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I am a little dissapointed that the Cardinals have not used the absence of players to the world classic to give some of their top prospects more exposure. Instead we are getting a steady diet of Mo’s Misfits (Players who have never been good and players who may have been pretty good once but coming off a bad year.) And very unlikely to do better with the Cardinals.
What would be wrong with Graceffo or McGreevry stretching out with multiple innings in a game. But we are getting Packy Naughton and VerHagen on a regular basis.
I am not an advocate of the Cardinals going after the mega-stars. There is a reason the one of the players association wants to have free agency earlier. Many of the players have reached their prime when they are eligible, particularly a late bloomer like Carpenter and Fowler.
But I think the Cardinals do a very poor job of signing good free agents. I refer to most of their signings as “Mo’s Misfits. Most of them fail even at the AAA level. When I looked at the other contenders and the players they signed I see many missed opportunities. I wonder whether the reason for signing such poor quality is scouting or management philosophy. In all fairness they have picked up some helpful guys at the trading deaeline.
How often they have signed guys like Holland, Miller and Cecil who was coming off a bad year and was worse. Or the guys who were never that good and still perform poorly. The reason we perform poorly in the playoffs is that our constantly low draft position prevents us from getting the high upside players that are the players needed for playoff wins.
I don’t know if the problem is Mo or DeWitt or both. But DeWitt could solve the problem. Mo will continue to sit idly and rely on the farm system.
So making bad decisions cause you to stop trying. If you look at the bios of the MLB top 100 many of the international players who made the list were also top prospects. In fairness some diamonds in the rough made it too.
Bottom line the quantity vs quality and waiting until the players get older is not providing the level of talent that many of our competitors are getting. And it will get worse as scouting get even more tools to evaluate prospects. Our top guy is Herrera (MLB #8 in Cardinals top 10) and the Cardinals didn’t even take long to send him back out even with Yadi’s injuries and Knizner’s weak bat.
Back to quantity over quality. The Cardinal international system is badly in need of overhaul.
The results of the Cardinal approach is clear. They have no international prospects in their top 5 and none in the MLB Pipeline top 100. Meanwhile there are 9 international prospects in the top 17 on the MLB list. There are 25 international prospects in their top 100. The Cardinals have only 2 home grown international players on their 40 man roster.
The current international system is like a second draft. The Cardinals highest rated signee is ranked 36th best. That is like waiting until the middle of the second round of the draft to select someone.
The days of finding diamonds in the rough are fading away with all of the technical tools now available to scouting. You have to compete for the top talent and the system allows the freedom to spend what you need to do that without getting ovewhelmed by the rich teams.
There are four sources of talent available to major league teams. Draft, Trades, Free Agents and International. The Cardinals have 6 players on the MLB top 100. Five from the draft (Walker, Winn, Hence, Burleson and Graceffo). One (Liberatore) from trades. No free agents and international. That is like trying half as hard as your competitors.
Mo is sitting back with a lackluster international program, making crappy free agent decisions and counting on the draft to bail him out. You do have to give him a better grade in trades for landing Goldschmidt and Arenado but how much of that was due to the Cardinal tradition. But he also gave up the current Cy Young winner and another front line starting pitcher to get Marcel Ozuna.
It was good to get Contreras but it was like we turned out the lights and shut down for the offseason after that signing.
Good pickup. Cardinals needed him. He is a tough out when you need a hit. Has hurt the Cardinals numerous times in the past. Always hated to see him come up in close situations.
If I were a manager I would want the hitting and pitching coaches to keep the players healthy and spend lots of time with the young players adjusting to major league competition and improving their techniques.
I never saw Albert or Maddux working with the young players much during the game. They were usually talking to the vets and the young players appeared to be gravitating to Waino, Albert and Yadi for game advice. And I am very alarmed at the high rate of injuries, particularly among the pitchers.
Also the meltdown of Carp and DeJong and the dropoff in performance in O’Neill and Carlson (although injury related).
At any rate I am ready to try something new. Obviously Ollie was too because I don’t buy the spin. An Mo wisely decided to go along with his manager this time.
The Cardinals missed the boat during the years before the cap on the international players was established.
Picking late they had a lower cap from the draft. That should have left them sufficient money to compete for the top international talent available. Instead they went cheap until this year and even since the cap they have given up cap dollars in trades. Consequently, they have had virtually no top international prospects since Oscar Taveras, Alcantra (who was never top 100, I don’t think)and Martinez.
It may just appeared so but it seemed that the young players and pitchers went to talk to Wainwright, Yadi and Albert more for advice than to Maddux and Albert. Of course a lot goes on behind the scenes and the TV guys can create a false picture if you are looking at the overall scope of things.
I just think Albert’s approach is designed for a hitters park. We don’t have a hitters ballpark. Bader and Carp started hitting home runs in Yankee Stadium, a real hitters park.
