St. Louis finished the regular season with 90 wins and locked up the NL's wild card spot, finishing second in the Central division behind the Milwaukee Brewers, oddly enough the same team in their way of a World Series appearance.
The Cardinals upset the 102-win championship favorite Philadelphia Phillies in the NLDS in five hard fought games.
After falling behind 1-0 to the Brewers in this year's NLCS, the Cardinals stormed back to take a 2-1 series lead and reclaim home-field advantage.
To make matters worse for the Brewers and the rest of the playoff field, no team has the pitching strength to matchup with St. Louis this October.
Chris Carpenter has been phenomenal this postseason to lead the St. Louis staff.
Carpenter is 2-0 this postseason, which includes a pivotal NLCS Game 3 win over the Brewers in St. Louis on Wednesday night.
Since being yanked against the Phillies after allowing four runs in three innings, Carpenter has allowed just three runs in 15 innings, including a nine inning shutout to close out Philadelphia last week.
The Cardinals' bats are also connecting at the right time.
Slugger Albert Pujols is second behind only Milwaukee's Ryan Braun in batting average, sporting a .452 average, and the Cards' David Freese leads the National League in RBI's this postseason, with 11.
St. Louis can take a command of the NLCS at home in Game 5, but even if they slip up, they look to be the best team in baseball at exactly the right time.
