ST. LOUIS -- The first time Albert Pujols, Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright appeared together in Cardinals uniforms, it was Sept. 11, 2005, at the old Busch Stadium.

It was Wainwright's big league debut. The Cardinals were on their way to a 100-win season. Molina was nearing the end of his first full season as St. Louis' regular catcher. Pujols, already one of the game's biggest stars, was working toward his first MVP award.

Seventeen years and three weeks later, on Sunday, Oct. 2, 2022, the trio was together, still, again and for the last time in the regular season. When the game began, there they were, Wainwright on the mound, Molina squatting behind home plate and Pujols hunched over on the ready at first base.

Given the pomp and circumstance surrounding the weekend, it's not as though any of them could miss the significance of the moment. But if by some miracle they did, all they had to do was peek at the throng in the stands.

"I just think this is probably the best I've ever seen our crowd, ever, since I've been here," Wainwright said.

The playoffs lie ahead, so their collective story remains a work in progress, but as a starting group, this was it for the regular season, as Wainwright won't pitch again before the playoffs.

Although Pujols left St. Louis for a decade before returning this season, the gap between that first game together and the last reached 6,230 days Sunday, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. And in case you're wondering, it is the longest gap between the debut and finale of a baseball teammate trio in baseball history.

Three of a kind

The longest gaps between the debut and finale of a baseball teammate trio in baseball history, according to Elias:

Days	Players	Teams	Years
6,230	Yadier Molina, Albert Pujols, Adam Wainwright	St. Louis Cardinals	2005 to 2022
5,937	Dave Concepcion, Tony Perez, Pete Rose	Cincinnati Reds	1970 to 1986
5,808	Kirk Gibson, Alan Trammell, Lou Whitaker	Detroit Tigers	1979 to 1995
5,507	Derek Jeter, Andy Pettitte, Jorge Posada	New York Yankees	1995 to 2010
5,505	Walker Cooper, Murry Dickson, Stan Musial	St. Louis Cardinals	1942 to 1957

And when you looked at all the Wainwright, Molina and Pujols jerseys around the park and noticed the disparate ages of those wearing them, it was this longevity that stood out as their last regular-season weekend in St. Louis unfolded.

"For many people in St. Louis that are probably all the way up to 30 years and younger, they don't really remember baseball a whole lot without those two guys," Wainwright said a couple of days before his start, always careful to make sure the focus stayed on Molina and Pujols.

The ballyhooed hardball fans of St. Louis crowded the downtown streets all weekend and jammed into sold-out Busch Stadium. But the three-day celebration of the Cardinals' last homestand of the season reached an emotional crescendo Sunday, when Pujols and Molina were to be honored during a pregame ceremony.

The buzz was palpable. Hall of Fame St. Louis sportswriter Rick Hummel declared before the game that he had never seen pregame lines outside like the ones outside the ballpark Sunday -- not for a World Series, not for anything. And he would know: Hummel is so immersed in Cardinals history the press box is named after him.

What, exactly, was it the fans wanted so badly to see and feel? Well, history. And no one does baseball history like St. Louis.

FOR ALL THE talk of baseball's ongoing relevance in the evolving intersection of sports, entertainment and culture, the historical ties that trace back through generations remain a key aspect of what sets the sport apart.

Here's one way it works: Player X pitched to Player Y who faced Player Z, and so on, taking these pitcher-batter matchups back as far in time as you can go.

One of the most amazing chains of this sort you can find got some small attention earlier this summer when pitcher Jim Kaat was inducted into the Hall of Fame. Kaat, who pitched in the majors from 1959 to 1983, was asked during a pre-ceremony Zoom call if he was aware that he was the only player who can say he pitched to both Ted Williams, who debuted in 1939, and Julio Franco, who retired in 2007. Turned out, he knew all about it.

Years after Kaat, Adam Wainwright also pitched to Franco, bringing that chain up to the current day. Here's the whole thing: Wainwright faced Franco, who faced Kaat, who faced Williams, who faced Ted Lyons, who faced Ty Cobb, who faced Cy Young, who faced Cap Anson, who dates to the inception of major league baseball.

