Should the cardinals retire the following players numbers?

[JessePopHaines16]

Jim Bottomley
Frankie Frisch
Chick Hafey
Jesse Haines
Joe Medwick
Johnny Mize
Billy Southworth
Pepper Martin
Willie McGee

Most of these players went into the hall of fame with the cardinals as their primary team and the 2 that are not in the hall pepper martin and willie mcgee with the cardinals but yet they had great careers with the cardinals so should they retire all their numbers or at least honor them in some sort of way?

[deadball-era-rules]

Well, I think if it was my job to pick who's in and who's out, I would look at it this way: You want this to be a great honor, so you can't retire every fan favorite or else the award is diminished (And you start running out of one-digit jersey numbers). I would say that Medwick, Frisch and Martin should definitely be retired. I'm on the border line with Bottomley, he's a maybe for me. Haines was a Cardinal mainstay for a really long time, but I don't know if his 210 wins get him on the list either. While everybody loves Willie, realistically he had that great showing in the World Series as well as a bunch of funny quotes, but other than being colorful and slightly better than mediocre, there's no way he gets retired. Johnny Mize wasn't even with the Cardinals for half of his career, so he's out for sure. Southworth and Hafey don't make it in my book either. Retired numbers should go to guys who were truly the greats of their time, spent nearly a whole career with the team and acted as the team leader all the way through. That's how I see it anyway. I would like to post a counter question if anyone's interested as well (although you still should post on the original question, I don't want to steal Haines' thunder because this is a great topic)- Is there anyone retired that you think shouldn't be? I say Mr. sutter personally. I don't hold relivers in high esteem to begin with. Sure, he had a bunch of saves and got that last strikeout in the 1982 series, but come on, does he really go up there with Stan the Man and Gibby?

[JessePopHaines16]

Sutter was only on the cardinals for like 4 seasons and he went into the hall of fame as a cub so he doesnt deserve to be on the cardinals wall if you ask me.

[ghostofelvis]

i thought bruce sutter's number is retired since he wore the same as jack robinson's #42...?

[JessePopHaines16]

well they could take sutter's name off the wall and still have the #42 to represent jackie robinson.

[ghostofelvis]

definitely not willie mcgee...!!!

[ghostofelvis]

albert's #5 will be some day...!!!

[JessePopHaines16]

well if you havent noticed nobody has worn #51 since mcgee was there so maybe they are thinking about doing something with it but if they are going to retire mcgee's # then they have to do everybody else on that list or at least most of them.

[JessePopHaines16]

i just think that the cardinals hold to many standards to honor one of their greats.

[ghostofelvis]

well if you havent noticed nobody has worn #51 since mcgee was there so maybe they are thinking about doing something with it but if they are going to retire mcgee's # then they have to do everybody else on that list or at least most of them.

i agree with that pop's on the last part of your statement...

something must be up...!

[ghostofelvis]

[StanTheMan]

None of them.

[JessePopHaines16]

None of them.

How come stan?

[deadball-era-rules]

Oh, I almost forgot about Boyer. Why the heck is his number retired? A .287 average with 282 HR, pretty middle of the road if you ask me. I'm not old enough to have seen him play, so if someone can tell me why he deserves to have his number retired, I'd like to hear it. If Boyer get in, why not Medwick at least? What a crime!

[JessePopHaines16]

I dont know but i am just wondering why most cardinal fans have such a huge problem with jesse haines. Whenever you bring him up some cardinal fans snap on you and say that he is the most undeserving cardinal ever and he never did anything wrong. 18 years with the cardinals which is 2nd only to Musial 210 wins which is 2nd to Gibson and he was quite possibly the nicest guy and the best team player willing to sacrifice his own playing time so young and more deserving players get it. So my question is what is the big problem with Haines?

