*snore*
I've been hearing that one ever since the "experts" realized they were going to be wrong about their predictions. Whatever excuse helps you sleep at night, I suppose.
The Tigers made it to the World Series and, for all intents and purposes, choked. St. Louis did what a good team does--they took advantage of EVERY mistake Detroit made. The Cardinals were free of any kind of pressure, and they certainly played like it. They had three extremely impressive pitching performances (Reyes, Carpenter, Weaver in Game 5), and two very good ones. The Tigers looked totally unprepared, but the Cardinals looked like a team that won 90+ games in the regular season (they most certainly would have if not for injuries throughout the year).
People who don't follow the Cardinals wrote them off, but those who do follow them knew that the overall record was very deceiving. Our players got healthy in the postseason, we did not have Jason Isringhausen closing for us (10 blown saves in the regular season--a big contributor to our final record), the starting pitching really got it together, and the bullpen was stellar, headed up by Adam Wainwright. Watching them win it all was almost surreal.
Good job, Cards! St. Louis deserves it!