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Yep, time will tell, but the Rays have made mistakes, too. I am just not ready to proclaim Palacios a long-term major leaguer. Maybe if he learns to handle both lefties and righties, that will change. For now, though, the trade is close to a wash.
I get the approach of looking at a trade over the long haul and I am a numbers guy, but it obscures the value of a player in the current year for a contending club. Good teams sometimes gamble giving up a young player with multiple years of control to get a veteran cog to fill a need for the here and now.
For example, if Lester had been the missing piece to help the Cardinals win the World Series, the fact that Thomas had one good year later on for a last place team is far less important. The flip side is Arozarena’s huge playoff stretch for the Rays a few years ago. Putting career WAR numbers aside, it will be hard for Liberatore to ever have that kind of October impact.
My thinking is the Cardinals don’t go from a contender to a door mat, and the pipeline from top tier to bottom tier without a whole lot of bad decisions having been made over an extended period of time. So it seems reasonable and justifiable to judge recent decisions with a thumb on the scale. Yes, I assume the worst from the F.O., but I think results justify it.
I think we here are obviously more aware of the Cardinals warts than we are of any other franchise – be because we follow this team very closely.
The big market, big money teams can afford to make mistakes because they are more willing to eat a bad contract.
StL has to suffer through the DeJongs, Carpenters, Matzs, and Mikolas contracts because ownership can’t / won’t eat them.
The bloated playoff system has also changed roster construction goals because – while winning 100 games and the division is nice – it pales in comparison to winning 85, squeaking into the play offs, then making a run to the World Series. See 2006 (83 games won but did win division and 2011, last team to qualify for playoffs.)
All of that said, the Cards last WS in 2013 is becoming a distant memory and the FO seems to push the wrong buttons more often than it used to.
The DeWitt / Mo team had a really good run but the past decade had produced average teams with average results – until all wheels fell off last year.
Usually at some point in everyone’s career, they get to the point where they lose the ability to continue to change and evolve to stay at or ahead of the curve.
I will make one last thought surrounding the Palacios-Kittredge deal and tying in to what ZTR said. We have pretty much covered the trade and people are probably tied of reading about it, but just one more point as it illustrates some of the problems of the current management group.
This particular deal, Palacios for Kittredge, is the kind of deal you make around the trade deadline. In other words, a contending team will trade a guy who appears to be more valuable int he future for a guy they really need now.
That is one of the key points I had when I saw this deal go down – I did not expect us to be much better this year than last year. So lets keep our younger talented guys as we should be building for a run in 2-3-4 years when guys like Walker, Gorman, Winn, Hence, Liberatore etc are in their peak productive seasons.
But management thinks they are there now – that they have a team that can win 90 games. They see things through red colored glasses. It’s like they have this mindset of “we are always pretty good, so we will always be pretty good.”
If management refuses to be realistic, then we are at risk to see more of these kind of transactions. And they think Ollie is an “amazing” manager. There is a disconnect between the way they view things and reality. At least it appears that way. Again though, we will have to see how things play out over the next few years.
Well thought out bikemike.
Another aspect of it that I found concerning is that I wondered if it was another Adolis Garcia type thing where the brass didn’t seem to know a young guy could play even though the numbers were there.
My last comment above prompted me to see when this trade happened vis-a-vis Bloom joining.
The trade was Friday Jan. 5 and Bloom was announced Monday Jan. 8.
ZTR, that is one of the best posts I have seen on this board in a long time. Completely spot on with everything you said. The Cardinals make a lot of mistakes but refuse to acknowledge them and rarely eat money so we just always have to ride it out. We have been riding it out for a decade now.
I also agree with bikemike in that the Cardinal FO makes decisions assuming that the next championship is right around the corner. I think they really believe we are always a contender even though no one else in Cardinal Nation feels that way. That is why when several of you guys keep saying that we are going to be sellers again this year or we are in a rebuild I have my doubts. The Cardinals have been sellers one time in the last 17 years so to think it will happen two years in a row I am skeptical of that.
