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I am curious what “restructuring their entire player development system” means. It could be a huge development unfolding this winter or it could be meaningless blather.
The same can be said for “the team views improving the baseball operations department to be just as important as adding more pitching.”
Saw this on MLBTR:
As sources told The Athletic, the Cardinals are in the early stages of restructuring their entire player development system, and the team views improving the baseball operations department to be just as important as adding more pitching.
The Athletic article is behind the pay wall there. Can anyone say what sources or who said what
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This is definitely exiting news if true. Stocking your pitching with trades and free agents is destined for failure. Or your core,for that matter. Spending your money on top people to run player development is imo the long term answer. I realize we have to add pitching from the outside for 2024, but not at the expense of weakening the core strength we currently have. I can wait another year if that’s what needs to happen.
No further details confirmed. The specifics are just speculation in the article. Basically increasing the size of the “small” player development staff, especially on the pitching side (Dodgers, Rays, Orioles and D’backs cited as examples with bigger staffs).
Is The Athletic on the SI path? How do you get ‘restructuring player development’ and ‘improving the Baseball Ops Dept’ out of adding a few guys? I guess we wait and see.
I respect Katie Woo and The Athletic. They are at the park every day. Comparing them to SI, which has no team presence, is ridiculous. Since you cannot even read their content, just maybe you shouldn’t slam them.
Having said that, writers are left to try to read between the lines as to the specifics of what Mozeliak is talking about. Writers have their “sources” but few are in the know and they know better than to say much. The Cardinals haven’t had their end of season meetings yet so even Mo may not know the specifics.
P.S. And even if they did know, it affects people’s jobs and their families’ livelihoods. They sure as heck shouldn’t hear about it first in the media.
This is the specific quote from Mo that closed his remarks (at least as reported). There as no further quote after this, just the writer commenting on what it may mean.
“…To do nothing, regardless of how you think about the organizational structure, I do think we should be looking at different ways to solve our problems in our situation. … I really think it’s more baseball operations in general and not simply just our major-league staff.”
The specific “restructure their player development system” comment is not a direct quote from any person but was attributed to “multiple sources.”
P.S. “Baseball Operations” is everything under Mo.
Well I read an article talking about the recent cardinal philosophy of just being good enough to make the playoffs or at least challenge for wild card spot. That’s why I’ve always hated the wild card system. Back in the day you played to win your division, if you felt you didn’t have that kind of team, instead of hoping miracles happened, you developed a plan to be good enough within a season or two. Once wild card came along and was instantly successful at winning it all, more teams started going the route of just being good to sneak in. The article mentioned that as of recent times, the wild card teams aren’t being as successful particularly st Louis but across the board generally wise with just few exceptions. So the article basically said the Cardinals need to get away from that and become more interested in a system that prioritizes winning a division and possible bye.
Well I read an article talking about the recent cardinal philosophy of just being good enough to make the playoffs or at least challenge for wild card spot. That’s why I’ve always hated the wild card system.
Yes, that is what is wrong with the team. They no longer have to play to win the division, they have to be in the top 50% of the National League to make the playoffs and reach their goals.
They have become content with mediocrity.
Evidently, nobody in the Cardinals organization ever read, “From Good to Great.”
How do you get ‘restructuring player development’ and ‘improving the Baseball Ops Dept’ out of adding a few guys?
Because the chunks and bits Mo spit out were vague. Mo is usually good at that, or maybe the reporters were bad at drawing out more specifics in this case.
It really doesn’t matter if you’re after good clues about the team’s prospect for progress, because things have devolved to the point that it’s important to pay attention only to the stuff that happens and not the stuff that’s said. Like last year on rehires/fires, Maddux, Albert and Holliday all said “I ain’t working here no more.” That was very disconcerting at the time, and even more so after it played out a bit. Looking back, that was about the most damning foreshadow for this season I can think of. Mo couldn’t cover that up very well and more stuff like that this year would not be good. And they just lost a coach to girls college softball. I wonder if the Cards stand alone as the only MLB team to have its staff poached by college softball?
