Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Good article. Trammel certainly deserves enshrinement. I hope Simba gets in. As I mentioned, he suffers some from being in an era that had some great catchers. Plus Jaffe points out the Whitey Herzog slight, where near the end of Simmons career Herzog wanted him to play first base. He then traded him and brought in a more defense-oriented catcher in Darrell Porter. Jaffe does not bring up this point, but it just so happened that in the 1982 post season Porter outplayed Simmons and the Cardinals won the World Series over Simmons’ Brewers. That might be another thing going against him.
So there seems to be a lingering view in some voters’ minds that Simmons was good, but not great. He is definitely borderline, but better than some catchers in the Hall. You can make a case either way for him, but we all hope he gets the call.
Seems most every day there is another article on a potential Stanton-to-St. Louis deal. I think putting a deal together is realistic. The main sticking point might be Stanton’s hesitancy in joining a team located in the Midwest.
I imagine he has told his agent to do all they can in working a deal with a coastal club first, and if the Marlins feel the deal with St. Louis is their best option it would hinge on him waiving the no-trade clause.
Lots of interesting money angles to hash out as well. I love the sliding scale concept a poster suggested. That would seem to make a deal more realistic and executable on both sides.
I base it on WAR, which takes into account both phases of their games. Not a perfect way to compare of course. Molina has played in more big-time games than Teddy, with a lot of post season action. That probably weighs in his favor. Ted had a tough go with the Cardinals, as we made a slew of bad trades early in his career, and then he was traded when we got competitive again. Ironically, when he finally got to a World Series it was against the Cardinals.
Yadi also has some intangibles in the way he runs a game, and pitchers are better with him behind the plate than other Cardinal catchers.
Tough call. I can see either one being given the top spot. Take the best of both and they end up being Johnny Bench.
Tough news. In the 1990s, I lived in Arvada, CO. Halladay went to Arvada West High School and is a legend there.
My prayers are out for his family and friends. No way we can put into words the sorrow surrounding something like this. Who can forget the epic game 5, 2011 Division series match-up between with the two friends, Halladay and Chris Carpenter on the hill, that ended 1-0. We scored a run after the first two batters in the game, and then there were 54 outs recorded with no more scoring. Two warriors at their best. One of the best games you will ever see.
Teddy is still the Cardinals all-time greatest catcher, with Yadi making inroads to that claim but he’s not there yet. Yadi will have to play at a very high level in his remaining years to over take Ted, which is not likely.
One of Ted’s “problems” of course, is that Bench set the bar so high for catchers in the ’70s that everyone else pales in comparison. He was always the “second best” catcher in the National League. Carlton Fisk and Thurman Munson were the two guys in the AL at the time. They both played in better media markets, and all three (Bench, Fisk, and Munson) played in World Series games.
Both Fisk and Munson were as good as Simmons, maybe a bit better, so that puts Teddy at around the 3rd to 4th best catcher during his time. Of course the best was the best ever, but it is still hard to get over that group and justify Ted in the Hall. But man the guy could hit. I remember going to some Cardinal games as a teenager and young adult when Simmons was in his prime, and he would hit the ball so consistently hard. For awhile I worked with a guy who grew up with Simmons in Michigan. He told me there was this vacant lot where they would play as kids, and Simmons was the only kid who could hit the ball out of the lot both right-handed and left-handed.
Ken Boyer is not on the list, but I believe he does deserve enshrinement. He was the best third baseman in baseball from 1960-’64, although Brooks was better in ’64. Mathews preceeded him, and Brooks Robinson and Santo succeeded him as best, all Hall of Famers.
Marvin Miller easily deserves enshrinement. His impact on the game will be felt for the rest of time.
Agree with Jags on Rosenthal. He is still young enough to come back strong. I wish we could have kept him and seen him through the rehab, and have him on the club in ’19. But it was not something management wanted to take on given the current situation.
While he struggled the last couple of years, he was a solid closer for us. I thought Matheny over-used him at times, including an egregious situation in a game I saw here in Denver back in ’13 I think (might have been ’14), where he was left in for 41 pitches despite a 3 run lead. 41 pitches in Denver is like about 60 anywhere else. It was unnecessary, and we may not have had to use him at all that day, but that is history.
I once tried to joke with Skip in the clubhouse when he was picking some new batting gloves from a group on a table, asking him if he wore out the velcro on his old ones. He did not even smile. Oops.
Sounds like Skipper was a little sensitive on that subject. No doubt he had been teased about that habit many times.
Descalso has put together a pretty good career as a utility guy.
Good to see Schumaker get a shot at a coaching job. As Brian mentioned, I never liked his penchant for diving in to first base. Plus he drove me nuts with the resetting of his batting gloves between every pitch. There were times I would yell at the television “Just stay in box!”. But that was his routine, probably to think about what the next pitch might be and where he would go with it depending on location.
Congrats to the Houston Astros! They came into the National League in 1962 along with the New York Mets, and finally get their first title. The Mets got their first way back in 1969, so it’s about time Houston got there.
