386 last spring? Me either.

Having a .400 hitter or two each spring is par for the course, but it helps by having Pujols around.

St. Louis Cardinals spring training and regular season results, hitters, 2000-2009

For the pitchers, I looked at starters. They have done well compared to their peers the last four springs. Three times in the last decade, Dave Duncan’s charges finished the regular season with a team ERA over 4.50 and each time, the staff finished in the second division in the measurement.

Individually, despite having led the Cardinals in regular season ERA four times, Chris Carpenter was the spring pacesetter just twice and only once did his numbers really stand out, back in 2006.

St. Louis Cardinals spring training and regular season results, pitchers, 2000-2009

Note the decade averages of spring batting average and ERA are not significantly better than their regular season decade mark. Very close, indeed.

Bottom line, I am not sure there are any takeaways from this, which is really the point. It is dangerous, perhaps downright foolish, to try to read much of anything from spring training stats.

Other spring training-related articles you may have missed:
“St. Louis Cardinals spring training radio and television schedules”
“Cardinals spring training rosters and numerology”
“Cardinals spring training ticket prices this decade”
“Cardinals spring training demographics”

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I will be the first to admit that spring games don’t mean anything… Or do they?

Certainly, the St. Louis Cardinals don’t get the in-season pleasure of meeting the Florida Marlins and New York Mets almost half the time as they do in Florida this March. Yet, as the old line goes, “Winning becomes a habit.”

Last spring’s 19-12 record by the Cardinals was third-best in the then-16 team Grapefruit League, with only the Yankees and Braves having put together a better mark, and it was second-best in the mythical spring National League Central Division behind Milwaukee.

Only twice in Tony La Russa’s 14-year tenure did his Cardinals club not post a winning spring record, in 2003 and 1998. Not coincidentally perhaps, St. Louis missed the playoffs both years.  Only in three years was the Cardinals’ spring record not among the top two in the NL Central.

In the small consolation department, even when the Cardinals had a below-.500 spring record, there were still either two or three NL Central clubs that fared even worse. Note the two sub-.500 springs of 14 (in bold) and three sub-.500 regular seasons of 14 did not occur in the same years.

As another firm reminder not to read too much into this, the Cardinals’ best spring under Tony was their .656 (21-11) showing in 1997. That club went on to miss the playoffs in the regular season and in fact, posted La Russa’s worst single-season mark as Cardinals manager at .451 (73-89).

In the aggregate, La Russa’s Cardinals have been 20 points better in the spring than in the regular season, .564 to .544.

St. Louis Cardinals spring training and regular season results, 1996-2009

Other spring training-related articles you may have missed:

“St. Louis Cardinals spring training radio and television schedules” (XM schedules being added)

“Cardinals spring training rosters and numerology”

“Cardinals spring training ticket prices this decade”

“Cardinals spring training demographics”

Follow me on Twitter.