Cardinals on 2015: 'We can do this for Oscar (Taveras)'

Bob Nightengale | USA TODAY Sports

ST. LOUIS -- Adam Wainwright stopped his warm-up pitches Monday afternoon at Busch Stadium, turned and looked up at the scoreboard above his head, and it suddenly hit him.

Wainwright, who was about to start the St. Louis Cardinals' home opener, felt the stinging in his eyes and started weeping. He kept watching, the tears kept falling, and pitching on this day could wait.

"It's as choked up as I've ever been on a baseball field," Wainwright said. "I wasn't expecting to do that. It's like it doesn't seem real until it is."

A poignant, moving tribute to Oscar Taveras was being shown on the scoreboard, with an entire stadium and its record crowd of 47,875 watching in silence.

The last time the Cardinals assembled on this field at Busch Stadium, they were feting Taveras for his game-tying, pinch-hit home run in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series against the San Francisco Giants.

Two weeks later, Taveras, 22, was dead.

Taveras, driving with his girlfriend, Edilia Arvelo, 18, in his Chevrolet Camaro, drove off the side of the road near his hometown of Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic. He had been drinking, according to investigators, and his alcohol content was five times above the legal limit.

Regardless of circumstances, the pain and anguish would be there — in the offseason, at spring training and finally as the curtain rose on the Cardinals' home season.

"I got teary-eyed watching that," Cardinals veteran reliever Randy Choate told USA TODAY Sports. "It was like when I first heard the news. I just broke down. It wasn't like we were that close or anything, but he was a teammate.

"You remember him hitting a homer in his first at-bat. You remember that homer against the Giants. You remember everything about him.

"I mean, he was just 22. He was a kid."

Choate, his eyes watering while talking, said he was trying to keep his emotions in check this day, but started losing it when he looked at teammate Carlos Martinez.

Martinez was sobbing.

Taveras and Martinez were best friends. Martinez even switched numbers during the winter and now wears No.18 to honor Taveras.

Every Cardinals player will wear an "OT 18'' patch on his sleeve, and signs with that message are everywhere inside Busch Stadium.

"He was taken away from us way too soon," Cardinals first baseman Matt Adams said. "Now, we have to deal with it. We have to move on.

"I think this team will do something special this year and dedicate this season to him."

The business portion of their home opener — a 5-4 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers — will be quickly forgotten.

They will never forget the tribute, and the man it honored.

"It was hard, just so hard," said Cardinals third baseman Matt Carpenter, who arrived 6 1/2 hours before the game. "It's sunk in. It's like everything just reset itself. It's like, man, you're watching highlights of a guy who was your teammate less than a year ago. You're starting a game, and he's not here.

"You couldn't help but get emotional. We all were."

Certainly, it was like no other home opener in the Cardinals' rich history. They brought out the traditional Clydesdales. They hauled out their Hall of Famers, too, everyone from Bob Gibson to Lou Brock to Tony La Russa. The team, including the entire coaching staff, was ushered onto the field by motorcade, receiving a thunderous ovation when their names were introduced.

"I've never seen anything like it," said new Cardinals infielder Mark Reynolds. "I mean, you're riding in the car, the horses, the (American) eagle, shaking hands with Hall of Famers.

"What a spectacle."

The Cardinals may not be the greatest team in baseball, or even the finest in their own division, but judging by Monday's home opener, you didn't need to indulge on their new deep-fried Oreo cookies or quadruple gooey burgers to grasp this year's theme: "Tradition Meets Today."

"Everybody has their own traditions for opening day,'' manager Mike Matheny says, "but it just seems like it's a little bigger here and a little deeper.

"I allow myself to watch the Clydesdales and the Hall of Famers come through. How many people get to ride around in front of 40,000 and have them cheer?"

Jason Heyward, the man who was acquired in a trade from the Atlanta Braves to replace Taveras, was so excited he forgot protocol. When he got out of the truck, and was introduced, he ran right past the Hall of Famers standing by home plate and hugged Matheny.

He was quickly re-directed.

"Man, it was fun," said Heyward, who had his entire family in from Georgia for the game. "Great for everybody involved. Fans. Players. Hall of Famers. Great tradition.

"It would have been nice to win for the crowd."

The Cardinals, who in the last four years have won one World Series, two pennants and earned four consecutive playoffs berths for the first time, will be awfully good again. They're not going away now. They never do.

The Cardinals have been to the playoffs 11 times in the last 15 years, participated in more playoff games, 60, than any team since 2009, and have had only one losing season since 2000.

It's hard to envision anything changing this year.

Sure, they have flaws. They could use one more frontline starter. They need more bullpen depth. And who couldn't use more power hitters these days?

Yet, until further notice, the NL Central race still runs through St. Louis.

Even if the Cardinals have readied to play a man down.

"Hopefully," Adams said, "we can do this for Oscar."

GALLERY: REMEMBERING OSCAR TAVERAS