The team needs to go into spring training with optimism. It can’t be same old, same old. It all depends what pitchers we obtain over the winter and that depends on DeWitt’s willingness to part with some of his do…re….mi. The attendance yesterday was shown at 93% full. That probably doesn’t help us. C’mon Mo spend what $$ you get wisely this time. I can’t take another ’23. Brutal.
Speaking of speculation wasn’t it mentioned awhile back that Mo would eventually transition into an “advisor role” while someone else would be moved up to PBO (I assume Girsch or Flores)? Mo’s contract apparently runs through 2025 so that transition may not happen this winter or maybe ever but it is something to keep an eye on.
And I agree with the other posters in not liking the wild card system. It has given the teams an excuse not to try to build a championship caliber team because they can always fall back on the “playoffs are a crapshoot” explanation so “just get in and see what happens”.
I would be ok with maybe one wild card per league but three is ridiculous. Of course the owners want a lot of wild card teams because they don’t have to build a team capable of winning 90 games and they can have a .500 ballclub playing “meaningful” games in September which help ticket sales.
Even if attendance was shown at 93% full, many of those tickets were discounted. And all those who had tickets and stayed home did not buy merchandise and concessions at the park. The Cardinals are surely feeling it, but whether lower than expected revenues translates to increased spending is unknown.
As a reminder, today, Flores reports to Girsch, who reports to Mo. Not saying Girsch couldn’t be skipped over, but he also might leave if that happened.
Interesting discussion on Wild Card, but it isn’t going to change for the reason$ mentioned.
Not saying Girsch couldn’t be skipped over, but he also might leave if that happened.
I’m not saying the Cards might want to fire Girsch, but if they ever decide to “fire” him by promoting somebody else (Flores mentioned) to POBO over him, I’m not sure it would work. Girsch doesn’t strike me as a guy who has a lot of leverage around the league.
Also for gscott, Brian or anybody, I missed the story where Mo might transition eventually to an advisor role, as gscott mentioned above. Any article you can point me to?
I do recall that when the POBO position was created, there was discussion of an evolution where Mo (as POBO) would be doing more and more strategic work on how to continuously modernize the organization and keep the Cards on the forefront of advanced technology, analytics, techniques, philosophies, etc., and how to implement all this. Focus was to keep Cards baseball ops on the leading edge to build/maintain a strategic edge over the rest of MLB.
Is that what you’re referring to, gscott? If so, I interpreted all that as something much more grandiose than “advisor.” Speaking of that, I haven’t perceived much evolution on the role of POBO. Mo still seems a lot closer to bean counter than strategic visionary and do-er. But again, I probably missed what you referred to on the advisor role.
The POBO is a trend around baseball that began with Theo in Chicago if I recall. Then the rest of herd followed. There were lots of grandiose words put around it, but the reality is that it is just an elevated title with the same responsibilities the POBO had as GM. That then allowed them to “promote” their top assistant GM to “full” GM to supposedly keep him in the fold.
Just my opinion, but how can any organization have multiple presidents? Reminds me of banks where everyone is a VP. Exec VP, Senior VP, First VP, Second VP, etc…
P.S. I am not aware of any direct comments Mo made about his future beyond his current extension. Maybe he hinted at something or maybe others are speculating. Before his promotion, Girsch supposedly turned down a chance to interview for the Mets’ GM position (back a GM or two). Whether he is as appealing today externally is a fair question.
So is the question of why DeWitt would jump his own hierarchy? This assumes an orderly transition, as discussed here with Mo stepping aside, not a mass housecleaning. In the latter case, anything could happen. But I really, really doubt it will happen now. Another bad year in 2024, however, and all bets may be off.
In their year end discussions, they might zero in on why a number of position players and pitchers (both starters and relievers) performed below both their career numbers and 2022 numbers.
And why they have had so much trouble driving in RISP. Especially with the bases loaded, where they rank 30th out of 30.
