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Well lets look at the pen today. You know the five starting pitchers. That leaves eight spots IF all are healthy!!! Might as well look for 10 !
1) Gallegos 4.75mil
2) VerHagen 3.0mil
3) Stratton 2.8mil
4) Helsley 2.0mil (estimate)
5) Hicks 1.8mil (est.)
6) Hudson 1.75mil (est)
7) Cabrera 1.1mil (est) LHPYeah jj….I think Verhagen is going to strain his shoulder wheeling his suitcase into spring training and may need to rest his shoulder long term….
I love the idea of trading for Sale, I know it’s a big “IF” but if he’s healthy at the end of the year, he’s the Ace they desperately need. Last years injuries seem to be a fluke (comebacker hitting his hand is simple crappy luck).
$10m of his salary is deferred for 15 years also, meaning he would be making $17.5 from what I understand and based on quick math the $10m deferred is $2.5 in todays money.
DeJong, Verhagen and Hudson for Sale?
For a team as tight spending as the Cards, 5.8 mill for Stratton and Verhagen seems a ton for the value (possibly negative).
Well, it’s still December, so I suppose there’s still a chance the Redbirds will trade for, or sign a FA SP’er. December has brought some pretty good luck for the Redbirds in those two categories. On Dec. 12th of ’84 the Cardinals sent George Hendrick to the Pirates for starting LHP’er John Tudor and he did pretty good. I’ll also throw in a little trivia along with this comment because on tomorrow’s date, Dec. 29th, the Redibirds signed a FA starting RHP’er in the winter of ’81. He did pretty good too. Can anyone name who he was?
For a team as tight spending as the Cards, 5.8 mill for Stratton and Verhagen seems a ton for the value (possibly negative).
Agree. Going back for a number of years, Mo’s screwups on relievers have been maddening, well beyond the two you mentioned. He’s had a couple good pickups along the way, but not nearly enough to balance out the bad, especially on a dollar basis.
Same as you adoration of Eddie. You like those results great for you. How about winning in the playoffs…or even winning the world series.
You can lay your worries to rest in regards to winning in the playoffs and winning a WS, Oliver. In ’23 the Redbirds will hit a race track gear in Sept. to win the NLC by a slim margin on the last day of the regular season with a W/L record of 88-74 and will remain white hot in the post-season. They then burn through the post-season with none other than Steve Matz as your coveted “ace” as he works 15 IP’ed to win 2 games in the NLCS and is named the NLCS MVP. But that’s only the beginning of the fun…They win the ’23 WS in 7 games against the Yankees. The ’23 WS MVP?…EDDIE!
Haha 1td, but you left out the best part. Oli will be named Manager of the Year in a landslide vote. Brandan Donovan will attribute his achievement as NL RBI leader and surprise MVP Award to his beloved skipper, saying “I wasn’t sure in the beginning, but batting me in the 5 spot all season long was sheer genius.” In fact, the baseball writers will be so impressed with the young manager, they’ll create a new Manager of the Decade Award. Shortly after the season, they’ll preemptively honor Oli with that one too for the 2020-30 decade.
Edwin Diaz and Liam Hendricks, both closers, will individually have the same salary this season as our entire 8man bullpen.
Haha! I was always under the impression that the “evil” baseball gypsies appeared at the very instant they saw Donovan’s name in the 5 slot last Oct. They then placed an age old Romani curse on not only every Redbird bat in the line-up, but also on the ring finger of Helsley’s right hand… Not to worry though. In ’23 we have the advantage of the “good” baseball gypsies to ward off all those evil baseball spirits still lurking in the vicinity of the Redbird manager…
“That list up above fills me with dread.”
Me too, Bling.
But replace VerHagen with Woodford, Cabrera with Thompson, and move Hudson to the Triple-A rotation until he’s needed in the majors — and add Pacheco or Packy in his place — and you’ve potentially got something really good.Reminders from 2022:
VerHagen 6.65 ERA and 6.53 FIP. Woodford 2.23 and 3.13.
Cabrera 4.63 and 5.62. Thompson (relief only) 0.91 and 3.18.But all of this would obviously require a commonsense, merit-based usage of pitchers, rather than spin rates or salaries or swinging strike data. A man can dream, can’t he?
I just happened to be over at Fangraphs and checked out their 2023 projections for:
Woodford 4.42 ERA, 4.54 FIP
VerHagen 4.16 ERA, 4.30 FIPThompson 3.97 ERA, 4.21 FIP
Cabrera 4.08 ERA, 4.35 ERAPretty much the same… They are obviously doing more than citing last year’s stats and assuming they continue…
Thanks Bob, I feel better now. It would also be helpful if Pallante could be used exclusively out of the pen. He did exceptionally well for a AA pitcher beamed up to MLB.
I see in Mlbtraderumors that Luetge (spelling?) of the Yanks was traded. I really liked him. It looks like the Yanks just didn’t feel his stuff was good enough but I liked his results. Sure would have liked a steady sub 3 era guy in the pen from the left side even if he doesn’t throw 100. I’d have done Luetge for Hicks if the Yanks included a lottery ticket or took on VerHagen. Hicks is tantalizing but he doesn’t seem he will ever evolve from thrower to pitcher and it would be great to clear out 2 spots that constantly caused trouble for a guy who quietly got guys out with average stuff.
