As we do each fall, the staff of The Cardinal Nation will start this series with recaps of the 2012 season at each level of the St. Louis Cardinals system, including the major league club. We follow with the crowning of three award winners for each team. They will be our The Cardinal Nation/Scout.com Minor League Starters, Relievers and Players of the Year.
 |
| 2011 Player of the Year Matt Adams |
We will unveil our selections, one team recap or award per day, beginning on Monday, September 17, and running throughout October. We start with the club recaps, then the Dominican Summer League (DSL) Reliever of the Year all the way through the Memphis Redbirds Player of the Year.
We will add some special awards and of course, name our top selections for the entire Cardinals minor league system for 2012 as well as the best rookies. The series will conclude with our choice as the top manager in the organization.
Though they watched these clubs and reported on them all summer long, our team of locally-based writers still have their work cut out for them to select the very best of the best from nearly 300 players. Yet this most knowledgeable group is more than qualified and again up to the challenge. They include Pierce Jefferson, Brandon Mahler, Juan Dorado, Jon Popham, Sloane Martin, Katherine Fernandez and Paul Ivice.
While the winning names will be made available to everyone as this master article is updated daily, the detailed commentary behind most awards in this series will be exclusively for Scout.com/The Cardinal Nation subscribers. All major league articles will be free for all.
They include analysis from our onsite writers as well as comments by Cardinals players, coaches and executives. We explain what tradeoffs were made and what we saw in the best players to take the field at each level of the Cardinals system during the 2012 season.
Again, we began the process with a daily series recapping each minor league club’s 2012 season in depth, looking at records, injuries, player movement, key stats and much more. Subscribers can click on the highlighted team names below to read those articles if you missed them the first time.
2012 The Cardinal Nation/Scout.com Award Winners/Schedule
( Subscribers: Click on the player name highlighted in the table above to be taken to that detailed article. In addition, select each team name to read the 2012 overall summary for that level.)
If you ever forget the location of this article, you can always use the permanent link on the lower left of The Cardinal Nation homepage. You can access our 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008 and 2007 Cardinals Minor League Players of the Year from there, too, as well as our Top Prospect lists from each of the last seven winters.
Speaking of top prospects, that annual top 40 countdown will begin in late November after this series concludes. Please remember that the two are separate and distinct.
This effort is to recognize the top performances on the field in 2012, whether or not the players are projected to have a major league future down the road. In other words, this is all about current results, not future potential.
© 2012 The Cardinal Nation, thecardinalnation.com and stlcardinals.scout.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.