That's eight players taking us from right here and now all the way back to the days of horse and buggy, when the Mississippi River washed past St. Louis thick with steamboats. That's history no other sport in America can touch.

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St. Louis fans seem keenly aware of such historical connections, as first baseman Paul Goldschmidt has learned during his four years with the Cardinals. Even as he emerged as a front-runner for NL MVP consideration this season, Goldschmidt has borne witness to what baseball tradition means in St. Louis.

"I don't know if there is anything like it in sports, or in any sport," Goldschmidt said. "We've got multiple generations that have been watching the same players in the same uniform and the same announcers. It's very important to this organization and this city. They're very proud."

The fans showed up earlier than normal Friday and Saturday, motivated by the bobblehead giveaways, with plastic facsimiles of Wainwright and Molina going to the first 25,000 through the gates.

You could watch them file in from certain vantage points overlooking the entrances, with stadium workers hurriedly handing out the dolls from a dwindling supply of cardboard boxes as the line outside went all the way down to the corner and twisted around out of sight. Eventually the boxes were gone and you could see the sagging body language of the first few hopefuls who came through the turnstiles just a little bit too late.

As part of the weekend festivities, the Cardinals created a display that consisted of the number "700" to honor Pujols' recent entry into the 700-homer club. They decorated it with some balloons and put it on display on one of the upper-level concourses. There was never a line shorter than 20 people deep waiting their turn to be photographed with the big numbers.

On Saturday, oversized greeting cards were added to the mix, on which fans could write down their well wishes. There was one for Pujols and one for Molina. All through the games, the line of people waiting to add their happy tidings was dozens of people deep.

"Thank you for making baseball unforgettable!" one fan wrote to Molina.

"You are the best baseball player I ever saw!" another fan gushed to Pujols.

DIFFERENT VERSIONS OF this kind of farewell ceremony have happened before in St. Louis, though there hasn't been anything quite like two franchise icons going out at the same time.

One of the most storied was Stan Musial's finale in 1963. Like Pujols and Molina, he had announced early in the season that he would hang it up when the campaign ended. While the Cardinals contended that season, they were out of it by the last game, so the focus was entirely on Stan the Man.

Musial was feted before the game, with commissioner Ford C. Frick uttering the words that are now often invoked to sum up the career of the greatest Cardinal of them all: "Here stands baseball's perfect warrior. Here stands baseball's perfect knight."

Those words adorn Musial's statue outside Busch Stadium.

Yes, the folks in St. Louis love their statues and their baseball, and so it would be far from surprising if at some point down the line, two or three more statues show up on the sidewalks around the stadium.

"These are two of the greatest icons this city has ever seen," Cardinals chairman Bill DeWitt Jr. said of Pujols and Molina.

The statues -- of a host of Hall of Famers including Rogers Hornsby, Bob Gibson and Ozzie Smith -- are always a popular attraction before a Cardinals game and so it was Sunday, when so many showed up so early for the event on what was a picture-perfect early autumn day under a flawless azure sky.

Musial was still around during the early part in the careers of the St. Louis trio, and Pujols in particular has long revered Musial, whom he befriended. So it was fitting that he watched over the ceremony honoring three of the greatest Cardinals ever. That's an empirical observation: Wainwright, Pujols and Molina all rank among the top 10 Cardinals in history by the baseball-reference.com version of WAR.

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That fact carries with it a not-so-gentle reminder of how the game has changed from when we first saw Pujols. When he broke into the majors, WAR was a fledgling concept being developed online out of the view of the baseball establishment. The publication of "Moneyball," which arguably nudged baseball analytics toward the mainstream, was still two years away.

Such numbers talk, even for those most attuned to the math side of the game, seems crude on days like Sunday, when Pujols and Molina are living out a dream day such as the one Musial enjoyed so long ago.

Before the ceremony, there was the usual pregame routine that wasn't that much different from any other quiet Sunday morning clubhouse during a baseball season. Pujols and Molina wandered in and out, following the same time-forged routines that have taken them this far.

Baseball Hall of Fame president Josh Rawitch was on hand to honor the players but also in hopes of securing a few mementos to be preserved for posterity in Cooperstown. Meeting Rawitch in the clubhouse before the game, Molina warmly thanked him for coming. They may have occasion to meet again at some point in the future.

