Who Is The Best Cardinal To Never Have Played A Game For Them

For  each of the 11 World Series titles that the St. Louis Cardinals won, for the 32 times that they have been in the playoffs, there is a front office guy who put that team together or a manager who guided them.

The title that person has his name affixed to may have been manager, general manager, club president, or president of baseball operations, but the goal, since 1882, has been to win.

The newly minted POBO, Chaim Bloom, is reaching into the past franchise success of minor league revamping and  trades in an attempt to rebuild the Cardinals for another era of excellence.

Whether or not the future epilogue Mr. Bloom writes will match the prologue written by his predecessors is something Cardinal Nation can only hope for.

In the meantime, we can take a look back at the masterminds of yesteryear and see if we can decipher which guy is the best of the best non-players in club history.

Branch Rickey played for the St. Louis Browns and New York Highlanders at catcher, leftfield, firstbase with a 98 OPS+ in four seasons.

Branch Rickey managed the Cardinals from 1919 through 1925. He served as GM, club president, business manager and part owner from 1917 through 1942. (There seems to be a brief interruption in 1918-1919 that I can’t get to the bottom of.)

During his time in charge, the Cardinals made six World Series appearances, winning four of them. His 1942 World Series winners lay claim to the most regular-season wins in team history, 106, in a 156-game season.

Rickey began the first minor league system in baseball in 1919. His and Cardinal owner Sam Breadon’s unique investment in a minor league system paid dividends in the form of Dizzy Dean, Paul Dean, Pepper Martin, Joe Medwick, Marty Marion, Stan Musial and Enos Slaughter.

He fashioned the Cardinals as the first NL team to experiment with uniform numbers, on their sleeve, for the 1923 season. The numbers were gone in 1924, then came back permanently in 1932.

Perhaps the most notable move Rickey made as an employee -owner of the Cardinals was the creation of the now iconic two birds on a bat logo in 1922.

Whitey Herzog was the Cardinal General Manager from1980 to1982 and manager from 1980 to

1990. 
      

The White Rat played nine seasons as an outfielder and first baseman with a .97 OPS+

In his GM role, Herzog signed Darrell Porter, pinch-hitter extraordinaire Steve Braun,

traded for Joaquin Andujar, Rollie Fingers, Willie McGee, Lonnie Smith, Ozzie Smith, and Bruce Sutter.

His player development team drafted Vince Coleman, Danny Cox, Rob Dibble, Terry Pendleton and Todd Worrell.

As a manager, he took that talent and turned around a dead franchise.

In 1980, the Cardinals were 74-88. Then, during the strike-shortened 1981 season, St. Louis had the best overall record in the NL East. However, they came in second place twice in the split-season format by a game and a half in the first season and a half game in the second season to Philadelphia and Montreal, respectively.

It was 1982, Mr. Herzog’s last as General Manager, that St. Louis won the World Series, besting Milwaukee with the help of many players aforementioned.

He stepped down from the GM role at the end of the 1982 season, remaining as the Cardinal manager through the first 80 games of 1990, when he decided to resign. Along the way, St. Louis went back to the World Series in 1985 and 1987. Herzog checks in with the third-most wins as a Cardinal manager with 822.

Walt Jocketty is a member of the Cardinals Hall of Fame.

Walt Jocketty served as Cardinal General Manager from 1994 to 2007. During his time, the Cardinals went from a moribund team to one that was the envy of baseball.

Jocketty had a knack for bringing in a player mid-season, like Big Mac, thus exposing them to Cardinal Nation, then swooping in to sign the player as he fell in love with Cardinal baseball. Larry Walker is another who comes to mind.

In addition to Walker and McGuire, he brought Will Clark to the Cardinals for a fantastic 51 games in 2000 that pushed St. Louis to the NLCS against the New York Mets, of which the Mets eventually won.

Other key moves include signing Chris Carpenter (on the advice of Mike Matheny), trading for Jim Edmonds, Scott Rolen, Adam Wainwright and drafting Albert Pujols.

Under Jocketty’s stewardship, the Cardinals won seven National League Central Division Championships, two National League Series Championships and the incomparable 2006 World Series.

His impact was felt beyond his tenure. Jocketty hired Hall of Fame manager Tony La Russa, who managed four more seasons after Jocketty was let go.

When Jocketty was hired from the Colorado Rockies, John Mozeliak, who also had a great run as the Cardinals’ GM - President of Baseball Operations, followed him to The Lou. Mo took over for Mr. Jocketty in 2007 and guided the ship for 18 years.

Tony La Russa. Simply the best. Here he is shown holding the 2011 World Series trophy.

Speaking of Tony LaRussa, he managed the Cardinals from 1996 through 2011. Collecting 1,408 wins against 1,182 losses for a .544 winning percentage. He sits atop the leader board for most wins as a Cards manager.

La Russa’s teams were known for “playing a hard nine,” he would say. They took that hard nine style of play to the post-season nine times, seven NLCS, three World Series, two World Series wins.

Jeff Lunow worked for St. Louis from 2003 through the end of 2011. He moved the Cardinals to an analytic approach that was emulated by other teams.

Wikipedia cites Mr. Luhnow’s drafts from 2005 to 2007 as producing  “24 future major leaguers, the most of any team during that period.” In that group were Allen Craig, Jon Jay, and Lance Lynn. All were key players in the Cardinals' nearly impossible late-season run to a World Series title in 2011.

John Mozeliak came to the Cards in 1995 from Colorado, less than a year after the Cardinals snatched Jocketty away from the Rockies. Mozeliak's first job with the Cards was as an assistant in the scouting department.

John Mozeliak was the 2011 MLB.com Executive of the Year.

Mozeliak continued Jocketty's run of success as the Cardinals GM and POBO.

St. Louis made 10 playoff appearances over its 18 seasons, twice got to the World Series, winning one and experiencing only two losing seasons.

During his tenure, the Cardinals had a franchise record five consecutive playoff appearances from 2011 through 2015.

Significant players during Mozeliak’s tenure include trades for David Freese and Matt Holliday. He signed Lance Berkman, Carlos Beltran, and Jhonny Peralta.

Two mid-season trades Mozeliak made that catapulted the Cardinals to the aforementioned 2011 World Series win netted Octavio Dotel, Rafael Furcal, Edwin Jackson and Marc Rzepczynski.

Two other Mozeliak trades of note were for Nolan Arenado and Paul Goldschmidt. Mozeliak was also at the helm when St. Louis drafted 2013 NCLS MVP Michael Wacha and Matt Carpenter.

I have to go with Branch Rickey as head and shoulders above the rest. The tie-breaker is the two birds on a bat logo. The Cardinal uniform is considered one of the best in American sports. Ensuring that they look good even in those rare seasons that they don’t win a lot. 😉

Charles I. Guarria is an author, reporter and host based in the state of Florida, USA, covering any topic, anywhere in the world. His career began in 2009. Mr. Guarria is a three-time winner of Emerald Group Publishing’s Highly Commended Award and host of The Opinion Guy Fun Friendly Informative. He is available for hire to write, research, or beta-read.

Thanks to readers who pointed out the oversight of George Kissell.

I realized after publishing that Dave Duncan deserves some ink. I believe he should be the first coach inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

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Photo Credit: alsorenson.com, Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, MLB, SABR,

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