They had some tough luck along the way, losing close NL playoff series in 1980 and 1986. And they had a future Hall of Fame pitcher, JR Richard, who tragically suffered a stroke at a young age and was unable to recover enough to pitch again.
I am happy for that most young Astros team, and Carlos Beltran as was mentioned. Also I am happy for Jose Cruz, a former Cardinal farmhand who we gave away early in his career, and he carved out a nice career in Houston. He still works for the Astros and does a lot of community outreach work.
This Series is something else. If it goes 7, and their is at least one more close or extra inning contest, it might go down as one of the greatest World Series ever.
While watching I am almost thankful the Cardinals are not one of these teams. I don’t think I could take it! 🙂
The Dodgers were in great shape with a 4-run lead and Kershaw on the hill. Now it looks like Houston should close it out with Verlander in game six. But with this series, who knows. I am really enjoying it.
As for the Yankees woes in the ’80s and ’90s, there is that classic SI cover that came out in 1991 I believe that had Maris and Mantle on the cover, with the caption “Whatever Happened To The Yankees?”
Diaz looks to be of little value to the Cardinals at this point, and would probably be a good throw-in on a potential trade.
If St. Louis struggles in the first half next year and Girardi is available, I wonder if the club would consider the change.
But if Joe G is not an analytics guy, then probably not.
I like all three of those broadcasters, and of course all three have strong St. Louis connections. As a kid in the ’60s, we grew up with Diz and Pee Wee Reese on the “Game Of The Week” Saturday broadcasts. He broke the mold of the polished broadcaster by being himself and talking the same way while describing a game as he did in real life.
Costas is a historian as much as he is a broadcaster. In a way, I do not think of him so much as a Hall of Fame broadcaster as simply a passionate baseball guy who is nationally known, and is very articulate. Some of us here are probably about equal with Costas as far as knowledge of the game’s history and place in American life, but we do not have the high profile profession. Still, the guy is well known as a media person who despite broadcasting all sports, is largely associated with baseball.
Joe Buck is similar, in that he is articulate and has been a terrific baseball broadcaster, although he might be more associated with NFL broadcasts. Still he made his mark doing baseball, and was a polished broadcaster from day one.
I think Dean is a slam dunk for the Hall’s broadcasters section, and have no issues with Costas nor Joe Buck being enshrined.
Trivia: How many remember that tonight’s starter for the Dodgers, Rich Hill, pitched in 23 games for Memphis over the first three months of the 2010 season before opting out of his contract?
I remember that we signed Hill, and he did not stay with us very long. I wondered if we gave up on him, or what happened as at one time he was a decent pitcher with the Cubs. He’s done well with LA.
Wow, that was some game last night. You figure you get two like Houston did a couple of times, and you are going to win. They eventually prevailed, but the cool thing about baseball is there is no victory formation. You gotta play it straight up until the final out.
Maybe November baseball is do-able after all. 🙂
Still wish MLB would have some of the games in the day. It will never happen of course as money overrides sentiment. But I think it would be cool if the two “get away” games, games 2 and 5, were day games.
Not recognizing the AA was an MLB decision, not made by the individual teams. There were four AA-NL teams involved and all follow the exclusion.
As I have written about in the past, it is a very murky area. When it benefits them, MLB recognizes individual player results from that period while not acknowledging their team results. Makes no sense.
I’ve discussed it before with Cardinals folks. The disconnect is understood, but my take is that those who get it don’t have the power and those who have the power have other matters on their priority lists.
If I think about it, I will try to ask Bill DeWitt, Jr. for his take when the team HOF committee meets again. It would take someone like him for this to have any chance of being formally reevaluated by MLB. At a minimum, the Dodgers, Reds and Pirates would also have to be on board. How the other 26 teams would react to being put farther behind the leaders in world championships could be another roadblock.Great information Brian. I can understand other club’s fragile egos being hurt by adding more history to some of their rivals, even though there are already huge differences in team’s history due to expansion. It just makes sense to take a team’s history from their origination as a major league club. Perhaps with the recent league changes by the Milwaukee and Houston clubs, MLB will be more open to recognizing records from teams that changed leagues in the past.
One thing interesting was that the information I saw on the Dodgers tying the Cardinals with 19 pennants, which was on an ESPN crawl, means that they are only counting Dodger pennants since 1901 (or since 1916 in their case). They won NL pennants in 1890, 1899 and 1900 as members of the National League, which gives them 22 with the 19 won from 1916 through 2017. Maybe the crawl had a “modern era” qualifier. I just happened to catch a glimpse of it on a television at the local gym where I work out, so I may have not gotten all of it.
We have commented on that from time to time. I disagree as well. I believe the prevailing thought at one time was teams that started in the American Association did include that as part of their “official” history but then that history was not as formalized as today. My dad had some old books on Cardinal history, one by J. Roy Stockton, and it started with the AA teams.
Bob Broeg’s 1981 book “Redbirds” is subtitled “A Century Of Cardinals’ Baseball”, and starts with the 1882 team.
