(KMOX) - On the heels of Joey Votto's, um, interesting presser the other day I saw some folks talking about how this St. Louis Cardinals-Cincinnati Reds "rivalry" has been rekindled or whatever and it left me wondering whether or not this is even a thing in 2021.
Sure, we had the Castellanos flex earlier this season and that seemed to fire up both sides a bit. In August 2010 we had the bench clearing incident sparked by a confrontation at home plate between Yadier Molina and Brandon Phillips (a day after Phillips said the Cardinals were "little bitches") but since Dusty Baker and Tony La Russa were butting heads back in the day what has there really been between the two teams?
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Not much to be honest. The Reds were really good for a few years (2010-2013) but they haven't had a winning season since then so there hasn't been a lot of buzz about these two teams getting together.
Rivalries are either historic - like Cards-Cubs - or they're about two teams battling for the same turf at the same time. The thing is, there just haven't been that many times in the last 20 years where both the Cardinals and Reds were fighting over their place in the standings. Maybe they will this season and maybe this kind of stuff will lead to some really fun, contentious games when these two meet again at the end of August.
Barring that, it's been pretty one-sided for a while...
The Cardinals have gone 197-145 against the Reds since the 2000 season began. That's a .576 winning percentage, the equivalent of a 93-win pace over a 162 game season. They've also had just one losing season (2007) since the turn of the century and they've made the playoffs 14 times in that stretch with two World Series victories.
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Meanwhile, the Reds have had five winning seasons, four playoff appearances and have won just two playoff games since 2000.
Based on that, I can see why Votto (and his .563 playoff OPS) gets so excited about a regular-season sweep.
(Yes, that's a cheap shot. I admit it. I also really like Votto, he's one of my favorite characters in the game, but if we're in trash-talking mode then we're in trash-talking mode on both sides of the "rivalry." LOL)
All cheap shots and trash talk aside, I hope this is the beginning of some rivalry-like activity that will last. That would be great for the game and great for fan bases in both cities but for a rivalry to emerge for real, one that will last more than a couple of series, Reds' ownership is going to have to do a better job of keeping their team in contention on a more regular basis.
Rivalries aren't built and sustained around "incidents" like we've seen between these two clubs, they're built over time when both teams are battling for playoff spots against one another on a regular basis.
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