Hello, and welcome to my new feature here at STL Sports Central: Breakfast with Bernie, which I’ll write early in the morning on most weekdays. I’ll serve up observations, opinions, notes, facts, stats, praise, cheap shots, randomness, and some weirdness as I have my first cuppa or two of the day. We’ll (mostly) go “Buffet” style to give you a chance to graze before I write a different column I’ll post later in the day. On most days, I’ll lead off with a Cards recap. There will be plenty of baseball information served here.
Your St. Louis Cardinals had no problem cranking up the competitive engine after Monday’s off day in New York.
The fellers returned to work Tuesday at Citi Field and won by a touchdown, slapping the Mets around for a 7-0 victory. The visitors had a lot of fun while metaphorically striking a match to the Mets’ $357 million payroll.
In the 40-man team payroll listings at Spotrac, the Mets are outspending the Cardinals by $248 million in 2026.
The cheeky Redbirds (36-28) lengthened their winning streak to five games and remain roosted at No. 6 among the 30 MLB teams with a sturdy .562 winning percentage.
The Mets? Well. For their $248 spending million advantage over the rebuilding team from the humble Midwest, the extremely expensive and largely disinterested Mets rank 24th on the circuit with a .439 winning percentage.
These days the Cardinals are flying first in the National League wild-card competition and have an eight-game lead over the Mets.
In case you’re wondering …
Based on payroll the Mets’ average cost per win this season is $12.31 million. The economy priced Cardinals have invested $3 million per victory.
Earlier this season Mets reliever Luke Weaver offered an interesting characterization of this gilded team's misery, saying it was the result of a "pressurized failure mindset.”
What?
Translation: we suck.
Five reasons why the Cardinals went into Queens and won the series opener by seven runs …
1. Dustin May, slinging. The comeback continued, with the big red right-hander shutting the Mets down and out for six innings. He conceded four hits and a walk and struck out six. May’s 69 game score was his highest in a start this season. (The average game score for starters is 50.) After getting punched out in his first two assignments as a Cardinal, May has a 2.89 ERA and 2.86 FIP in his last 11 starts, with an average game score of 57.
Since April 10, here are the top five fielding independent ERAs among National League starters:
– Jacob Misiorowski, 1.55
– Cristopher Sanchez, 2.02
– Paul Skenes, 2.23
– Chris Sale, 2.27
– Dustin May, 2.86
It was great to see May get some run support. I wish the deep thinkers among us would at least try to understand the correlation between a pitcher’s run support and his individual won-lost record – as well as his team’s record when he starts. Memo: May ranks 49th among NL starters in run support this season. In May’s 13 starts the Cardinals have scored two or fewer runs 10 times and were held to three runs another time. Yeah, but the Cards’ 6-7 record in May’s starts is his fault. Sure whatever ya say, Homer Simpson.
2. Alec Burleson was a big hit. That’s because he’s a helluva hitter. Tuesday he punctured the Mets with two hits and three RBIs in the form of a two-run homer and RBI double. Burly continues to muscle right-handed pitching this season.
3. Nathan Church returns. And he put on a show. And the Cardinals’ new starter in center field looked damn good in his first game back from the IL. Batting 9th, Church had three hits (including a dub) after missing 15 games with a left-shoulder strain.
The highlight was Church’s marvelously entertaining defensive play to end the fifth inning and strand two Mets on base. With the Cardinals leading 4-0 – it was still a game – NY’s Marcus Semien tried his best to line a shot over Churchy’s head in deep center … uh-oh … but the rookie center fielder quickly retreated in his dogged pursuit of the bullet and chased it down.
Church ended the suspense with a stylish basket catch. Was this Citi Field or the Polo Grounds? Semien’s shot left the bat at 101 miles per hour. Statcast gave Church only a 35 percent chance to make the grab. He made the catch – which was a four-star catch according to Statcast.
4. Lefthanded-hitting heroics. Manager Oli Marmol confronted Mets starter Freddy Peralta with six left-swinging bats in his lineup Tuesday: JJ Wetherholt, Burleson, Lars Nootbaar, Church, Nolan Gorman and Jimmy Crooks. The Cards won this one with a flurry of left jabs, left hooks, left uppercuts. Their LH bats combined for six hits, two walks, a double, a home run, and six RBIs.
“I kept attacking,” Peralta said after the game. “And they were really aggressive.”
5. Locking it down: The Cardinals had a 6-0 lead when May finished his start, so the St. Louis bullpen had the extra protection of a comfortable lead. That said, I take nothing for granted. But two of the Cards’ most maligned relievers – lefty Justin Bruihl and righty Matt Svanson – worked the final three innings and put away the Mets without drama. Twelve batters faced, one hit allowed, no walks, three strikeouts. That’s it. Bruihl worked two innings before handing off to Svanson.
Bruihl catches a lot of flack, but in his last 20 relief appearances the dude has a 2.66 ERA in 20 and ⅓ innings. Bruihl hasn’t given up a run over his last five relief gigs – and had no walks and six strikeouts in 6 and ⅔ innings.
During the Redbirds’ five-game winning streak the bullpen has a 1.42 ERA, and that includes an 0.57 ERA over the last four wins.
Since May 1, the St. Louis bullpen ranks fifth in the majors with a 2.91 ERA and has clawed for an improved 23.2% strikeout rate that ranks 13th since the end of April.
