CARDS HAVE A TEAM, NOT MERELY A HERO MCGWIRE IS HAPPY TO BE WINNING AGAIN.

Byline: Matt McHale Staff Writer

People forget that before he became a legend, Mark McGwire was a winner.

In his last three seasons, McGwire averaged 64 home runs. Three times in the first four years of his career, he went to the World Series with the Oakland A's.

Yet as he clubbed his way into baseball mythology by setting records and reviving a sagging sport, the importance of those titles became blurred.

By everyone but him.

McGwire's St. Louis Cardinals were a bad team but a great attraction. They were 23 games under .500 the past three years but had more than three million in attendance each season. How else to explain how he could hit 70 homers in 1998 - shattering Roger Maris' single-season record by nine - and not be named the National League's Most Valuable Player?

Last season, McGwire had 65, but in the games he hit home runs, the Cardinals were 24-32.

``All I've ever asked is to be on a team that's competitive,'' McGwire said this week in San Francisco. ``I know how hard it is to get to a World Series. All I ask is to go into the last week battling for it. For two years here, it was a stalemate. The same team and the same players.''

Out of McGwire's frustration has come a new Cardinals team, one that is 20-14 and in first place in the National League Central heading into tonight's series opener against the Dodgers at Busch Stadium.

They are still hitting home runs. Their 55 in April set a major-league record for the season's first month. But just seven were hit by McGwire, who has overcome back problems to regain his place among the league leaders.

``He doesn't enjoy being singled out in a team game,'' Cardinals manager Tony La Russa said before a three-game series with the Giants. ``He's not a big ego guy. He's been misunderstood. When he hits two home runs and we lose, they want him to be all excited. If he isn't, they say he has a bad attitude or is surly. Are we so screwed up we want the guy to celebrate his individual day if we got beat? I think we need more like him. There's enough arrogance these days.''

By acquiring Jim Edmonds from the Angels in exchange for 18-game winner Kent Bottenfield and rookie second baseman Adam Kennedy, the Cardinals added a

left-handed power hitter to balance the lineup.

Edmonds, who the Angels refused to trade for McGwire in 1997, is having a career year in a career that already has been impressive.

He leads the NL in hitting with a .406 average and is among the league leaders in home runs (11), slugging percentage (.794), on-base percentage (.533), walks (31) and runs (34).

All this translates into a potent offense, but it's not enough to ensure a winner in the NL's toughest division. If they had beaten Cincinnati, which won 98 games in 1999, last Sunday, the Cardinals would have led the Central by 5 1/2 games. The lead now is 1 1/2 games.

General manager Walt Jocketty also upgraded the pitching staff, bringing in former AL Cy Young award winner Pat Hentgen from Toronto and Darryl Kile from Colorado. Hentgen, who will pitch Sunday against Carlos Perez, has struggled, but Kile is 6-1 and has regained the form that made him one of the NL's top pitchers during his final two seasons in Houston.

But make no mistake. Offense runs this team. Andy Benes has received the least amount of run support, and he's getting 4.3 per start.

And even that hasn't been enough at times with the Cardinals' shaky bullpen.

Will it be enough to win the Central? Houston has won it the past three seasons but is struggling in its new ballpark. After opening the season 7-2, the Cardinals are 13-12.

But McGwire is pleased and that means a lot.

``This team reminds me of the A's,'' he said. ``Guys love to come to the ballpark, they want to be together at home and away. It's been a while since I've been on a team this competitive and this close.''