St. Louis Cardinals links: Offensive fireworks, a Kyle McClellan update, and more World Baseball Classic ruminating

Before you ask: Yes, VEB Monitor lives in fear of the impending Google Reader shutdown, but only because it's how I sync NetNewsWire across computers. Until RSS2K, though, I promise to fight through the nervous shakes and give you all the St. Louis Cardinals links I can remember to add to our semi-regular link feature.

(If you have a link you think would be of interest to VEB readers—yours or someone else's—feel free to send me an e-mail. If you're a VEB regular who thinks writing a semi-regular link-dump sounds like a good time, also feel free to send me an e-mail.)

RetroSimba: Departure of football Cardinals helped baseball Cardinals
The Gridbirds' move was approved shortly after I was born, so I've always found it a little surreal that they ever existed at all. This is another right-in-retrosimba's-wheelhouse subject—how their exit changed the course of baseball-Cardinal history.

Baseball Musings: Team Offense, St. Louis Cardinals
When you find yourself worrying about the St. Louis Cardinals' weird shortstop proclivities, take a look at this post about their projected team offense.

Baseball Nation: The World Baseball Classic and the apathy myth
The weird thing about sportswriters' rush to declare Team USA insufficiently interested in the WBC is that they don't do the same thing every time, say, the Astros beat the Giants. Baseball is not basketball—really good teams often lose to teams that are not as good, and it has nothing to do with your half-formed impression of how in it they are.

Lone Star Ball: Kyle McClellan sidelined for 4 weeks
Kyle McClellan's odds of making the Rangers' Opening Day roster were low to begin with—he was part of a crowded fifth-starter audition—but according to LSB this about wraps it up for him.