Matt Holliday

Once the Cardinals finish up their West Coast swing through Arizona and San Francisco, they'll find themselves smack-dab in the middle of a duel against their fiercest competition for the NL Central crown, the Cincinnati Reds.

After another great outing from Adam Wainwright, the St. Louis Cardinals fall again after bullpen struggles and defensive miscues continue to plague the team.

Wainwright put together a big night going seven innings giving up only two runs on five hits with seven strikeouts. By any stretch, that's a great night. Not only was he pitching well, he got an early base hit and made a pair of key defensive plays.

Question:  What lately has been lacing Lance Berkman’s milk bone bat?  Answer:  Leather baseballs bouncing off the wood and flying out of MLB venues.

The fantasy baseball season is starting to filter out the big fish from the small ponds, the rooks from the bishops and the Cardinals hitters from the haters.

The emergency surgery to remove Matt Holliday's appendix certainly harms the heart of the St. Louis Cardinals lineup. But with the advent of laparoscopic procedures, the Cardinals have yet to put the All-Star slugger on the DL.  

His absence and the early-season struggles of Albert Pujols have left St. Louis hurting for runs early this season. But it could be worse.

The season is only a few days old, but there are certainly plenty of injuries that need discussing.  Let’s take a look at the latest:

Our top three fantasy outfielders in 2011 are the same top three fantasy outfielders that most other sites have in their top three. However, I've seen all three in the top spot at a relatively even split. In an ideal world, I'd like to get my No. 1 outfielder as the third outfielder off the board.

Here are our top 50 outfielders in fantasy baseball for 2011:

The St. Louis Cardinals offer plenty of fantasy baseball value in 2011, from front to back of the draft board. But the Cardinals have also had some issues with consistency over the past few years, and a couple of questions surrounding some key players.

Shhh...do you hear that?

If you're a baseball fan, a sports enthusiast, or if you simply happen to hail from the Greater St. Louis area, I'm sure you are hearing the same thing I am.

Silence.

That's right, for the first time in recent memory, the day's sporting headlines have not been dominated by Albert Pujols chatter and, I must say, the silence is deafening.

Can signing the games best player be the worst decision of your life? The St. Louis Cardinals could find out if they give him Alex Rodriguez money.

The self-imposed contract deadline came and went for the Cardinals slugger. Now, Albert Pujols will walk into the 2011 season without a new contract and the possibility of playing somewhere else next year.

The top four outfielders—Carl Crawford, Carlos Gonzalez, Ryan Braun and Matt Holliday—are so tightly bunched that they could conceivably finish the season in any order and I wouldn’t be surprised. And no, Josh Hamilton was not an accidental omission; his injury history is too worrisome for an early-round pick in my book.