It’s the last off-day before the All-Star break, and the Cardinals are set for a 3-game series at Wrigley.
We start by talking about how we can still enjoy the season even if the team remains less than competitive. From there, we move on to talk about Cardinals All-Star Alex Reyes. Despite the honor, the saves and the low ERA, we both see warning signs and think “selling high” might be the (unlikely) right thing to do.
From there, we focus on the Cubs. A coin flip determines sides for a debate over “who sucks more,” the Cardinals or the Cubs? And for our box score of yore, we look at a very unusual Cardinals/Cubs game at Wrigley from 1930.
Ben Humphrey recommends the episode of the Starkville podcast with Andrew Miller, focused on “the sticky stuff.” (Starkville is available via a subscription to The Athletic.)
Ben Godar also recommends a podcast: Crushed, from Joan Niesen. It’s a highly-bingeable 7-episode series looking back at The Steroid era. Even for those of us who lived through it, Crushed provides rich context and deeper insights into everything from the Andro in Big Mac’s locker to the infamous testimony before Congress. Niesen is a St. Louis native for whom the ‘98 HR chase was a formative moment, so there’s lots of great content for Cardinals fans in the series.
Episode 12: The Cardinals might suck, but the Cubs suck more