World Series hero and ‘The Secret Weapon’ selected for Cardinals Hall of Fame class

Nelson Cruz changed baseball history when he drifted back too slowly and tentatively in pursuit of a soaring fly ball in the bottom of the ninth inning of game six of the 2011 World Series.

The ball bounded off the wall, David Freese slid into third base a hero, and a day later, the Cardinals had a championship.

Now, 12 years later, that same play has earned Freese a new coat.

The homegrown third baseman and World Series Most Valuable Player was elected to the Cardinals Hall of Fame by the fans, the team announced Wednesday. He joins José Oquendo (organizational selection) and Max Lanier (Red Ribbon Committee selection) in the Class of 2023.

“We take great pride in the selection process we use for electing new members of the Cardinals Hall of Fame,” Cardinals Chairman Bill DeWitt, Jr. said in a statement.

“I’d like to thank our fans as well as the Red Ribbon Committee who cast their votes for this year’s induction class. Congratulations to David Freese, José Oquendo, and the late Max Lanier on this tremendous honor. We look forward to celebrating the achievements of these players during our induction ceremony in August.”

Joaquín Andújar, Steve Carlton, Matt Morris and Edgar Renteria were the other candidates for the fan ballot and will return to the vote next spring.

Freese played five of his 11 Major League seasons with the Cardinals, joining the organization in a trade for fellow Cardinals Hall of Famer Jim Edmonds following the 2007 season. They join Frankie Frisch and Rogers Hornsby as members of the team’s Hall of Fame who were at one point in their careers traded for each other.

The 2011 postseason was the defining stretch of Freese’s career, both in St. Louis and elsewhere, and his heroics in that do-or-die game six generated highlights which have come to define the experience of winning for a full generation of Cardinals fans.

‘The Secret Weapon’

That winning, though, comes on the back of hard work and full dedication to even the smallest details of the game. No one other than the late George Kissell has personified those qualities and that hard work more than José Oquendo, who played nearly 1,000 games for the Cardinals and has been an instructor or coach in some capacity since 1997.

Oquendo, the indomitable “Cheo” to both his charges with the Cardinals and those around the game who hold him in the highest of esteem, was perhaps best known during his playing days for his versatility. As “The Secret Weapon,” he made at least one appearance at all nine positions in 1988, a year in which he posted half of his 14 career home runs.

In 2022, he received the team’s George Kissell Award for player development, tying the legacies of the two together formally even as they’ve become undoubtedly inseparable among those who have watched the team’s inner workings for many decades.

He also won two World Series championships (2006, 2011) as a coach on the Major League staff, coaching third base from 2000 through 2015, again in 2018, and briefly in 2020. Oquendo was among the candidates interviewed to become the team’s manager following Tony La Russa’s retirement in 2011, ultimately losing out to Mike Matheny.

Streetcar hero

Lanier, who died in 2007 at the age of 91, pitched 12 years for the Cardinals, including throughout World War II. He was an All-Star in both 1943 and 1944 and played in three straight World Series from 1942-1944.

The Cardinals won the first and last of those, including the so-called Streetcar Series against the cross-town Browns in 1944. He was the winning pitcher in the decisive sixth game of that series, and his 1.71 ERA in World Series games is fourth-best in team history.

The lefty won 101 games for the Cardinals across 12 seasons, posting a 2.84 ERA, 20 shutouts, and 12 saves during some stints of bullpen work. His son Hal would have a respectable big league career of his own, lasting ten seasons as a utility infielder for the Giants and Yankees.

Ceremony set in August

This year’s class will be honored over the third weekend in August and inducted in a ceremony held Sunday, Aug. 20, at the Hall of Fame Museum.

The induction of three additional honorees this year increases the total number of those remembered at the museum to 53, tracing back the history of baseball in St. Louis from Charles Comiskey’s earliest days running the St. Louis Browns in the 1880s through Oquendo’s ongoing work to shape future generations of Cardinals.