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6:45 p.m.
RHP Adam Wainwright (0-0, 7.20) vs. RHP Corbin Burnes (4-2, 3.35)
BSM // KMOX // WIJR
(and Bally Sports Southeast/Southwest Extra)This one will be tough. Burnes is capable of shutting a team down. Hopefully Fahrenheit can turn in a good performance and we can steal this one.
Need a win because we have the Dodgers coming in for a four game set and they are on a roll.
We need this series bad. Waino will reach down for everything he’s got. I hope there is something there and it is enough..
Matthew Liberatore is being called up to start this game. The Cardinals are going to a six-man rotation with Wainwright moved to Thursday.
Liberatore ‘s first major league action this year is a start in basically a must win game against the Brewers? At least it’s at home….
Seems a bit desperate.
If we go to a six man rotation I assume that the bench will lose a man, Barrera I’d guess since they decided to let Contreras catch again.
Can’t imagine shortening the pen with the lack of innings the starters cover.
I don’t see it as desperate. Giving the starters an extra day when they haven’t gone deep and there are no days off seems a good idea. Milwaukee is better against RHP so that is likely why now.
A pitcher will have to go down, as the roster must stay at 13-13. As I wrote in the article, my guess is James Naile will be the one.
Barrera could go when O’Neill is ready, rather than either Yepez or Burleson.
We are facing Burnes, who is one of the best pitchers in MLB. I don’t see how Liberatore is a desperate move as we are likely going to struggle anyway. Maybe he throws 6 shutout innings and we win 1-0, who knows.
Liberatore looks to be ready and the Brewers struggle against lefties. So if you’re going to do it, you may as well do it now with this long stretch of games. Plus, the timing is perfect to pitch against the Brewers. We don’t want his first start of the year to be against the Dodgers. I like the move. But it does leave us with one less pitcher in the pen.
I don’t have a problem with Liberatore coming up. It should have happened a few weeks ago. But going to a 6 man rotation doesn’t help with the innings deficit by the starters. It actually makes it worse since the bullpen will now be down a guy. What we need is five starting pitchers who can give us six innings regularly, but that seems too much to wish for.
Yeah, I don’t think any team has 5 SP’ers who are capable of consistently taking on that kind of workload. I’d say if you have 3 of them, you’re doing really good.
I don’t think very many teams even have 1 pitcher who has averaged over 6 innings per start.
Even the great Ohtani is slightly under that. I think there’s around 15 pitchers out there that meet that standard.
But yeah, it would sure be nice to have 3 that could. Or better yet, 4 of 6.
Yeah, you’d be a run of the mill .500 team if you had 5 Jake Westbrooks, but at least the BP would be well rested.
Interesting with Libby. The six man makes sense in this stretch, but as others have said we need the starters to consistently get through the first half to two thirds of the outs.
On another topic, like 1TD I am not a big fan of the batting order Marmol is using. Although there is some justification in hitting your top man at 2 in a DH lineup, I think a stronger set up is to put Goldy at 3. I might even go Goldy, Gorman, Arenado at 3,4,5, doing the R-L-R. Hit Noot and Edman (or Donovan) at 1 and 2.
And finally, Noot is becoming a fine player. Like the way he goes to the left side a lot, and with power.
Hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think Libratore can save us. A better idea would be to move Dejong from last night’s 5 slot to 3 or clean-up…
In my view, placing Goldy in the 2 slot creates a few problems of which the primary one is that it creates a situation that allows an opposing pitcher an extended stretch in which he doesn’t face a serious power threat after the clean up hitter. He can relax a bit after Nado and, to me, the teeth of the order doesn’t seem to have any extended bite. I’ll use last night’s line-up as an example. If you were a pitcher and a baserunner or two were aboard, would you rather have a stretch that consisted of Goldy, Contreras, Nado, DeJong and Gorman, or Goldy, Nado, Gorman, Contreras and either Edman or Donovan? The Nootz unquestionably belongs in the lead-off slot at the moment, but I’d take either Donovan or Eddie in the 2 slot over Goldschmidt anytime. I think it’s a bad idea to have both Edman and Donovan placed at the tail end of the order with both Dejong and Knizner. It’s too much of an extended breather for the opposition.
I’ll also say that the Cardinals did pretty good last season with Goldy in the 3 slot and I can’t forget that all the problems seemingly began at the instant the line-ups were announced for the 1st game of the ’22 NLWC series and the Redbird whiz-kid field manager had Donovan placed at 5 and Albert Pujols placed at 2nd. If he was responsible for that fiasco, it’s entirely clear to me that filling out a Big League line-up card is not his longsuit.
Back in the 80’s and 90’s it was very commonplace for most starters to go six innings. Nowadays if a guy can average six innings he requires close to $20M per year and is probably looking at some top 10 cy young votes. Thanks Moneyball.
As for Goldy at number 2, I mean we had a really good week last week with that lineup so it can work, however, I agree that he would get more RBI chances hitting third. One thing Marmol seems hung up on is that he prefers to stagger the RH and LH hitters in order as much as possible. While I understand the benefit of doing that I don’t think it should be the deciding factor of the order.
Having a power hitter number 2 in the lineup is not a new phenomenon. Those of us that followed the Cards closely in the 80’s were used to switch hitting slap hitters at the top (Coleman, McGee, Herr, etc.) but things began to change in the 90’s and early 00’s. Off the top of my head the first slugger I remember the Cards hitting second was Larry Walker. That was LaRussa’s idea.
Oh and who hits second for the Yankees these days? That would be Aaron Judge, he of 62 HR last year.
IMO, the use of radar guns, shorter starts and more arm problems are related. The timelines of both trends probably corresponds.
Tagging on to the lineup comments, it is indeed something I think the Cardinals are weak on. Shildt hit Goldy at 2 for most of 2021 I believe, so obviously management has some metrics that they believe gives them an advantage with Goldy there. One number is probably my that hitting 2 will give you some extra PAs over the course of a season compared to 3.
But I still think you build a stronger run producing lineup with Goldy at 3. At 3 you consistently have your 1 and 2 guys ahead of him, who should be better than your 9 and 1 guys. Then go with strong bats at 4 through 6 and that is a tough stretch for the opposition.
I don’t like Contreras at 3. He is perfect at 5 or 6 though. Gorman is looking like a great 4 or 5 hitter, and possibly even at 2 depending on the starters on a given day.
And yes, in that post season game having Donovan at 5 and Pujols at 2 was asinine. Flip them and you had your on base guys, who could run, followed by three power guys – a formula built for run production.
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