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Interesting. The one thing the Cards have going for them are those final seven home games against the two teams in front of them in the division.
This Pittsburgh series will be tough, as the Pirates have better pitching than Cincy. I don’t think we are going to score 8 runs a game this weekend.
Dang, was rooting for Milwaukee. That was a wild one, as the breaks went the Cubs way in the last couple of innings. Might be better for us that Chicago won, since realistically our chances at the WC are better than at the division title. But I don’t want the Cubs to win the division a second straight year.
Got one better than all of those, Cranny. The Rajah, .569 as Cardinal manager, including a World Series championship. Frank Frisch checks in at .564, and also has a World Series championship.
Or how about this guy, Johnny Keane, .560 and a World Championship. But then there is one guy who is out-of-sight. Billy Southworth, .641 with 3 pennants and two World Championships. Greatest era of Cardinal baseball ever.
Just for fun, my personal top five Cardinal managers of all time:
Billy Southworth
Tony LaRussa
Whitey Herzog
Johnny Keane
Red SchoendienstFrisch and Hornsby would be sixth and seventh, and you could almost put either guy in either spot. I would put Frisch sixth simply because he managed longer.
We might have a little clearer picture after this weekend, when the Cubs and Brewers finish up their four head-to-head match ups.
St. Louis is in an interesting spot, with the schedule having us at home for four against Chicago, and three against Milwaukee to wind things up. We most likely will impact the wild card, whether us playing to be there, or playing the spoiler role.
The key (obviously), is to keep winning and see what happens. After our game last night I switched over and watched the end of the Bucs/Brewers. Frazier cranked a walk-off to win it. Pittsburgh showed some heart, so they may be tough this weekend.
Although we won a see-saw contest last night, as long as Chicago and Milwaukee win there is nothing we can do to get back in the hunt.
We will no doubt talk a lot more about this after the season ends, but our season was sabotaged primarily due to the offense not performing as planned (or hoped), and the bullpen struggling, especially in the first half.
On offense, two guys stand out as the culprits. First, Matt Carpenter was not able to provide the pop needed of a number three hitter, and eventually lost his job in that role and moved back to lead off, where at least he got on base via the walk enough to justify hitting at that spot. Second, Steven Piscotty was a major disappointment, although Tommy Pham finally stayed healthy and showed what he can do, offsetting Picotty’s weak bat. Piscotty is not exactly a gazelle in the outfield either. In fact, Pham is better in all phases of the game.
In the bullpen, no one excelled at closer for a significant portion of the season, and the big off-season acquisition of Brett Cecil was major big disappointment. Anyone watching the Cardinals would much rather see Lyons or Sherriff in there at crunch time, than Cecil.
Anyway, we’ll have many words from many posters about this topic as Summer turns to Fall. As it looks right now, I would like to see the Cleveland Indians finish the job and win their first championship since 1948, which be only the third world title in their long history. If they end up playing the Dodgers in the Series, it will be the same two teams that battled when Cleveland won it’s first championship back in 1920.
A belated “Congratulations!” to the PCL champion Memphis Redbirds. Despite numerous call-ups of key players in order to try to get the big league club into the post season, the Baby Birds kept chugging.
I saw something where that team went an amazing 13-0 in extra inning games. Amazing. A very good year for the junior Cardinals, which takes a little sting out of the failures of the big boys.
Good point about Milwaukee, Brian. St. Louis not only has the Cubs to overcome, but the Brewers as well. Those 4.2% odds are probably about right.
Management will have it’s work cut out this off-season. Hopefully they move their thinking more over to the “winning” side of the spectrum, if you think of “cost control” on one end and “winning” on the other. To do that, they need to sign Lance Lynn, and explore opportunities to bring in an impact bat without gutting the farm.
You then set your club up with potentially a deep pitching staff, so that even if a deal cannot be struck for a bat before 2018, the opportunity to make a deal next year remains strong if the pitching depth is good. Plus the club’s strength would presumably be pitching, which almost guarantees at least a shot at success.
Most likely the season is done. Still we do have those 4 remaining head-to-head games against Chicago, so while we need some help, that is the one thing that gives us a faint hope. If it was a case of us and the Cubs being done playing each other, then it would be especially hard to overcome a 6 game deficit in 13. But since we still have those 4, we do have some control over our destiny.
Now if we continue to tank this week and go into that series still six or more back, it won’t mean a lot. We really need to keep it no worse than six, and preferably more like 4 back to even think there is hope. And even at that, you almost need to sweep the four to get into the thick of it, which is unlikely, but not unprecedented.