[deadball-era-rules]

I love Haines. I have no problem with him at all. He's just one of those borderline candidates for getting his number retired in my eyes. However, if guys like McGee Boyer and are even getting considered as possible nominees for number retirement, Haines should get his number on that wall far ahead of them, no doubt about it. Haines is definitely a sadly overlooked hero among Cardinal players in my opinion.

[JessePopHaines16]

well they should at least out a plaque or a statue of Haines in front of Busch Stadium. Most of those statues dont even belong in front of the stadium if you ask me.

[hubkittel]

None of them.

That's pretty much where I'm at on this. Although in the past I have supported the movement to retire Willie's number, I know that it'll never happen and probably shouldn't happen. I think the Cards have retired all the numbers that they're going to and the only other numbers that get retired will be modern players who make the Hall of Fame. That's a reasonable policy.

One thing that bothers me is seeing some mediocre franchise (in any sport) with 20 retired numbers-half of whom you can't place and the other half a collection of mediocres-all in the name of creating some kind of "history" for themselves. I have no problem with the Cards limiting the number of retired numbers and making it one of the great honors a player can achieve.

The next number the Cards will retire will most likely be "5".

[hubkittel]

So my question is what is the big problem with Haines?

I've never heard anyone express any problem with Haines. If anything most Cards fans, sadly, have no idea who he is. There may be a problem in the sense that there is some question as to whether or not he belongs in the Hall of Fame but not with Haines himself or the nature of his career.

[JessePopHaines16]

That's pretty much where I'm at on this. Although in the past I have supported the movement to retire Willie's number, I know that it'll never happen and probably shouldn't happen. I think the Cards have retired all the numbers that they're going to and the only other numbers that get retired will be modern players who make the Hall of Fame. That's a reasonable policy.

One thing that bothers me is seeing some mediocre franchise (in any sport) with 20 retired numbers-half of whom you can't place and the other half a collection of mediocres-all in the name of creating some kind of "history" for themselves. I have no problem with the Cards limiting the number of retired numbers and making it one of the great honors a player can achieve.

The next number the Cards will retire will most likely be "5".

well it doesn't have to be retired numbers or even statues i would really like the cardinals do away with both the statues and the retired numbers and just put plaques up of all the players who went into the hall of fame as the Cardinals as their primary team.

[StanTheMan]

How come stan?

To me... you have three levels of honor in the organization.

#1 is a Retired Number... it does not get any higher than that. To say that no other player will ever wear that number is a VERY powerful thing.

#2 is a Statue at the park. Not as big as my namesake, but the smaller ones outside the park. Still a huge honor, but not quite a retired number.

#3 The club does NOT reissue the number for quite some time. I think it would be a nice honor for McGee to NOT reissue his number until at least his death. A nice gesture indeed. The club has not reissued McGwire's number either, but that is for a different reason alltogether imo.

#4 A larg brick outside the stadium (surrounded by fan's bricks - which I have one of) comemmorating your special play or event/game in Cards history.

The amount of numbers retired right now is perfect imo. Boyer was retired not long after his death, which was due to Cancer iirc. He was also a manager of the Cards, right? His numbers are nowhere near those of the other retiree's but due to the circumstances surrounding his untimely death, I can't deny him his due.

The retired numbers are for the very, very best of the ELITE of the ELITE. To retire too many cheapens the importance, imo.

If all the Cards executives in the past felt that Haines, Medwick, Martin, et al did not warrant a retired number, who am I to say they were wrong, and retiring a number posthumously, especially 60 years on, is not what the honor is all about imo. Retiring Medwick right now basically says all the folks who ran the Cards for all those years were wrong.... but were they?

McGee simply was not good enough. Are there any other examples of a team retiring a number of a player of McGee's stature? I can't think of any.

[deadball-era-rules]

I like the statues outside the stadium, especially the George Sisler one. He's a guy who doesn't get his due.


One thing that bothers me is seeing some mediocre franchise (in any sport) with 20 retired numbers-half of whom you can't place and the other half a collection of mediocres-all in the name of creating some kind of "history" for themselves. I have no problem with the Cards limiting the number of retired numbers and making it one of the great honors a player can achieve.


