ST. LOUIS -- The last time the St. Louis Cardinals won the World Series was in 1982 and they lost the opener 10-0 at Busch Stadium on a three-hit shutout by the Milwaukee Brewers’ Mike Caldwell.

Cardinals’ manager Whitey Herzog was asked about the scouting report on Caldwell. “A little sinker, little slider, little scroogie, little spitter. Not a good move to first, but we didn't get many on.”

That was the topic after the game. George Bamberger, one of the top pitching coaches in the game, managed the Brewers for a couple of years in the late seventies and he was a proponent of the Staten Island sinker, called a spitter in less polite circles. Bamberger was from Staten Island and by the time the Brewers made the World Series he was managing the New York Mets.

Caldwell was an avid student and was considered a practitioner of the Staten Island sinker. It was quite the topic after that opening game in 1982.

“Sinker, slider, screwball,” Cardinals first baseman Keith Hernandez said. “Maybe a little grease on it. I don't know what it was. But Fernando Valenzuela doesn't throw a screwball that drops like that. Hey, I might be wrong but I got four pitches where the bottom just dropped right out.”

He fouled off three of those pitches so he didn’t complain. “The ball's already on the ground,” he said. “I’m not making a big thing out of it.”

Gene Tenace didn’t want to comment. “I don't know what it was, a screwball or a forkball. He had excellent command of it….I never let that bother me when I'm batting. As soon as you start complaining, that's what a pitcher wants you to do. I've never complained. He's still got to get it over.”

In his second start in the Series, Caldwell gave up 14 hits and four runs in 8 1/3 innings as the Brewers won Game 5 6-4 and funny how nobody complained about the spitter.

The Cardinals won in seven games.