The ceremony was definitely not part of the normal pregame ritual. DeWitt Jr. mentioned that Pujols and Molina had to be convinced to allow the festivities to take place at all. After all, it was a game day.

The ceremony began with a nostalgic video celebration on the scoreboard. They did one of those Friday, too, to commemorate Pujols' run to 700 homers. Everyone, including the players on the field, stopped to watch and Pujols appeared to grow emotional. Then he celebrated by clubbing home run No. 701.

"Just blessed to be back here," Pujols said when it was over. "A lot of things had to go the right way for me to be here."

For the gift-giving and speechifying part of the proceedings, a gathering of VIPs was seated in folding chairs on a canvas near home plate. The group included DeWitt Jr., his son Bill DeWitt III, chief baseball executive John Mozeliak, manager Ollie Marmol and old teammates such as Matt Holliday, Ray Lankford and Jason Isringhausen.

Both players had a gathering of family members on the field with them, too, including Molina's big league backstop brothers, Bengie and Jose. Perhaps the most surprising presence was that of Wainwright, who was scheduled to start the game on the mound.

"Waino is our brother," Molina said. "I respect him for doing that."

Two hidden items covered in canvas were perched nearby, one bearing the No. 4 and the other No. 5. The mayor of St. Louis sent proclamations, naming Sunday "Yadier Molina Day" and Oct. 5 "Albert Pujols Day."

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The gifts included some custom golf clubs, silver plaques and a couple of nifty portraits by artist Carlos Mercado, who hails from Molina's beloved Puerto Rico. The paintings featured renderings of Molina and Pujols in action against a graffiti-like backdrop, with the pieces accented by neon lights that included the Cardinals logo. After the game, Mercado met the players in the clubhouse.

The speeches were touching, although you'd be hard-pressed to identify a "perfect warrior" epitaph that is going to become iconic from the proceedings.

But they were honest and moving. Wainwright, speaking on behalf of all Pujols and Molina's teammates over the years, made everyone laugh with his easy, folksy manner, calling Molina "his catch partner" and "the smartest player anyone has ever seen."

"I think it's great that we get to come together today as a group, as city and as a fan base," Wainwright said, "to celebrate two of the greatest icons that this city has ever seen."

Molina started off by sheepishly uttering "Hola" to the fans after the "Yadi! Yadi!" chants died out from the stands. He grew particularly emotional when he turned to thank his mother, speaking in Spanish. When he composed himself and turned back toward the fans, he said, "I hope all you guys understood that Spanish." Everyone laughed.

Pujols' comments went much the same way, though he also recounted all the things that had to fall into place for him to return over the last offseason, not the least of which was baseball's adoption of the universal DH.

He then said, "The next step is to try to bring a championship back to the city of St. Louis." That was a reminder that for all the lasts and finales of the weekend, the Cardinals remain focused on what lies ahead. All weekend, Pujols kind of deflected questions about this being the last of anything, because the Cardinals will be hosting a wild-card series in days.

Molina and Pujols both ended their speeches in very similar fashion, referring to "the best fans in baseball." It's something players everywhere always say to their fans, but in St. Louis the words have long been used as a badge of honor.

"I'm proud and it was a great honor to wear this uniform in St. Louis," Molina said. "In baseball heaven."

Looking around at 48,000 fans clad in white, red and powder blue on their feet, under a perfect midday sky, with the Arch hovering on the horizon and the Mississippi rolling on just out of sight, the words felt more than appropriate.

SUNDAY WAS ABOUT a city saying farewell to a couple of local legends, but it was also a baseball game. The first on-field news of the day was the announcement that Pujols was getting the start at first base and would bat third, while Molina would bat fifth.

This is not a common configuration for the 2023 Cardinals. Pujols had started in the three-hole just once all season, while Molina was getting his third start in the five-hole, the highest spot in the order in which he has appeared during his final season.

Speculation began in the press box about how their departures would be handled: together, or one at a time? And when it happened, how long would the ovation be?

