Its been confirmed through a few sources that it is in fact the Matt Holliday tweeting at twitter.com/mattholliday7.

Not only that, but after reading over his stream of “tweets” we can say Matt Holliday seems pretty cool. Below is a sampling of some of his best mind droppings.

Matt Holiday’s thoughts on…

Turkey Bacon:

not sure turkey bacon has earned the right to be called bacon, maybe breakfast turkey strips

Brett Favre:

qb no no, roll right throw back left to middle

Former football players getting fat: [Editor's Note: Watched this and thought the same thing.]

Duece is enjoying the retirement gumbo a little to much

And lastly, the offseason:

On my way to workout with trainer, trying to pump myself up. Ready for spring training! ST is way easier than offseason workouts

Follow Holliday at mattholliday7 and while you are at it, follow us at punchingkitty!

According to ESPN’s MLB prospect, and faking himself into thinking he is way more important than he is expert, Keith Law says St. Louis Cardinals prospect Casey Mulligan might be good enough to get to St. Louis this summer:

Relievers don’t usually make my top 100 unless they’re top-shelf, but ex-catcher Casey Mulligan and his plus changeup could sneak into the big leagues this year.

You might recognize the name Casey Mulligan.  Since he’s not quite famous for his relief pitching just yet, you probably know him as the ballplayer that suddenly busted out a rendition of Thriller during a rain delay.

We really hope Law is right.  St. Louis has had a real lack of interesting bullpen guys since our favorite Steve Kline left.

We’ve given Kurt Warner a hard time in the past and we still don’t fully understand the people that are so wrapped up in Warner-love that they seemingly forget about just how bad he was at the end of his Rams’ career.  However, Kurt Warner is seemingly a great guy that has had a great career (though not hall of fame worthy) and made the rarely seen choice to end it on top.  Sure he got rocked repeatedly and got whooped by the Saints, but Warner was a solid quarterback this year on a good team.

Don’t be sad though St. Louis, we have no doubt Kurt will be all over the place sooner rather than later. He’ll be on Fox Sports or NFL Network chatting it up, or maybe even have his own late-night tent church program!  We’re hoping at some point he’ll even end up riding shotgun on Becky Queen of Tile’s magic carpet.

But the best thing about Warner retiring?  We don’t have to hear the Hy-Vee stockboy story anymore!

There once was a man name Stubby Clapp you toiled away in the Cardinals minor league system, only briefly appearing in the majors in 2001. In 25 at-bats Clapp tallied 5 hits, 1 walk, 7 strike outs and 1 RBI giving him a .200 average.  Nice. His fame in Memphis playing for the minor league Redbirds though knew no bounds and in fact his #10 is the only one ever to be retired by the team.

So whatever happened to Stubby Clapp, straddler of the Mendoza Line and the best named player in the history of the St. Louis Cardinals?

I’ll tell ya!  Dude’s carrying around the Olympic torch!

Savannah’s Stubby Clapp recently covered 300 meters with the Olympic Torch in LaSalle, Ontario, near his hometown of Windsor.

“It was an unbelievable experience,” Clapp said. “The experience, pride and passion that came with carrying the torch which is a sign of peace.”

Well there you go.  Stubby Clapp.  Olympics.  Torch.  Other Noun.

When Clapp isn’t being picked on for his name or carrying the torch he spends his time as a hitting instructor in the Astros minor leagues.

via JacksonSun.com

[Ring! ... Ring! ... Ring!]

Scott Boras: Hello?

Rick Ankiel: Hey!  How have you been?

SB: Uh, good.  Who’s this?

RA: Ha!  Yeah…so haven’t heard from you in a while.

SB: I know…I’ve been busy.  Seriously, who is this?

RA: Rick!  Rick Ankiel.

SB: Oh yeah!  Sorry…you know…bad connection.  How’s the old pitching arm kid?!

RA: Scott, remember?  I’m an outfielder now.

SB: …oh yeah. Real shame about that.

RA: Yeah, so anyway…great job with Matt Holliday by the way.

SB: Thanks! We really came out great on that one.  Really great deal.  When you get to free agency, hopefully you can get a deal yourself.

RA: That’s the thing actually.  I am a free agent.

SB: Oh.  Call your agen…

RA: You are my agent!

SB: Oh.

RA: Think I can get back with the Cardinals?

SB: No, I think I already took their money…er…I mean with Holliday…

RA: Yeah…Yankees?

SB: Maybe I’ll give them a call…or…well…

RA: What?

SB: Piratesayswhat?

RA: What?!

SB: Great. You’ll love Pittsburgh.  I hear the Steelers were good last year. …

RA: The Pirates?! Dude!

SB: Yup, turns out that was legally binding.

RA: But I hate Pittsburgh!

SB: Well seeing as how you rarely leave Spring Training, I don’t think that should be a problem.

[Click.]

In a story about as shocking as the day Rosie ODonnell came out of the closet, today St. Louis Cardinals hitting coach and former home run champ Mark McGwire confessed he took steroids during his major league career, including 1998.  Which of course is the year that JD Drew first played major league baseball…oh and he and some crazy black guy hit a bunch of home runs.

