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Arbitration exists for a reason. I don’t have a problem with that and wouldn’t consider it ‘fighting’ either.
If the players always get what they want, they will keep asking for more and more money in those hearings. The system is designed to cap the earnings.
If we were talking about a random journeyman the Cardinals had signed to a league minimum salary to be a bench player I doubt this thread would be on page four, however, this isn’t just a random journeyman. It is a player with an extensive history with the club, therefore, the concern is that the Cardinals will not treat him as the 26th man. History suggests that they won’t be able to control themselves.
It is a player with an extensive history with the club . . . History suggests that they won’t be able to control themselves.
Yep, and the most recent history includes a significant poor strategic decision, PLUS subsequent poor day-to-day tactical decisions. Those often go hand-in-hand with the Cards as the top brass can’t seem to separate the two, which compounds some problems unnecessarily.
We’ll have to hope for the upside on this one. One thing I’ll say for Carp, he gets paid the same whether he plays or stays home. He wants more than just the paycheck. He obviously loves the game and wants to play.
I would have much preferred Palacios over Carpenter, but we did get a mid-30s pitcher with recent arm woes for Richie. That is about all this management group can get these days it seems.
But who knows, maybe old Carp will suddenly find it again like he did when wearing the pinstripes, and go all “Albert 2022” for us. That is the fascinating thing about baseball – just when you think you have it all figured out, things go a different way.
I think what really gripes some Cardinal fans about this signing is that it gives the impression that the organization really isn’t that interested in building a championship caliber team. They always seem more interested in gimmicks and feel good stories. That may not be their intent but that is certainly the impression. I like Carp because he was once a great Cardinal player but nostalgia doesn’t win championships.
I have a hard time with the idea there was still enough need for veteran presence to justify using a roster spot on a player with so little utility. We got rid of the bad apples, I thought. We brought in 3 veterans on top of what we had. It doesn’t pass the smell test.
Bad apples? This a clear cut case of one bad apple spoiling the entire bunch. And that apple’s not only really, really bad, but also continues to take up residence on the top step.
bling said:
We brought in 3 veterans on top of what we had. It doesn’t pass the smell test.
Not apples and oranges, but different kinds of apples.
All three you refer to are starting pitchers. As noted before, starters hang with starters, relievers with relievers and position players with position players. I am not defending the Carp move, but I see why it does not overlap with Lynn, Gibson and Gray from the leadership angle.
Mo said that carrying the leadership burden last year was “demanding” on Goldy, so they got him help. It must have been a bigger problem than we know for them to tie up a roster spot on it.
But I am being repetitive, so I will stop here…
Some guys just aren’t geared for a leadership role and I feel that Goldy’s one of those guys. In my view, his temperament is similar to what I observed from Matt Holliday when he was a Cardinal. Obviously Holliday and Goldschmidt are both outstanding baseball players, but I don’t feel they possess the sort of mindset that would place them anywhere near qualifying as the type of on field or clubhouse leader as guys named Chris Carpenter, Yadier Molina, Albert Pujols, or even Lance Berkman. The collective mindset of those four names contained enough leadership fire to set a clubhouse or baseball field ablaze…If the Cardinals are planning on Lynn, Gibson, Gray and Matt Carpenter to provide the type of clubhouse or on field veteran leadership required to vault this team back into a position of prominence, they’re in deep trouble. Before anything good happens, they’ll first need a genuine Big League manager to lead this team.
It doesn’t take a genius to understand that leadership starts at the top. In this case, the Cardinals are desperately searching searching for somebody to do Marmol’s job for him. While it’s wonderful if a team has a vet or two who can help out but it’s the manager who sets the tone and drives the stagecoach, not the wheel horse (or in this case, the rear-left Clydesdale).
I dunno, CIF. It is different today from the old days when management ruled. About all the manager controls now is the lineup and playing time and there are those here who think he doesn’t even do that.
I think he doesn’t even do that. If he did, someone with an appropriate resume would have been hired. He does what his resume suggests he is qualified to do.
If the analytic room is not handing down an optimum lineup, to the manager daily, they aren’t doing their job. The manager should have the best case scenarios / matchups for that game, in hand, to base his decisions on. I’d be alarmed if this weren’t the case.
BW: That being the case, where does the failure of leadership lie? If, as Mo said, carrying the leadership burden was demanding on Goldy, does that mean it’s all Goldy’s fault? Jeepers! Who’s next? Maybe it’s my fault!
It depends if the analytic department is handing down options or a highly suggested recommendation. My assumption is that it is the latter. As I have said before it is not a coincidence the Cardinals have had three rookie managers in a row. They pull the levers they are asked to pull.
There are very good theories here. My take is that like almost everything in life, the most likely answer is not at one end of the extreme or the other.
For example, does Marmol get analytic input on the lineup? Of course. Does he get heat if he goes in another direction? Probably much less so if they win.
Do they have no leadership? Of course not. But there seems enough data points to suggest there was a reason it became a priority to enhance. Even the manager himself said at WWU that he has to do a better job in 2024.
Numbers cant script a baseball game. They can be provided, and highly suggested, but sore necks and sore toes make decisions too.
I’d be asking for a daily cheatsheet on that days pen vs bench handedness matchups, for both teams.
No manager can do all that from the dugout and manage a game at the same time. Splits takes work, and it’s too much to memorize.
Whitey Herzog and Dave Duncan both had these big binders full of data that they used during the game. I don’t know where they got the information from but neither struck me as the type to take much advice from upstairs.
It’s my view that any focus placed “upstairs” during a baseball game only serves to diminishes a clear picture of what’s happening at field level. There’s not near enough area contained in any skybox to play the game of baseball.
The game has changed since Whitey and DD, not unlike how technology has changed every aspect of our daily lives. In Whitey’s heyday, the personal computer had just been invented and Gates and Jobs were young tech weenies working out of their basements and garages.
Technology isn’t bad. Any and all concern is in how it is used. And we cannot see that clearly from our vantage point. But keeping the eye on the big picture, to try to pin the disaster of a 71-win season on the numbers nerds would be pretty crazy, maybe more so than giving them credit for 93 wins the year before.
P.S. Duncan’s use of analytics was years ahead of its time. Today, he’d have staffers to prepare that for him, but you can bet he would still pour over it religiously. And when all the emotion is stripped away, that is all it is about – trying to find an edge to win. But competition constantly causes the bar to be raised higher. If you stay back in the 80’s, you are putting yourself at a disadvantage, whether you are playing baseball or manufacturing automobiles.
I hope Duncan gets into the team Hall of Fame one day…
If CArpenter is released before Spring Training ends, is he owed a full minimum salary, or is it prorated?
He would be owed a pro-rated amount as severance pay. That’s 30-45 days of pay depending on exactly when he gets released. But if he makes the opening day roster, the Cards are on the hook for his full minimum salary regardless of when/if they release him during the season.
All of that info gets credited to Skyriec on VEB. He’s always the contract/rules expert over there.
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