There were some numbers in play as well. The one everyone knew was 701 -- Pujols' still-rising career homer count before the game. And for Molina and Wainwright, it was their 328th game as a battery, extending a record they established earlier this season when they passed longtime Detroit duo Mickey Lolich and Bill Freehan. That number is now fixed as the new standard and it's hard to think it will be approached any time soon.

Finally, despite all of Pujols' standard-busting statistical feats, perhaps the most amazing statistic for any of them belongs to Molina. Over 19 seasons with St. Louis, he will finish with a grand total of 24 games played in which St. Louis had been mathematically eliminated from postseason contention.

Then there was the big number, the one that should have created more buzz than it has: Pujols entered the last home game three RBIs shy of Babe Ruth for No. 2 on the all-time list. For whatever reason, the RBI leaderboard doesn't create the same stir as its home run counterpart, but think about that. Entering the game, only two players in the history of the majors had driven in more runs than Pujols. One was leader Hank Aaron (whose top spot is safe for a long time to come) and the other was Ruth.

As we've all witnessed with a degree of awe over the last half of this season, Pujols has responded to the opportunity for a storybook end to his nearly unparalleled career by rewriting what a fairytale reads like. Certainly his second-half flourish is something no one around baseball, not just St. Louis, is going to forget any time soon.

Was there any doubt the fairytale would continue Sunday?

In the bottom of the first, with two runners on base, another thunderous roar emerged from the stands as Pujols stalked toward home plate for his first at-bat. He looped a double that landed right on the left-field line and caromed away from Pittsburgh left fielder Jack Suwinski, driving in two runs as Pujols jogged into second base for a double. It gave him 63 RBIs on the season ... and 2,213 for his career. One shy of Ruth.

After going to third on Nolan Arenado's foul out, Pujols scored on Molina's sac fly. Marmol's celebratory lineup had already paid off. Then, in the bottom of the third, Pujols strode to the plate for the last time in a regular-season home game.

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You kind of sensed it was going to happen because it was just that kind of day. That feeling didn't make it any less spine-tingling when Pujols unloaded on a Roansy Contreras fastball, depositing it into the grass of the batter's eye in center field. That pushed the homer total to 702 and the RBI total to 2,214. Pujols had caught Ruth.

And despite all that, Pujols, while expressing his gratitude for everything that happened this weekend, still just wanted to look ahead to the playoffs.

"That's what we play for," Pujols said. "We make good money and have a good career, but [at] the end of the day you also want to win championships."

It wasn't all fairytale stuff though. Wainwright has been struggling lately and his problems continued Sunday. The Pirates touched him up for six runs and by the bottom of the fifth, it was time for Marmol to pull the plug.

Marmol decided to go ahead with a pre-planned triple-switch he had hoped to execute at the start of an inning. But Wainwright needed to come out. After a brief meeting on the mound between Marmol, Wainwright, Molina and the Cardinals' infield, hugs ensued.

That was followed by Wainwright, Molina and Pujols walking off the field together. It was a poetic maneuver by Marmol, though perhaps because it occurred so early in the game, it might have caught the fans off guard. The cheer was ample but not epic or as sustained as you would think. Maybe they were just worn out. Maybe they're already looking toward this trio's return in next weekend's wild-card round. That didn't make it any less special.

"It was meant to be, at the same time," Molina said. "It was great. We wanted to finish that inning, but it was great, just to walk off the field with them."

It was like the St. Louis baseball community was forced to process, too soon, the moment they knew was coming. The era of Wainwright, Molina and Pujols was over, save for the uncertainty and promise of a playoff run that starts in a few days.

After that, what lies beyond this year is a future without Molina or Pujols and, possibly, without Wainwright, too. And while that's bittersweet, no one should fear for the Cardinals as an ongoing baseball institution, in no small part because of the legacies the beloved trio will leave behind them.

In St. Louis, it's always on to the next generation, while never losing sight of the ties this one has to the ones that came before.

"Every year, you want to keep their tradition going," Goldschmidt said. "The guys before Albert and Yadi when they were young, they were great players and I'm sure they felt the responsibility to carry that tradition along.

"Winning and the way this team plays, bringing the younger guys up, that'll be a spot that I will be in the next couple of years. It's a responsibility we all feel."

Cardinals honor albert pujols yadier molina adam wainwright

2025-02-06 21:32:29