Even today sites such as retrosheet and baseball-reference list the 1880’s as the beginning of the Cardinals and Dodgers franchises. The organizations themselves seem to be out of touch with their own history.
Saw something that stated the Dodgers are now tied with the Cardinals for third in pennants won with 19. The Giants are second at 20, and of course we know who is first.
By my count however, the Dodgers are now tied with the Cardinals alright, but for second place with 23. The Giants are third at 22. These numbers are attained by going back to each franchise’s origins, and counting up pennants for what was recognized as the major leagues at the time.
The Dodgers have the 19 modern era NL pennants, plus the franchise won the 1889 American Association pennant, and NL pennants in 1890, 1899 and 1900.
The Cardinals have won 19 modern era NL flags, and won four straight AA pennants from 1885-88.
The Giants have won 20 modern era pennants, and also won NL flags in 1888 and 1889.
There have been three eras where the Cardinals and Dodgers combined to dominate baseball. The franchises won pennants from 1885-1890, with the Cardinals getting the AA flags from ’85-88, then Brooklyn winning the 1889 AA pennant. The Brooklyn franchise then moved to the National League in 1890 and won another pennant.
In the 1940s, the two franchises combined to win 7 of the 10 NL pennants, 4 by the Cards and 3 by the Dodgers.
From 1963-1968, the two franchises won each of the six NL flags, splitting them at 3 apiece. Plus each franchise won 2 of the 3 World Series they played in the ’60s.
It’s an all NL West World Series. The Astros have now won two pennants, one in each league. They are the only franchise in the modern era to win a pennant in each league. Milwaukee has represented each league in the Series, but those were two different franchises.
These are two of the three best teams this year, along with Cleveland. This should be a good World Series.
Goo point on the potential coaching decisions. It’s obvious that Matheny’s job is on the line in 2018. Unless a guy feels very loyal to Matheny, a more stable situation would probably be more attractive than the one in St. Louis.
Then again, a more stable situation most likely will not have any openings, so a coach looking for a job may not have many options.
Never thought Dusty was the best manager out there, but had Scherzer pitched like he is capable of in game 5, the Nationals would have played in the NLCS.
Dusty and Matheny are fairly similar, in that they are usually not thought of as the most astute managers in the game, but have had some good clubs. Dusty’s teams tend to tire of him though, while the Cardinals value stability and feel it outweighs any shortcomings their manager may have. Plus they must be of the opinion that with experience their manager will continue to improve.
Hopefully that was a token win for Chicago, and the Dodgers finish them off tonight.
The Yankees are the surprise club in this year’s post season. They are really probably a year or two away from when they should be real tough. Both those teams, Houston and New York, are young, exciting clubs with a few veterans to help provide leadership. Ironically two ex-Cards are there with Beltran and Holliday (Beltran has been with many teams of course).
I wonder if Pujols will ever get another shot at the post season? Other than a 3 and out in ’14 I believe it was, the Angels have not been too good despite having one of the best players in the game (Trout that is, not Albert). They still seem aways off with a weak farm system and mediocre big league club.
Thanks for the clarification, Brian. I have actually not been to a game in St. Louis since 2009, so I need to get back there. Hopefully 2018 will be the time.
I knew the Cooperstown broadcasters were in the “broadcasters wing of the Hall of Fame”, or wording was usually given similar to that. But your comments make it clear that the Hall definitely keeps them separate. I would guess the Cardinals Hall will not do that as well.
On a bit of a side note, and I have mentioned this before, another old timer who I believe should be inducted to the Cardinal hall is Harry Brecheen. The two Harry’s, Brecheen and Caray, are both richly deserving of the honor and I hope they get in over the next few years. If not, I may start a personal campaign on their behalf; maybe I will call it the “Harry-Harry, lets get the vote to carry” (them to the Cardinal Hall, campaign). (only halfway joking on that).
32 teams is the tipping point for me. That gets to where MLB is over-saturated. 30 is even a bit too much, but what can you do? In the NFL today, I cannot follow it all as there are just too many teams.
I would go this way with 32, using the four-per-division approach and Montreal and Portland as the new clubs. Not perfect either, as you lose the Rangers-Astros in-division rivalry. But this way you pick up Pirates-Phillies, Nats-Orioles, White Sox-Royals, and Tigers-Blue Jays, all natural geographic rivals. You also return Washington to the AL, where they have a long history, and Houston to the NL, where they have a long history. Having one Chicago team in a “South” division is awkward, but that is sort of how sports is these days (thinking of the “Big 10” and “Big 12” in NCAA).
NL East: Mets, Expos, Phillies, Pirates
NL North: Cards, Cubs, Reds, Brewers
NL South: Braves, Marlins, Dbacks, Astros
NL West: Dodgers, Giants, Padres, Rockies
AL East: Yankees, Red Sox, Nats, Orioles
AL North: Indians, Tigers, Blue Jays, Twins
AL South: White Sox, Rangers, Rays, Royals
AL West: Angels, Athletics, Mariners, Portland