ST. LOUIS — Sitting at home watching every other team around baseball carry on while the Cardinals were on COVID-19 hiatus was rough, to say the least.
Baseball rambled on while the Cardinals sat there helpless, waiting on test results and attempting to figure out how the rest of the season would even work.
But now, finally (knock on wood), Cardinals baseball is back. And it's not just back. It's going to be everywhere for the next month and a half.
Nothing about the Cardinals', and baseball's, situation is ideal this year. But for the next 50 days or so, we are getting a whole lot of baseball in a short period of time. Let's embrace the craziness.
Including the Cardinals' games on Monday against the Cubs, they'll have to play 52 games in the next 42 days to complete their 60-game season within the current MLB schedule. And although that sounds ridiculous in concept, the league and team have made every indication it's going to happen, somehow.
Including that Monday twin bill in Chicago, the Cardinals have nine (!!) doubleheaders left on the current schedule.
Yes, it sounds crazy. Yes, the players, especially the pitching staff, are going to get tired. Yes, we're just one positive test (from the Cardinals or any team on their schedule) away from possibly reevaluating this all again.
But for right now in this moment, the rest of the season is setting up to be a baseball lovers dream.
If the current schedule holds, we're only getting two days without Cardinals games from here to Sept. 27. That is so much baseball.
Those nine doubleheader days are virtually full days of baseball. We're getting at least 14 innings (due to the new doubleheader rules) each of those days. How great does that sound?
Whether you're working at home with the game on the TV, back in the office listening to the redbirds on KMOX while you work or just following on social media, days with Cardinals baseball are simply better than days without Cardinals baseball.
The scenario is crazy and not what any of us had hoped for, but let's make the best of it.
We had to go without baseball for four months. Now, we get the opportunity to make up for that lost time.
We get to see Dylan Carlson in a Major League uniform. We get to see Adam Wainwright keep doing his thing for possibly the last season. We get to see Tyler O'Neill remind us he's one of the strongest guys we've seen.
Of course fans will be clamoring for the Cards to win, but more than that I think St. Louis is just happy to have baseball back in any form or fashion.
I know I'll be watching every pitch in this insane last-ditch sprint that I can. And if I know anything at all about St. Louis, the rest of the city will be, too.
