I've been knitting a sweater all through the baseball postseason -- it helps take the edge off the really tense moments and gives my hours of TV watching a productive element. The night of Game 5, I had reached a point in the pattern where I was supposed to cast off a few stitches at the beginning of the row and then decrease. By the 7th inning, I had knitted without doing the decrease for about an inch, pulled it all out, and started again three times. On the fourth try I did the decrease -- on the wrong side. Only then did I realize I was maybe a little too distracted to knit that particular evening.

The whole winning-the-World-Series thing didn't really sink in until I was looking at the pictures of the celebration online Saturday, and it suddenly hit me that no one is ever again going to be able to say Albert or Jimmy or Scott couldn't win the big one. And you can point to the stats and say Albert didn't do much in the Series, only the stats don't exactly take into account 1)The Cardinals never would have even made the playoffs without his 25 game-winning RBIs, 2)Some of the brilliant defensive plays he made including the throw from his back in Game 5 and 3)he was one of the people helping Yady Molina with his hitting prior to Yady's well-timed hot streak. As for Scott (Rolen): every time he came to bat in the Series I almost cried, it was so good to see his old swing again. Don't leave us like that again, Scotty. Learn a feet first slide in the off-season, please.

And then there's Jimmy. Despite Albert being my boy and Yady being the most adorable, and my new crush on Adam Wainwright's curveball, Jim Edmonds is the Cardinal I think I love the most. I've defended him against all those stupid charges of "hot-dogging" and waited patiently through the cold streaks when he never even takes the bat off his shoulder while he's striking out, because he always seemed to pull off the big hit or fabulous catch when we needed it. After the concussion this summer, when he could barely see straight, let alone play, I resigned myself to this unfitting end to his Cardinal career, being glad I got to see him pinch-hit at Shea in September (and kicking myself for not getting a good picture). Little did I know that not even a month later, I'd be back in Shea taking a picture of Jimmy (and his broken toe, and his woozy head, and probably a sore back because his back's always sore) batting in the NLCS, having become the team's leader just when they needed him most. I'd love to see him retire as a Cardinal, be it this year or next, but even if financial concerns put him in another uniform next year, this championship is always going to be due partly to him, and that makes him a Cardinal for life. Jimmy, if I had a game ball to give out for this season, it would go to you.