This article from last February mentions some potential changes coming in the front office and a “passing of the torch”. Nothing seemed to be set in stone though.
https://www.kmov.com/2023/02/14/reports-cardinals-mozeliak-agrees-contract-extension/
The Flores over Girsch line of thinking is just speculation on my part. The reason is that it is my perception that Flores is more on the radar of other teams around the league than Girsch is and the Cardinals should do everything in their power to keep him based on his draft performances. DeWitt may view that differently.
If Flores is your future leader and you want to keep him, you make him GM to give him the best and broadest possible experiences before taking over all of baseball ops. If another team wants him, that is precisely what they will do.
Frankly, I am not sure that the status of the farm system (near the top of the bottom half of MLB) coupled with the negative trend at the MLB level makes anyone from the organization all that appealing externally right now.
In 2020, Flores was exceptional, gambling on three high schoolers at the top of the COVID draft, but that is essentially what his reputation rides on.
We will learn this off-season about who might be in demand for interviews.
Fixing the Cardinals is a portfolio optimization problem.
You have two assets – money and players
You have two constraints – budget and roster
So, how do we optimize the roster subject to payroll and roster constraints?
First, let’s look at the budget:
Using Opening Day payroll for 2023, these are the (net) subtractions from the roster. I say net, because Wainwright & DeJong still have some money owed. I am also counting pro-rated signing bonuses as part of salary.
Wainwright (-$17.5M); Montgomery (-$10M); DeJong (-$6.3M); Flaherty (-$5.4M); Hicks (-$5M); Verhagen (-$3M); Stratton (-$2.8M); Cabrera (-$0.95M). Total: (-$50.9M). If we assume each one is replaced with someone making the major league minimum, then we have a net of roughly $45 million to work with.
Players likely to be traded to free up cash/improve roster elsewhere:
Gallegos (-$5.75M); O’Neill (-$4.95M); Hudson (-2.65M); Andrew Knizner (-$1.1M). Total: (-$14.45M) Again, if we assume replacement with players making the minimum, that is an additional $11.5 million to spend.Total available: $56.5 million
I am going to count the “dry powder” as salary increases they already have on the books:
Mikolas (-$2.7M); Matz (+$2M); Contreras (+8M). Total: +$7.25MIn terms of the starting rotation we have to improve upon, we have to replace:
Adam Wainwright – 101.0 IP/7.40 ERA
Jordan Montgomery – 188.2 IP/3.20 ERA
Jack Flaherty – 143.1 IP/4.96 ERA
Dakota Hudson – 81.1 IP/4.98 ERAIn terms of Cardinals likely still on the roster:
Zack Thompson – 66.1 IP/4.48 ERA
Drew Rom – 29.1 IP/7.98 ERAI don’t think the Cardinals will be able to improve upon Jordan Montgomery, so I think he has to be one of the FA pitchers they sign. Probably something like 4 years/$82 million or 5 years/$100 million.
5/125 more likely. and unless he sees the team making a real effort to improve he won’t commit. I say he waits.
My guess is Monty has seen enough of the Cardinals.
Up above a couple weeks ago somebody said:
Spending your money on top people to run player development is imo the long term answer.
But that can’t happen. The org would not hire them and they would not want to come. The org want people to adhere to the philosophy and implement it, not decide there are changes needed to make it better and push for those changes. We saw exactly that with Shildt. It is probably why Maddox and Albert left. There was no avenue for utilizing their knowledge and experience. There is no reason to think the org would be more interested in hearing about it from polo shirts than from uniformed personnel. Mo wants drones who will follow instructions and stay in their lane, not “top people”.
I got around to reading MLBTR’s Cardinals offseson outlook article. I picked out a few items, which are just their speculative take:
Speaking about O’Neill “They showed little interest in trading him and reportedly plan to give him the left field job to start his final year of club control.”
Citing Winn’s young age and slow offensive start ” Winn is probably ticketed for Triple-A to start next season, which would leave Edman as the presumptive starting shortstop.”
They mentioned that Herrera is now out of options and will either be traded or on the active roster all next season.
They mentioned that any significant FA pen acquisition would be the first since Andrew Miller.
The rest is just canned trade speculation spew.
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