I agree whole-heartedly. I've been to several Royals games and I can't even tell you who half of their retired players are. Seriously, when Dan Quisenberry gets his number retired by a team, that is one embarassingly lame class to be in.

[hubkittel]

I think the Cards do an outstanding job of honoring their history and while we can nitpick a retired number here or a statue there, there are very few sports teams that do a better job with this kind of thing than the Cards. The little statue thing outside the stadium is a bit out of control, in my humble opinion.

The statue thing in general is out of control in all of sports and I'm pretty sure we started the whole thing with the Musial's statue (which obviously I have no problems with-God forbid and strike me with lightning if I did). When the Rams put up those statues of Warner and Faulk, I just had to laugh. I'm okay with Jordan's statue in Chicago (although they seriously should have waited until he retired-for good-before putting it up) and I'm good with the Gretzky statue in Edmonton but I can't really think of anybody else in the world of sports in the last forty years who deserves a statue outside a stadium or arena. Musial, Jordan, and Gretzky-that's it. All other statues should be torn down.

[STLCards2]

Johnny Mize was the elite of the elite. Mize can make a case as one of the top 5 1st basemen in the history of baseball. His first 6 years with the Cardinals are very similar to Alberts' in terms of OPS. Mize was a better player that Brock and Boyer.

Frisch and Medwick bot hhave claims as top 100 all-time players. Both guys also deserve their names (numners) retired.

These guys were not left out because they were though of as not worthy, but because we have short-term memories, and lack of hisorical perspective. I wouldn't be at all suprised if there are people in the organization who wouldn't know the difference between Frankie Frisch and Frankie Avalon. This is why our horrible fielding, low OB%, HOF leftfielder has his number retired whil Mize doesn't.

[STLCards2]

I agree whole-heartedly. I've been to several Royals games and I can't even tell you who half of their retired players are. Seriously, when Dan Quisenberry gets his number retired by a team, that is one embarassingly lame class to be in.

During the same time-period, Quiz pitched the exact same amount of innings, and had a lower ERA than Sutter, playing in the much more offensively minded AL. If Quiz is out, we had better take Sutter down too.

[deadball-era-rules]

If you look about ten posts earlier, I had already said that I didn't hink Sutter worthy, so I suppose we're in agreement! At least with the Cardinals Sutter is the worst of the reitred number, with the Royals, Sutter would have been at the top of the class. They have Frank White retired as well- but not Bo Jackson... That's KC for ya.

[STLCards2]

If you look about ten posts earlier, I had already said that I didn't hink Sutter worthy, so I suppose we're in agreement! At least with the Cardinals Sutter is the worst of the reitred number, with the Royals, Sutter would have been at the top of the class. They have Frank White retired as well- but not Bo Jackson... That's KC for ya.

One thing going for White over Jackson (niether are jersey-retired level), is that while White played for the Royals for 16+ seasons, Jackson was only there 5 seasons, and only cracked 500 AB's one measly time (barely too). It would be like the Cardinals retiring Pete Alexander or Orlando Cepeda.

[hubkittel]

I'm not sure I get the whole anti-KC thing. Frank White was an outstanding player as was Quis. I see nothing wrong with KC honoring the great team they had from the mid 70's to the mid 80's-Brett, McRae, White, Amos Otis, Willie Wilson, etc. That team won their division seven times (when there was only two divisions per league), the pennant twice, and one world series. It would be a shame if KC didn't honor those players.

[JessePopHaines16]

The only number that is worth retiring for the Royals is George Brett in my opinion and why all of a sudden are we talking about the Royals anyways?

[hubkittel]

The only number that is worth retiring for the Royals is George Brett in my opinion and why all of a sudden are we talking about the Royals anyways?

Some of us watched those great Royal teams and actually liked them (regardless of what happened in '85). We felt the need to come to the defense of Quis and Frank White.