I agree with much that has been said.
Hard to know what role the pitching coach plays in conditioning, player acquisition, use of bullpen and other issues. We forget as fans at times that no one is operating in a vacuum. I would say at least a pitching coach is responsible for mechanics and helping maximizing the pitchers skills through the development of pitches that can make the player most successful.I am most concerned about injuries. While overall the Cardinals had a good injury year that doesn’t tell the whole story.
Virtually all of the best Cardinal pitchers have missed significant playing time since Maddux came in 2018. Add Matz to that this year and I suspect Cabrera is struggling with injury the way he melted down late in the season.
I give Maddux A+ for the emergence of Helsley this year. The Cardinals were 50-4 in the games he appeared in this year and he only gave up more than one run one time. Gallegos gave up multiple runs 6 times and multiple earned runs 5 times and the Cardinals were 44-13 in the games he appeared in. Makes you wonder about the seemingly effort by the Cardinals to keep him closing. Why only 54 games for an all-star closer and why the multiple inning use. 17 times and often a three day gap before the next outing.
Of greater concern is the poor recovery of quality pitchers who have been injured. Flaherty, Hudson, Reyes and Hicks all appeared to have top of rotation potential or closed ability. Add them to Wainwright and Milolas and have a deep staff if healthy. But the Cardinals had only 36 wins and no saves from that group of 6 in 2022. Hudson is clearly overthrowing at times as was Gallegos while trying to salvage his closer spot. Also Whitley who use to be a low mid to high 90’s pitcher with a good change and good command low in the zone. Now often high and outside a lot and less velocity.
Finally I don’t know what Maddux has to say about the use of Mo’s Misfits, my name for pitchers he aquires that weren’t very good before we got them and just as bad or worse afterward. I am referring to Verhagen 21.2 innings and 106 ERA+, Wittgren 29 innings and 66, Naughton 32 innings and 81 ERA+ and McFarland (although good in 2021) 32.2 innings and 58 ERA+. Contrast that with Pallante 121 ERA+, Woodford 48.1 innings and 172 ERA+, Thompson 34.2 innings and 186 ERA+, Oviedo 25.1 innings and 108 ERA+.
Bottom line, my own data suggests that he has contributed with the development of some of the young pitchers, but the injuries and poor recovery bothers me. I think I would look to change and if interested Wainwright could be a good choice. I wonder what role Yadi and Waino will play for the Cardinals after retirement.
The question is what would you expect of a pitching coach if you were a GM. Doubt that they have much effect on the vets.
But I would expect the younger pitchers to improve with a good pitching coach through improvement of mechanics, teaching new pitches and new strategies as other teams adjust to their approach.
Also conditioning.
Montero, Plummer and Urias reached the major leagues for the first time after leaving the Cardinal organization.
Darn Apple TV. When I try to use my email they say it is already being used and when I try to get access using my email they say it is not known. GRRR
Notice that they did not limit the time between innings. I get fed up with three minutes of commercials while the players are loitering in the dugout. I believe there is a minimum change time in the minors but the bigs would have to give up commercial time to implement that.
Where is the data that says the fans are leaving the game because of the length.
I said two months ago that Gallegos is not a 9th inning guy. Looks like to me that he is overthrowing trying to be the closer. He was never as wild and particularly as wild high like he has been lately. As an 8th inning guy he had good command of the strike zone and kept the ball down. Fastball more 92-94 but he winging it at 95 trying to close.
Mo’s bullpen crew of castoffs has really hurt us this year. Rather see us go with some of our young arms.
I think Shildt got a lot more heat than Ollie has. I think some seriously objected to him because he had no professional baseball experience.
I think our amateur scouting has been overall good. But our scouting of other major league systems seems to be pretty weak and pretty wrong most of the time.
I am a little concerned about Ollie’s two inning use of our closer. Over 30 pitches last night so I suspect he is not available for tonight.
The umpire really hurt us. He made two terrible strike calls against Knizner who then struck out with the bases loaded. Not sure I would have pinch hit for Knizner that early in the game. You can have your players looking over their shoulder with that kind of moves. Also you have to ask if you want to use a key pinch hitter that early. If Goldy was not available then is Molina or Sosa that much better. I think they are better but neither are tearing the cover off the ball.
Again the umpire struck later in the game when he called a strike on a clear ball four pitch to Bader which would have loaded the bases for a pinch hitter for sure in that situation.
The reason I feel that Gallegos is not a strong closer is that when he has an off day you can lose a 2 or 3 run lead. That doesn’t happen with closers like Chapman and Hader and other strong Cardinal closers in the past. They give up one run and occasionally two but not 3 or 4.
Probably also has something to do with the pitchers wanting a specific role. I would buy into Helsley being a earlier inning distress guy if we had a strong closer. My feel is that Gallegos is an adequate closer but not much above that level.