But management thinks they are there now – that they have a team that can win 90 games. They see things through red colored glasses. It’s like they have this mindset of “we are always pretty good, so we will always be pretty good.”
If management refuses to be realistic, then we are at risk to see more of these kind of transactions. There is a disconnect between the way they view things and reality. At least it appears that way. Again though, we will have to see how things play out over the next few years.
This was also the primary drawback/criticism of the Gray signing. He is an excellent pitcher, but they paid $75mm and sacrificed a premium draft pick / slot-money to get him for a 3-year window during which they’ll likely be in purgatory and should be rebuilding. That signing/contract is the sort of thing you do when you believe you’re “one player away.” Half-measures have become a feature, not a bug, in this organization.
RBK, would you say they hurt the chance of being a contender in the future to be “competitive” now?
Short answer: probably.
I guess to be fair to the FO, it’s certainly possible that they are right and are closer to contention than I think they are. But IMO, they are more than a player or two away, just too many holes on the roster and in the farm system. IF one is of that view, then Gray’s contract doesn’t make a lot of sense and is arguably counterproductive: the additional wins Gray brings you in this 3-year contract window just aren’t worth that much if you are in 70-80 win purgatory (at best), and in some ways they hurt you by lowering your future draft position. In the meantime, the Cardinals gave up a premium draft pick and slot money this year (they haven’t drafted this high since JD Drew in 1998), which would have been valuable for a rebuild, and they spent $75mm that could have been allocated to younger players that perhaps could help beyond the next couple years.
I say all of that while readily acknowledging Gray is a terrific pitcher. But this is the “half-measure” thing I was talking about: if you’re going to sign a 35-yr old premium FA like Gray to a 3 year deal and give up the draft pick, presumably you’re going for it, right? Instead, per usual they immediately retrenched at the $170-175mm payroll level and hoped for the best.
I don’t blame them for the budget, but they should be held responsible for setting unrealistic expectations with their oft-stated “compete every year” objective given that budget and the observed recent productivity level of their farm system. I can’t think of another roughly median-or-lower payroll team in MLB that “competes every year.” Even the Rays have periodic resets. During that incredible 15 year run the Cardinals had from 2001-2015, they had 1) a top 10-11 payroll; 2) an immensely productive farm system; and 3) an inner-circle HOF player contributing 8-9 WAR per year at a one position for 11 seasons. They don’t have any of those things now (though they may creep back up to 11-12th in payroll by default this year because so many other teams have gone backwards because of the DSG bankruptcy).
I would say winning the world series in 2011 was the best thing for that partucular team but the worst thing for the organization. It just gave them the notion that getting lucky is easier than trying to be the best you can be.
I would say winning the world series in 2011 was the best thing for that partucular team but the worst thing for the organization. It just gave them the notion that getting lucky is easier than trying to be the best you can be.
I think there is something to be said for the idea that perhaps they “over-learned” their lesson from 2006 and 2011 (and from 2004-2005 and 2015 on the other side of the coin). There is no doubt the playoffs have a high degree of randomness, but they seem to have taken that core insight and turned it into a strategy and operating plan that is too fine and too clever by half.
Perhaps a small matter, but why do we stink at stolen bases? 15 so far is near the bottom. Only 2 of the 29 other teams have fewer.The ML average is 25 and the top teams are in the 40s and 50s.
True we also stink at OBP, one of a handful of teams below .300, but percentage wise we are not that far behind.
And why do we stink at throwing out base Steelers? Only 3 all year is also near the bottom. 2 or 3 teams in MLB have fewer. That is said to be on the pitcher as much as the catcher, but whatever. Why do we stink at it?
Why do we stink at it?
Don’t know the answer to that, but I have another ‘stink’ question. Why do we stink at allowing inherited runners to score? Anybody know where to find stats on this?
I’m guessing it is hurting our starting pitcher era numbers. And our won/loss record.
