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baseball reference
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top 50 career batting on one tab
top 50 career pitching on another tabI agree that tenure with the Cardinals on this list is important. The arguments about Albert being in the same class as Musial (as a Cardinal) are simply wrong.
Number two of three articles…
I agree with all except catcher. Molina should be the choice. You can’t just WAR with Molina…he adds so many intangibles. If you go only by WAR he isn’t getting in the HOF but to me, he is a lock.
In this all-time #stlcards draft, I predict a close battle between @ToddZola and @Jeff_Erickson for second and third place! https://t.co/e61YteqZkj
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) May 3, 2020
This is a great exercise, Brian. As a side note, in 1943 Stan Musial led MLB in
batting average, on base percentage, slugging percentage, hits, doubles, and triples. He was the NL MVP at 22 years old. After the 1944 season, he was called into the Navy and served for 15 months (mostly spent at Pearl Harbor), missing the entire 1945 season. When he came back in 1946, he led MLB in almost every measurable statistic, led the team to a World Championship, and again was awarded the MVP. I wonder what he missed in additional WAR as a Cardinal being out for the 1945 season."Stan, Red, Ozzie and Ted – My St. Louis Cardinals Dream Team" I focused on career WAR in selecting my all-time #stlcards team and using that criteria, my draft comes out on top, over @Jeff_Erickson and @ToddZola of @RotoWire. Sorry, guys! https://t.co/y2tdIWdNxz pic.twitter.com/DI4pAEEmet
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) May 3, 2020
Brian, I believe it’s safe to say that you ate their lunch. If those teams played each other, I’d give your team a great shot to win a Cardinal Series. Team 3 has a strong 1-2 punch in the lineup, tremendous speed at the top and a solid front of the rotation but top to bottom, your roster looks dominant.
It was really fun and it sparked quite a twitter discussion, too. Some commenters were focused on top individual seasons, which would have led to a different draft. Coming in, they kept the rules sort of vague on purpose.
A lot of what can be said of Molina could be said of Simmons in his time. A lot of times he was the glue on some bad teams that didn’t have much else. Yadi has always had a a big star or two and a decent ensemble cast. No so for Ted.
IMO whoever got the first pick (Musial) would be the winner in bWAR. In reality, team 1 doesn’t have enough pitching to beat #2 and #3 consistently.
It is all in how the guidelines are defined. The career WAR lead for Stan over the next tier of players is 30-40 WAR. My team was 66 WAR higher than the next closest one. If the players were playing real games, it would be one thing. If fantasy categories were used to score, it would be another, but the guidelines for the exercise were purposely vague. It would be interesting to do it again looking at best individual season, rather than career accomplishments, as the teams would be very different, but it was a lot of fun no matter what.
IMO whoever got the first pick (Musial) would be the winner in bWAR. In reality, team 1 doesn’t have enough pitching to beat #2 and #3 consistently.
With only 6 pitchers, any team would struggle to hold those offenses back!
By my eye, I suspect that Team #1 has the best offense, followed by Team #3 and then Team #2. Team #2 has the best pitching, then Team #1 and then Team #3.
Sure glad you got “Stash”. Some people don’t know that he is 2nd all time in total bases. 3rd all time in doubles. 4th all time in hits. And 3rd all time in runs created. Those who didn’t have a chance to see him play missed a real treat.
Interesting project. Some of the picks are puzzling to me. I would have chosen Joe Torre over Matt Carpenter at third base, or over Garry Templeton as my utility guy.
I don’t understand at all the Mordecai Brown pick. Was he choosing based on career, despite such little time as a Cardinal? If so, why not go Grover Cleveland Alexander? Alex made much more of a mark as a Cardinal than Brown, and his career WAR is double Brown’s, in about half again as many seasons.
Then Jeff chose both Lee Smith and Jason Isringhausen. I can see putting one of those guys on, but then filling the other slot with the likes of Bill Sherdel, Howie Pollet, Spittin’ Bill Doak, Joaquin Andujar, or maybe even Burleigh Grimes or Nellie Briles. Heck you might make a case for Ernie Broglio, who was pretty dang good as a Cardinal, or his mates Larry Jackson and Lindy McDaniel. Or you could go the “Mordecai Brown” route and put the Dazzler on your club, the great Dazzy Vance.
Carpenter has higher Cardinals WAR than Rolen (my pick) who had three more WAR than Torre. I just really liked my infield with Rolen and Ozzie to go with Red and Bottomley. I had Joe as my third catcher, ahead of McCarver, but I didn’t need it. Joe should have been on someone’s roster for sure.
I think the Mordecai Brown pick was a whiff. I don’t get the idea of taking multiple closers, either. I thought Jeff was going to take Broglio because he even mentioned him on the telecast when he selected Brock.
Overall, it was surprising to me how many pitchers were in the 15-30 career WAR bandwidth as Cardinals. That is why I filled all my hitters first. The offensive dropoff was much steeper.
I like your roster best of the three, Brian. As I mentioned, I think the other two have a couple of clunker picks. The Three-Finger Brown pick was arguably the biggest blunder. He pitched one year for the Cardinals, going 9-13 for a very poor club, throwing 201 innings. He pitched over 2300 innings for the Cubs, and is a legitimate Hall of Famer, but as a Cub.
Some others who starred mostly for other teams but spent time in St. Louis I can understand, such as Steve Carlton, Alexander as I mentioned above, and several others. A couple more to consider and who are long forgotten are Slim Sallee, a good lefthander mostly in the dead ball era, and Dave Foutz, who along with Carruthers was a big contributor to those 1880s powerhouse clubs. And if you want to get a little more modern, Matt Morris.
Todd mistakenly drafted a seventh pitcher, who was Sallee. He had to remove him and take his utility instead. I would have drafted Carlton if Jeff hadn’t. He may never make it, but I believe Carlton is deserving to be in the team Hall of Fame. His seven years with the team were that good, but if Hernandez can’t even get elected, it may not happen for Carlton until he gets to the 40-year threshold and the committee can vote him in.
Agree on Lefty. I voted some 15 times or more in the Cardinals HoF ballot, listing Hernandez each time as he is a no-brained in my opinion.
For my second pick I alternated between Tudor and Carlton. I think both should be there eventually, and hope Big Steve does not have to wait too long.
I have spoken to Carlton a couple of times, similar to Hernandez. When you get Steve away from the media and mob and chat more one-on-one, he is relaxed and easy to converse with. My sense with him, without him actually vocalizing this, is that he would have preferred staying in St. Louis, even with the good Phillies teams he was with in the late ‘70s and ‘80s. Not sure he cared for Philadelphia all that much, but again I am speculating on that – he never directly said it.
Carlton really only had 5 full seasons in St. Louis. In 1965 he only pitched 25 innings. In 1966, he only pitched 52 innings.
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