Can we at least take the ship to YELLOW alert?

Granted, the Cardinals record of 14-16 in the month of September is cause
for concern.You don’t want your team to be “limping” into the playoffs.
On the one hand, four of the last five World Series winners have had
winning records from September 1 to the last game of the regular season
(the one exception being the Cardinals in 2006)

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On the other hand, a sub-500 last month of the season does not automatically translate into getting swept in the first round of the playoffs. Among the teams that were swept in the Division Series since 2004, only two of them had .500 winning percentages or below from September 1 to the end of the regular season.

Two other notable examples are Angels in 2004 and the Phillies in 2007. Both of those teams had to make mad runs just to overtake the teams in first place going into September and get into postseason.

A few trends in the last month plus are cause for concern. Ryan Franklin has struggled since the day before Labor Day with an ERA over 7 in that span. Albert Pujols hit his 47th and final home run on September 9, with only 11 RBI’s since then. He is batting .323 since September 11, so those hits have to become homers and RBI’s sooner or later. If Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright were struggling going into the playoffs, I’d be really worried. Carpenter is 3-1 with a 2.41 ERA in September and October while Wainwright is 3-1 with a 3.38 ERA.

With all that in mind, the Dodgers are probably the most ideal opponent, having lost five in a row after the magic number for clinching the NL West was reduced to one. The Phillies have closer issues. The Rockies are the hottest team among the four NL playoff teams. That could translate to opening the NLCS in St. Louis, if the Cardinals can beat the Dodgers. On the American League, the Detroit Tigers are considered the least threatening of all of the last nine teams still standing, but that was case for the Cardinals in 2006.