Before the 1996 season, Cardinals GM Walt Jocketty, when talking about Ray Lankford and Brian Jordan...sounded like the cat who swallowed the canary. Jocketty was certain that the security that the Redbirds had bestowed upon their two emerging stars, in the form of multi-year contracts, would enable both of them to have monster years.

Indeed, Lankford and Jordan were the two brightest batting lights, on a team, Tony La Russa's first Cardinals team, that fell one game shy of appearing in the '96 World Series.

With Jordan's contract expiring after the '98 season, it would have made sense for the Cardinals to lock up Jordan prior to the start of that season. But 1996 was Ozzie Smith's last as a Cardinal, and at the '97 trading deadline, Jocketty traded for Mark McGwire. Those two changes seemed to alter Jordan's relationship with La Russa...and don't forget that '97, like 1994 and 1992, were injury-marred campaigns for Jordan.

So Jordan was allowed to play out his option in '98, and prior to the '99 season the former Atlanta Falcon signed a five-year $40 million contract with the Braves.

Unfortunately for La Russa, Jocketty and the Cardinals, Jordan's "replacements" (Eric Davis and Darren Bragg), are out for the year, with shoulder and knee injuries, respectively. Meanwhile, Brian Jordan has appeared in 122 of Atlanta's 129 games so far, while Lankford has played in only 99 of the his team's 129 games. The numbers, in 1999, don't lie.

Jordan's '99 Stats (8.26.99)

AVG G AB H 2B 3B HR RBI SB .294 122 474 140 24 2 22 100 11

 AVG  G   AB  H  2B 3B HR RBI SB
.307  99 342 105 27  1 15  54  9