Hummel: Jim Edmonds, future Cardinals owner?

A much practiced 3-step approach, no doubt.

St. Louis restaurateur Edmonds, who is helping with the outfielders, said he didn’t think he wanted to be a full-time coach and travel much of the season. Instead, Edmonds, who is known for his whimsy, has a rather unusual aspiration.

“I’d like to own the team some day, to be honest,” Edmonds said this weekend. “You see (Cardinals chairman) Bill DeWitt stand up in front of the team and be such a stately figure. What a great position it would be to be like a Magic Johnson (Los Angeles Dodgers) or a Michael Jordan (Charlotte Bobcats), where you have part of an ownership

“I don’t know if I’d like to put the group together or sneak in the back door,” Edmonds said. “But I definitely think that it would be a great thing to be high up in the front office and evaluate and do all the fun things.

“Well, they’re not all fun but I’d like to do the things involved in keeping a team winning.

“You start talking about the tradition. There’s ways to do it out there on the field and there’s ways to do it up there’’ in the front office.

...DeWitt chuckled Saturday when Edmonds’ desire for ownership was relayed to him. He said Edmonds hadn’t talked about any ownership stake with him — and the team isn’t for sale.

“No plans at all,” DeWitt said. “We’re very happy with the situation.”

But DeWitt said Edmonds had expressed an interest in being more involved.

“He knows the game as well as anybody,” DeWitt said.