“I just happened to be over at Fangraphs and checked out their 2023 projections for:
Woodford 4.42 ERA, 4.54 FIP
VerHagen 4.16 ERA, 4.30 FIPThompson 3.97 ERA, 4.21 FIP
Cabrera 4.08 ERA, 4.35 ERAPretty much the same… They are obviously doing more than citing last year’s stats and assuming they continue…”
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Oh, I’m sure Woodford and Thompson won’t duplicate their spectacular low-2 ERAs in 2023. (Just like Helsley won’t repeat his incredible ERA either.) But I very much doubt that Jake & Zack will see their ERAs double. They could, of course. But I’ll bet even money on the under.
Anywho, Brian, I went out of my way to check Baseball-Reference for their projections, since the above looked highly questionable to me. And indeed, B-Ref sees things much differently.
Woodford 3.54 ERA in 61 IP
VerHagen 4.50 ERA in 36 IPG. Cabrera, 4.00 over 54 innings.
Z. Thompson, 3.27 across 44 innings.The sad fact is that except for 26 innings that he twirled 8 years ago for Detroit, VerHagen has pretty much only been terrible in the majors. And Cabrera? If we very modestly set the “good season” bar for an MLB reliever as a sub-3.50 ERA over at least 30 innings, we see that Genesis Cabrera — and Jordan Hicks, by the way — has never met even that meager standard.
I think it’s pretty clear that [velocity + movement] is a good basis for drafting pitchers, but it is not nearly enough justification to deploy a mediocre pitcher at the MLB level. You simply gotta get people out, no matter how you do it. I’m starting to think that the Cardinal brass has forgotten that. And that Marmol never knew it in the first place.
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“Thanks Bob, I feel better now. It would also be helpful if Pallante could be used exclusively out of the pen. He did exceptionally well for a Double-A pitcher beamed up to MLB.”
Happy to help, if I have. And I agree, Bling, about Pallante. In relief he had an ERA about a run and a half lower than in the rotation. If the club wants him to break camp with the team, then he’s gotta be a bullpenner.
But if they believe he could be a mid-rotation starter long term (surprisingly, his FIP and WHIP were equally mediocre whether starting or relieving), then they have to send him to AAA. Can’t give him the Hicks/Oviedo treatment. Give him the Lance Lynn/Wainwright treatment, i.e., let him develop his craft over dozens of Triple-A starts, and you’ll never regret it.
Andre should probably get extensive Triple-A time regardless of his projected MLB role, but I’m not going to ask for a miracle.
I may be in the minority, but I would like to see what we have in players and prospects and make a deal later if need be. It’s a risk, but we have a lot of young talent that may sort all of this out for us via attrition. Unless the right deal comes along to package up for an upgrade, let’s go! I don’t want to sign another Miller or Cecil who way under performs. Relievers just seem to be a roll of the dice. Like to see what Wilking Rodriguez brings. Looks the part.
I thought it would be amusing to see what Fangraphs projection had to say about MrP’s “steady sub 3 ERA guy” who “doesn’t throw 100” and “who quietly got guys out with average stuff.”
Fangraphs projects Leutge to have a 4.08 ERA in 2023, even though he’s been under 3 the last two years and the last time he was over 4 was 5 years ago in the minors.
Hicks is projected at 3.22 although he has been near or over 5 the last two years and was last near 3.22 4 years ago. VerHagen is projected at 4.16, which he has been over every year since 2015.
It is a good illustration of the dystopian world of Derangemènt Analytica where actual results are not predictive and are therefore irrelevant. Think of it as “the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition”. That’s a sign post up ahead . . .
Boaters know the dangers of piloting their craft by following its wake…
Seriously, though. Some people grab onto projections when they tell them what they want to hear but disparage them when they don’t. As the most recent posts here show, projections can vary quite widely by the source, so putting a lot of weight on any of them has inherent risk.
That doesn’t mean that assuming last year will repeat is any more of an accurate predictor, however. This can especially be the case when there are not extensive past histories and/or other factors such as injuries are involved.
I think projections have their use as long as they aren’t taken too seriously. IMO, it is better to learn what one can from those who study analytics more deeply than us, rather than discard them out of hand.
Bob Reed said:
The sad fact is that except for 26 innings that he twirled 8 years ago for Detroit, VerHagen has pretty much only been terrible in the majors.
Change “VerHagen” to “Mikolas” and you could have said the same thing about the latter before he went overseas and became a better pitcher. Mikolas’ ERA as a starter with Texas had been 6.44.
Things can and do change over time. Maybe that will apply to VerHagen and maybe not. But his 2022 was compromised by injury. No one seems to remember that he ultimately required hip surgery. He is coming to 2023 camp and we will see how he performs. I don’t get what all the beating him up here in the offseason accomplishes. He isn’t going to be the fifth starter, but he could still become a decent multi-innings guy.
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