Let’s head to the buffet …
– The Edmonton Oilers are “nearing a deal” with Mike Babcock to be their next coach? What, was Iron Mike Keenan unavailable?
– The only way major college football could possibly be more corrupt is by putting FIFA in charge.
– So funny that people were actually surprised that a Lubbock, TX judge ruled in favor of Texas Tech to allow the billionaire-funded football program to bring back the team’s Gamblin’ Man quarterback.
– I hope the Gamblin’ Man quarterback was at least smart enough to put down five dimes on the virtual certainty of Judge Hee Haw giving the Gamblin’ Man and Texas Tech an injunction that will let him play college football in 2026. Every time the kid throws an interception this season, he’ll be accused of game fixing. And just imagine what sore-loser, borderline insane gamblers will think of doing if they invest heavily on Texas Tech but lose because of three interceptions lobbed by Gamblin’ Man. What a nice system they got there in college football.
– The Boston Red Sox are 27-38 (.415) and languishing in the AL East standings, and the notoriously meddling and impulsive team owner John Henry is said to be considering another front-office shakeup.
– Wait, didn’t Henry cure the Red Sox by firing the evil Chaim Bloom after the 2023 season? Didn’t Henry and his toadies and the conniving manager at the time (Alex Cora) convince themselves and each other that Bloom was the big problem? What a joke, and I hope Bloom is laughing.
– Meanwhile, the national baseball media have no idea what to do with the Cardinals. The Athletic doesn’t cover them – and yet has beatwriters assigned to lesser teams with much smaller fan support. In the latest “power rankings” at The Athletic, the voting panel has the Cardinals ranked 13th behind several teams that trail them in the overall standings. The Cardinals have the sixth-best record overall and fourth-best in the NL.
– What’s the objective here, Athletic? Shouldn’t the power rankings reflect success on the field? Or are the power rankings there to deny credit to teams like the Cardinals for exceeding expectations? Just because The Athletic writers were convinced the rebuilding Cardinals would stink and be a complete non-factor in 2026, so to me these power rankings reflect the feelings of a bunch of people who stubbornly believe the Cardinals are a fluke that will eventually fail. And maybe the Cardinals will fail. But I repeat: if you’re going to do weekly power rankings, shouldn’t those rankings be reasonably in line with the MLB standings? Or is this all about writers’ egos?
-- Something like this: We neglect the Cardinals in our coverage and refuse to accept that they matter, or have the sixth-best record in the majors -- no way! -- so how could they possibly be ranked in Our Top 10?
– If the Knickerbockers want to beat the Spurs in Game 4 and take a 3-1 lead in the NBA Finals, maybe that process starts by remembering that big man Karl-Anthony Towns was the No. 1 reason for New York’s two wins at San Antonio? Towns excelled at both ends of the floor. But in Game 3 the Knicks coaching staff made him disappear.
– Nolan Gorman batted 8th in Marmol’s lineup Tuesday. Is that OK? My gosh the way some of the BFIB carry on and on and on about Gorman, risking coronary episodes with each at-bat, you’d think this situation rises to the level of the famous Cuban Missile Crisis.
Thanks for reading …
–Bernie
Bernie was inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2023. During a St. Louis sports-media career that goes back to 1985, he’s won multiple national awards for column writing and sports-talk hosting – and was the lead sports columnist at the Post-Dispatch from 1989 through 2015. Before that Bernie spent a year at the Dallas Morning News, covering the Dallas Cowboys during Tom Landry’s final season (1988) plus the sale of the team to Jerry Jones and the hiring of Jimmy Johnson as coach. Bernie has covered several Baseball Hall of Fame managers during his media career including Tony La Russa, Whitey Herzog, Earl Weaver, Joe Torre and (as an interim) Red Schoendienst. In his career as a beatwriter and columnist, Bernie covered Pro Football Hall of Fame coaches Joe Gibbs, Tom Landry, Jimmy Johnson and Dick Vermeil on a daily basis.
Bernie has covered and written about many great St. Louis sports team athletes including Albert Pujols, Kurt Warner, Brett Hull, Yadier Molina, Adam Wainwright, Jim Edmonds, Marshall Faulk, Scott Rolen, Mark McGwire, Orlando Pace, Isaac Bruce, Torry Holt, Adam Wainwright, Chris Carpenter, Al MacInnis, Brian Sutter, Bernie Federko, Chris Pronger, Dan Dierdorf, Jackie Smith and Aeneas Williams. Bernie covered every baseball Cardinals’ postseason game from 1996 through 2014 and was there to chronicle teams that won four NL pennants and two World Series. He provided extensive coverage on the “Greatest Show” St. Louis Rams and has written extensively on the St. Louis Blues, Saint Louis U, and Mizzou football and basketball. Bernie was/is a longtime voter for the Baseball Hall of Fame, Pro Football Hall of Fame, Heisman Trophy and the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame.
You can access his columns, videos and the podcast version of the videos here on STL Sports Central, catch him regularly on KMOX (AM or FM) as part of the Gashouse Gang, Sports Rush Hour, Sports Open Line or Sports On a Sunday Morning shows. And you can catch weekly “reunion” segments here at STL Sports Central featuring Bernie and his longtime friend Randy Karraker.