St. Louis Cardinals

The St. Louis Cardinals are a professional baseball team based in St. Louis, Missouri. They are members of the Central Division in the National League of Major League Baseball. The Cardinals have won ten World Series championships, the most of any National League team, and second overall only to the New York Yankees, who have 27.The 2011 season may go down as one of the Cardinals most followed pennant races in recent years. By August 25, the Cardinals had played their 130th game of the season and were 10½ games behind the Wild Card leading Atlanta Braves. Written off by most analysts to make the playoffs due to the large deficit, the team began the month of September at 72-64 and 8½ games behind both the Wild Card and Central Division leaders. Atlanta went into a tailspin during the final month of the season, finishing 9-18. At the same time, the Cardinals went 18-8 to finish the season at 90-72, one game better than Atlanta's record of 89-73, and won the National League Wild Card on the final game of the regular season. This marks the largest comeback in MLB history after 130 games played (only 32 regular season games remained), and the second largest comeback in the month of September. The Tampa Bay Rays have the largest final month comeback, as they began September 9 games behind the AL Wild Card leading Boston Red Sox, before overtaking them, also on the final regular season game.
The Cardinals matched up against the Philadelphia Phillies in the 2011 NLDS. The Phillies were heavily favored to win. However, the Cardinals defeated them 3 games to 2. Game 5 would become notable for its great pitching duel between the Phillies ace Roy Halladay and Cardinals ace Chris Carpenter. After giving up just 1 earned run over 8 innings, Halladay left the game for a pinch hitter in the bottom of the 8th. He was bested by Carpenter who threw a complete game 3 hit shutout, winning 1-0. The win advances the Cardinals to the NLCS against the Milwaukee Brewers for the first time since 2006.The team mascot is an anthropomorphic cardinal wearing the team's uniform named Fredbird. He is assisted by Team Fredbird, a group of eleven women who entertain fans from the field and on top of the dugouts.