What we really need is the Cubs to be the second coming of the ’64 Phillies and lose their next 10, while we win about 8 in a row.
Not quite that simple, as we are not mathematically out even with a loss. Plus we still have those four home games against Chicago.
Still though, realistically the club has to win today to make a statement. They have never really shown the ability to quite keep up with the “big boys” the last two years, and this year most likely ends up the same way. But the games are decided on the field, not in words.
If Lynn goes out and dominates, we really need to get serious about bringing him back. One thing I hear is the club most likely will not show any interest in him because he will block a promising young pitcher. But really, bringing him back only “blocks” the 12th pitcher on the roster. It really comes down to whether or not the club feels Lynn will be worth the investment. The Cardinals get a little careless in that area, as they seem to always think they have a bountiful crop of young pitchers. We do have talent, but pitching is a fragile commodity.
And letting him walk risks his ending up in Chicago or Milwaukee, or with a club we will be contending with for the post season in the future.
I still love the pitcher W-L stat. There was always something special about the 20 game winner, which is pretty much a relic of the past. Two of my favorite standout W-L records are Carlton’s 1972 season of course, and another former Cardinal, Larry Jackson, who went 24-11 for a Cub team that finished 10 games below .500 in 1964.
The reason the pitcher’s won-loss statistic evolved in the first place was that the position is by far the most important one in the game, and has the most impact on a game’s outcome. In the early years of baseball, pitcher’s were expected to complete the game, and usually did, so the W-L really meant something.
Obviously pitching for a better team (better offense and defense that is) will usually help the W-L, and their are random events beyond a pitcher’s control that will impact the record. To accurately assess any player, one always needs to take in several statistics. Even as a kid looking at baseball cards, I could see that some pitchers were really better than others, even though the lesser guy won more games. In 1962 Whitey Ford had that glittering 25-4 record on his baseball card for the ’61 season, but as an 8 year old kid I would look at his numbers and see that he was only 12-9 the year before, with a similar ERA, even a bit lower in ’60, and knew that he was just as good in ’60 as ’61, but in ’61 everything came together.’
Today the W-L does not mean as much, because the pitcher of record gets more help from other pitchers than in the past. Rarely does the starter finish the game, but the rules still say he can get a win if his team is leading after 5 and maintains the lead. Today pitchers probably average what, 2-3 innings less per start than their ancestors? So in a sense we could say the W-L record has lost 25-30% of it’s meaning compared to prior generations.
Too darn early to start a season, but that is how sports is in these modern times. Everything is expanded, the season, the marketing, the games, the finances. At some point we might see meaningful baseball played in 9 of the 12 months of the year, like basketball and hockey.
I was happy that we kept Molina, as he deserved a shot at finishing his career as a Cardinal. Maybe he will play on after this deal ends, but I liked the deal from a legacy standpoint, and like Mo said at the signing, I felt he still had enough left to bring some decent value on the field.
I would have preferred us keeping Kelly at AAA all year, and starting his career next year as Yadi’s backup, with the two splitting time in ’19. But that’s not a huge deal. Most of one more year under Yadi is certainly good schooling.
It seems worth a shot as we need the bullpen help, and improving a shot at the post season today is worth a lot. If Alvarez becomes an everyday regular in the bigs, then we most likely overpaid unless we go deep into post season, but as others have pointed out we have depth at second, and so this is not going to cripple the organization. Not a real high risk, and while a bit of a long shot, the potential reward is decent.
I am liking Martinez at first base. His defense there seems better than in the outfield, although that is not saying much as he is a butcher in the outfield. But he actually does okay at first, and his bat might be the best on the team.
We might want to play him every day the rest of the way and see what we’ve got, although Matheny rarely does that.
Hang in there, 14. I saw something on the news that this could be the first year in over 100 where two storms of least a category 4 hit the U.S. in the same year.
St. Louis now 5 behind Chicago, and a game and a half behind Milwuakee. Still a chance, but my sense is this will be like last year where we end up close, but not quite there.
Still some positive things about this club. The young players are talented. And we have a good core of young vets like Wong, Pham, CMartinez. Gotta somehow get Lynn back for ’18, and maybe shop Carpenter for bullpen help plus a prospect.
Good point on the comparison with Duke. Seems like keeping Siegrist over Duke would be the better way to go. But maybe the club sees Duke as a much better option in case we do have a chance at a post season berth, and they will worry about next year after this one is done.
Haven’t you learned by now people. Mike Matheny can’t manage a bullpen. He can barely manage at all and isn’t good enough to manage this franchise.