Why do we stink at allowing inherited runners to score? Anybody know where to find stats on this?
The IS% column is inherited runners scored percentage.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2024-reliever-pitching.shtml
The stink thing is easy. We have gone from teaching fundamentals to teaching launch angles and spin rates.
I also think every move this organization makes at this point is clearly aimed at trying to insure 3 million plus clicks at the turnstiles. To this point, that has been a success. When that fails, maybe they go back to building the best product possible. Do you really believe they would be paying Goldy Arenado and Contreras if they didn’t think they would fill the seats? Because it sure isn’t because they win games. Until those big contracts quit tilting the boat and MO goes to pasture, we won’t be able to assemble a winning roster and start winning the way it has to be done by midmarket teams in the current structure of mlb. It has to be a BLEND of veteran contracts and cost controlled players DEVELOPED by the organization. Than you have to have smart experienced baseball people running things on the field without interference from the front office. We don’t have any of this. At this point, for me, I need to just enjoy watching the games and worry less about winning.We are 15 out of 18 attempts in stolen bases.
Percentage wise we are good but we are third from the bottom in OBP and our rabbits are all batting under their weight…
RBK, i dont throw the 2006 team in that equatuon. Its why i hold that team higher. That team had a good record til things just fell apart the last month of the season. You could blame it on several factors but until that team struggled, they were looked to be just as capable as any of the other teams. Albeit an older team but still capable, that fact just gets obscured by their final record. I never felt the 2011 team waa a championship team til they actually won it. All we pretty much had was pujols who was even less than what he was before and some solid pitching though that was spotty.
2006, late in the season, the closer goes down and they have to put a rookie in that role. All hope is lost, right? Wrong.
The SB will go up when Edman is back. The team also needs to get on base more and the SB rate will go up as well.
Flags fly forever as the saying goes, so I am good with any pennant no matter the circumstances. And really in the modern set-up, it is not unusual for a team with a lesser record to win the World Series. In fact that is the norm as rarely do the two top teams end up in the World Series.
But it was apparent last year that this club needed to commit to a 3-5 year plan. Management chose instead to tweak the roster and see how it goes this season. So far not so good. I actually think they will look longer term if this season ends up at sub-.500 again, but we will see.
I think the Pirates are doing things right. In two years, and maybe next year they are going to be a force with Jones and Skenes at the top of their rotation, barring injuries of course.
I want to believe in the Pirates as it is nice to see an underdog team, but I am unsure of their offense long term. Jones and Skenes are really exciting, but they don’t have much promise on the offensive side and Nutting won’t spend to bring anyone in.
RBK, your posts from last night are pure gold. That is high quality stuff and I mean that sincerely.
You are correct in that this organization has muddled itself into a quagmire of mediocrity and there seems to be no way out unless they do something outside of their comfort zone. Those options could include one or many of these actions:
1. Make changes at the highest levels of the front office.
2. Make a managerial change after giving out an extension.
3. Raise the 40 many paroll closer to 220M instead of 178M.
4. Jettison high priced veterans to restock the farm.
5. Stop signing FA’s with a QO that prevent us from maximizing from the draft.
6. Do a deep dive on our player development system and figure out why our players stagnate here.
7. Commit to an actual rebuild instead of being stuck in the 75-85 win total that gets you nowhere.Those options don’t all go together whichi s kind of the point. The Cardinals need to figure out which way they want to go. Open up the pocketbook and try to spend their way out of their problems or retreat and try to rebuild it a piece of a time. This idea of building a half*** team in hopes of snagging the final wildcard spot is driving everyone crazy.
I am not arguing with the 1-7 presented, though I am curious why in #6 that scouting gets off scot free, with the assumption that player development is solely to blame for the pipeline. (They are two separate parts of the organization.)
How do we know whether the right players are drafted and they are developed wrong or vice-versa? I suspect the reality is somewhere in the middle, hence my question.
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