McGwire said he also used human growth hormone, and he didn’t know if his use of performance-enhancing drugs contributed to some of the injuries that led to his retirement, at age 38, in 2001.

“That’s a good question,” he said.

He repeatedly expressed regret for his decision to use steroids, which he said was “foolish” and caused by his desire to overcome injuries, get back on the field and prove he was worth his multimillion salary.

“You don’t know that you’ll ever have to talk about the skeleton in your closet on a national level,” he said. “I did this for health purposes. There’s no way I did this for any type of strength use.”

I’ll give him credit for this though: McGwire actually called the family of Roger Maris to tell them first and apologize!

McGwire hit a then-record 70 homers in 1998 during a compelling race with Sammy Sosa, who finished with 66.

On Monday, McGwire called Pat Maris, the widow of Roger Maris, who had held the home run record with 61 in 1961, and admitted taking steroids.

“I felt that I needed to do that,” McGwire told Costas. “They’ve been great supporters of mine. She was disappointed and she has every right to be.”

Told by Costas that certain Maris family members have said that they now consider Roger Maris’ 61 the authentic home run record, McGwire responded: “They have every right to.”

When asked by Costas why he preferred to stand for the interview, McGwire replied “Are you kidding?  I’ve had more things poke me in the ass than Paris Hilton.  I don’t really poop any more, it just kinda ’sweats’ out of me back there.”

We here at PK aren’t hypocrites though.  We advocated that Big Mac come out and just say what everyone already knew.  Stop acting like we are all morons and just say it!  He did.  We are cool now.  We aren’t going to be like some of the press that urged him to come out only to kick him in the jimmy when he finally did.

Stop by any time for a beer Mac!

Quotes and video clips via ESPN

He’s going to be around for 7 years, so we might as well dig in here and get to the real question: How’s Matt Holiday’s wife looking?

Verdict: Eh.  Not bad.

Evidence:

After meeting on a blind date in 1998 and getting engaged a year later, Matt and Leslee now have two boys age 5 and 2.

She looks pretty cute.  She’s no Mrs. Heidi (Mark) DeRosa (ahem), but not too shabby either.

Approved!  Kick off  your shoes Mrs. H and make yourself at home!

Of course Rolen was supposed to be around for a long time too.  How’d that end up again?

The Cardinals have finally sealed the deal!  It took a lot of dinners and getting their had slapped away from some boobs, but after a weekend of some heavy petting, the finally went all the way and got the deal done with the apple of their offseason’s eye, Matt Holiday.

Holliday announced the deal himself on ESPN Radio yesterday. (No, not the St. Louis version 101 ESPN, the national version.  Bitch slap!)

“Well, I think first of all going into free agency I had in the back of my mind that I really liked my time in St. Louis and felt it was a good fit for me and my family,” Holliday said on the show.

He added: “At the end of the day we decided that was best for us.”

He followed up with: “Oh, and they were the only ones really bidding for me and they still gave me a sh*t load of money!  Ka-kow!”

The deal for the nearly 30 year old (Jan 15th) Holliday is for 7 years and roughly $120 million, giving him an average of $17 million dollars a year.

More from Holliday:

“When you’re a little kid growing up hoping to be a professional baseball player and hoping to play in the major leagues, I don’t think you ever think about the money,” Holliday said. “Now that you look at it, it’s a little overwhelming.”

We’ll take some Matt.  Don’t want you feeling uncomfortable.

Quotes via ESPN

According to ESPN’s Jayson Stark our very own Albert Pujols is baseball’s MVP of the decade!  …duh.

After all, what didn’t Sir Albert do in this decade, outside of forgetting to get to the big leagues until 2001, neglecting to finish in the top four in the MVP voting once and never quite getting around to winning any Nobel Peace Prizes?

So is there really any argument here? If a man has pretty much been the MVP of his league in every single year of an entire decade, what would be the case that he isn’t the MVP for the decade as a whole? Correct answer: There’s no case. None.

Sounds like a pretty locked up case to me.

In a related note, my Mom recently named me the decade’s MVP of Cuteness.  Sadly I came in third place for the decade’s MVP of Being the Nicest Little Boy to “Josh the Bat Boy” and one of those kids in the Slyman Brothers commercials.  …I don’t even know how she knows them!

Stark goes on to say that not only did Pujols get over 50% of all MVP votes for the decade, and come away with the 00’s Triple Crown, but Alberts farts cure acne. True. Story. One blast to the face and your pock marked mug smooths into silky skin babies are jealous of.

Seriously though, don’t forget when you watch him play here all summer that you are watching one of the top 5 greatest baseball players ever.  Ever!  Pretty amazing and something we probably take for granted here.

If I didn’t recognize the two on the left as St. Louis Cardinals Brendan Ryan and Colby Rasmus, I would say this picture appears to be the start of an amazing douche collection.

It has it all, the guy that throws the peace sign everywhere, the “I’ve been rocking this so long it can’t possibly be ironic any longer” mustache and a straight up classic “Me Play Sports Good” face on young Colby in the middle.

Don’t get us wrong, Rasmus and Ryan are solid young players, but photos like this make us miss Larry Walker and Reggie Sanders.