I can’t put the blame on Matheny for this one. Personally I would have liked to see Lynn come out for the ninth, but the game is rarely played that way anymore. With us and a bullpen in flux, it made sense to me, but then I figured we would go to the bullpen with Lynn at 100 pitches.
Still we lost on a pitch low and outside where Posey just happened to get enough of the bat on it to bloop it to shallow right. Then in the 10th, Molina and Piscotty had bad ABs. I was “yelling” at Molina to look for something to hit to right field, which he did not do. Same with Piscotty – go up there with the notion that you are going to go the other way unless you get behind in the count.
We’ve lost a lot of games this year because of poor fundamentals. I think we are 19-27 in one run games, which shows we either do not play fundamental ball, or we are victims of bad breaks. Today was a combination of both of those.
Good call on Charlotte, as that is an area that seems to be a decent sports locale. Another one might be Nashville.
But as mentioned, before you expand you need to figure out a way to strengthen the existing franchises that are perennial financial drains. Florida has never been a big regular season baseball area, although it is great for Spring Training.
The Athletics were an iconic franchise, but since the late ’30s when Connie Mack ran the franchise into the ground due to mot being able to finance the organization like it should have been, in turn brought on by the Great Depression, they have mostly struggled to make ends meet. First the move to Kansas City where the owner was a New Yorker, and the club became the major league farm team of the Yankees turned out to be a joke.
Then they had an owner who wanted to build a winner, but his personality was so abrasive he alienated the big shots in Kansas City, who wanted nothing to do with him. Finley then moved the team to an area where baseball already had a toe hold, but was struggling. The Giants were not drawing all that well at the time and had a bad ballpark.
At any rate once again, you gotta strengthen what you have first, before diluting the product.
A new St. Louis Browns team is fun to think about, but I doubt the area can support two teams despite the rabid following the Cardinals have. That has been built up over many decades, and putting a new team there and calling them the Browns might work for awhile from a novelty standpoint, but would not be sustainable. Plus I doubt the Cardinals would allow it to happen.
Wow. Not sure how to read this. Is it throwing in the towel, or simply making room for better options and getting out from at least part of a bad contract? Definitely the latter is true, and because Leake has been so bad since May we are not really losing much. His last start was better, but he has not been anywhere near the pitcher we had hoped he would be. He has not been “Kip Wells” bad, but he has been mostly bad.
I mentioned before that I think Leake could work out as a good bullpen guy in ’18, but am fine with the club pursing a deal. That was a tough contract to take from the get-go, as I had hoped back then that we would have worked harder at retaining Lackey.
For this off season, I hope management works hard at retaining Lynn.
With inter-league play fully integrated into the game today, there really is not a big need to get the leagues evened out in terms of number of teams.
With some clubs struggling quite a lot, like Miami, I am not sure it makes much sense to further dilate the product. Personally I think there are too many teams in all professional sports as it is. But it is a reality of the times because the industry is so big dollar-wise.
Good to get the comeback win. A loss there and you really feel any chance of making a run slipping away. A win keeps things positive for now.
As for Leake, I wonder if he might thrive in the closer’s role? He has a bit of that crossfire delivery, and reminds me somewhat of Dennis Eckersley. He’s not as good as Eckersley of course, but kind of looks like him and has sort of a similar delivery. Eck had almost perfect control though, and while Leake is not bad he is not as sharp.
But maybe in 1 inning stints, where he can just let loose and throw he would be very effective.
Management needs to seriously look at bringing Lynn back, although he’s probably going to cost more than we are willing to offer, and then audition Leake for a bullpen role in 2018.
But Lynn “costing more than we are willing to offer” is why we struggle to get to post season. At some point we need to hit on a key player, and not keep coming up with the second best offer.
I am travelling right now, so do not have the exact information. However, a recent SABR publication had an in-depth article on the percentage of draftees that eventually reach the big leagues. I believe it was even broken down into percentages of anyone who appears in even one major league game, and percentages of those who reach a certain threshold, like 500 games or some amount of innings pitched or appearances for pitchers.
Bottom line, the chances of reaching the “show” were small. I believe even for first rounders it was 50% to even get there, with percentages dropping from there on down. I will see if I can dig that out when I get back home next week.
I think the club will look at Wacha and Leake as bullpen pitchers for 2018. And perhaps one of them will evolve into the closer role.
Rotation would be Martinez, Wainwright, Reyes, Weaver and then Lynn or someone from the farm that has already been mentioned (Flaherty, Hudson, etc).
The club should look seriously at bringing Lynn back, as I don’t think they will want to go with three rookies in the rotation (counting Weaver as a “rookie”). But on the other hand, the Rockies have gone with four rookies this year, and have had some good success.