When the Cardinals closed out 2009 with 91 wins (both actual and Pythagorean), they wrapped up the 27th-best 10-year period in their history by Pythagorean Win % (of 119 10-year periods, starting with the 1882 season). Within that, they featured the 14th-best five-year run (.586). How’d they do it? With some stellar players. So without further ado, we present our Cardinals all-decade team from 2000-2009, as part of the United Cardinal Bloggers‘ January project.

Catcher

Player	RC	RC/G
Molina	248	3.8
Matheny	198	3.4

The Cardinals had two of the best defensive catchers in baseball during the 2000s in Mike Matheny and Yadier Molina. Molina gets the nod for being a notch better with the leather and the lumber.

First Base

Player	RC	RC/G
Pujols	1364	9.9
Martinez	147	5.1

One of the team’s best players of any century, Albert Pujols also led the team in games in the 2000s with 1399 (Jim Edmonds was a distant second with 1105). We included Tino Martinez as runner-up, but there really is no runner-up here.

Second Base

Player	RC	RC/G
Vina	276	4.9
Miles	145	4.2

Fernando Vina played a PED-aided superior second base and hit more effectively than Aaron Miles. If only Skip Schumaker had broken in at second base…

Third Base

Player	RC	RC/G
Rolen	455	6.8
Polanco	154	4.4

Scott Rolen was the team’s best third baseman since Ken Boyer, and probably its best-fielding third-sacker in its history. He easily beats out the man whom the Cardinals traded for him, Placido Polanco.

Shortstop

Player	RC	RC/G
Renteria	409	5.1
Eckstein	216	4.9

Observers thought that the Cardinals wouldn’t be able to replace Edgar Renteria at shortstop. The team came pretty close with Eckstein, who gave the Cardinals the best three years of his career (6.4 WAR total). It’s just that Renteria’s five in the decade were better, both in fielding and in cumulative run production.

Left Fielder

Player	RC	RC/G
Lankford	153	6.0
Duncan	189	5.7

Chris Duncan actually created the most runs of any Cardinal left fielder in the 2000s. But Ray Lankford, who played a year and a half at the beginning of the decade then returned for the 2004 season, bettered him in RC/G and fielding.

Center Fielder

Player	RC	RC/G
Edmonds	832	8.1
Ankiel	151	5.0

Perhaps the centerfielder of the decade in all of baseball (only Carlos Beltran has an argument), Jim Edmonds was second only to Pujols as contributor to the team’s success in the 2000s.

Right Fielder

Player	RC	RC/G
Drew	308	7.4
Ludwick	245	6.6

Tony La Russa might not want to admit it, but JD Drew was the team’s best right fielder of the aughts. As productively as Ryan Ludwick has played the last three seasons, Drew — led by a Pujols-like .432 wOBA in 2001 — outperformed him before leaving for greener pastures.

Starting Pitchers
Though we prefer a traditional four-man starting-pitching staff, we decided to go with a full five for this fantasy team (it’s not like it’s a real team, anyway, right?). To create a short list, let’s start with all the Cardinal pitchers with at least 50 starts in the decade:

Player	GS	IP	BF	BB	SO	ERA	ERA+	FIP
Chris Carpenter	125	859.1	3437	175	703	2.91	147	3.23
Adam Wainwright	86	644	2714	193	511	3.17	135	3.54
Matt Morris	156	1046.2	4396	267	758	3.81	111	3.81
Woody Williams	92	588.2	2463	157	412	3.53	118	3.83
Joel Pineiro	68	426.1	1772	74	226	4.14	102	4.03
Darryl Kile	82	544.1	2280	151	421	3.54	125	4.06
Kyle Lohse	55	317.2	1351	85	196	4.14	102	4.14
Braden Looper	63	447.1	1896	116	236	4.37	99	4.47
Jeff Suppan	95	572.1	2482	197	328	3.95	109	4.67
Todd Wellemeyer	64	377.2	1637	148	263	4.31	98	4.79
Mark Mulder	53	311	1369	114	166	5.04	85	5.08
Jason Marquis	97	602.2	2612	214	334	4.6	94	5.13
Garrett Stephenson	68	419.2	1810	148	248	4.63	94	5.14
Andy Benes	63	370.1	1636	180	279	5.05	87	5.60

Carpenter, Wainwright and Morris are locks. Carpenter was hands-down the team’s best pitcher of the decade, and Morris led in games started, batters faced and strikeouts, and his 3.81 FIP proves that he provided quality and not merely quantity. The fourth and fifth spots are a bit tougher to select, but it’s hard to argue against Woody Williams, whose 3.83 FIP is well ahead of the next-best in Joel Pineiro. Pineiro’s 4.03 FIP is so similar to Daryl Kile’s 4.06 that, given Kile’s clear superiority in games started, batters faced and strikeouts, Kile gets the nod.

Relief Pitcher
If you require a relief pitcher for this all-decade team and don’t want to simply use the sixth-best starter, let’s look at reliever expected wins added (WXRL), a reliable stat for relievers from Baseball Prospectus. We’ve converted these relief pitchers’ aggregate totals to a WXRL/9 to see who who was most effective and not merely most used in pressure situations (since WXRL is a counting stat):

Pitcher	WXRL	WXRL/9	WXRL/IP
Isringhausen	18.019	.398	.044
Franklin	8.101	.360	.040
Kline	8.795	.320	.036
Veres	7.799	.313	.035
Tavarez	4.015	.278	.031
Springer	2.651	.193	.021
King	2.013	.178	.020
Timlin	2.754	.152	.017
Eldred	2.790	.147	.016
Thompson	2.727	.057	.006

Franklin makes it close, but Isringhausen has him in both cumulative and rate stats.

So the team looks like this:

Yadier Molina	C
Albert Pujols	1B
Fernando Vina	2B
Scott Rolen	3B
Edgar Renteria	SS
Ray Lankford	LF
Jim Edmonds	CF
JD Drew	RF
Chris Carpenter	SP
Adam Wainwright	SP
Matt Morris	SP
Woody Williams	SP
Darryl Kile	SP
Jason Isringhausen	RP

So when did these players’ time with the club overlap?

2004 was indeed a magical year, and for good reason: 10 of the 13 players we picked for the all-decade team played together on that pennant-winning club.

This entry was posted by Pip on Friday, January 29th, 2010 at 1:00 am and is filed under analysis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.