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Well that is three and counting post season MVP’s we have given up.
It is subtle but there is a difference in good players and winning players. Herzog was a genius at picking out winning players. The winning players do tose little things that help a team win even while sacrificing potential stats that help them at contract time.
The Dodgers pulled Tommy out of center field and installed him at shortstop during the San Diego series after the Padres capitalized on Dodger defensive leaks.
If I were a pitching coach I would work on movement on the fastball. Straight fastball even at 100 is batting practice
I agree the hitting coach has little to do for the veterans except when they are in a deep slump but as someone pointed out the new guys have a lot to learn at the major league level and there will be adjustments by the opposition. I still maintain that a good hitting coach would have helped Walker and Gorman and maybe even Carlson. And at least he could have told Aranado to stop swinging at so many pitches out of the zone.
And I am a strong believer that players need to have a clear role on the team and just as important they accept the role. How do you think Otani would feel if he was dropped to 5th or 6th in the lineup just because a left handed pitcher was on the mound. Extreme example I know but I doubt that players like to not know where they are going to bat or whether they will even be in the game. Think of Gorman having a decent year and Taylor Motter who had not hit above the Mendoza line in 4 previous major league seasons,
s in his place in the lineup because a left handed pitcher was on the mound.The only thing I can say in defense of Ward is that possibly he was under strict orders from Mo to continue to apply the Jeff Albert approach to hitting.
But there has been too many guys like Gorman and Walker who had early success and faded. In fairness that goes back before his tenure as well. But I would think one of the most important responsibilities is to help the younger players adjust to the inevitable adjustments the opposition will throw at them. Let’s hope that the second season bug doesn’t hit Winn too.
Let’s also hope they don’t just move the assistant up. We need seasoned field management.
I am a firm believer that the good managers make more than 3 or 4 games difference. Whitey Herzog was a genius in his ability to identify winning ball players and I think Shildt picked up some of that from him
Then there is the clubhouse atmosphere. Think that was a big problem for the Cardinals this season. While the players seemed to be congenial with Ollie I believe that his crazy linups, use of green pitchers late in close games, his obsessiion with platooning and other issues had to lead to soome dissatisfaaction. And maybe the players blame Mo rather than Ollie.
Shildt has a tough task in LA. The top half of that Dodger lineup is pretty awesome.
It seems that Mo has surrounded himself with weak people who will not challenge him. He fired a good field manager supposedly over a coaching decision. But instead of replacing the manager with an established manager he goes with one of the least exxxperienced options he has. I think both Yadi and Albert would have welcomed a coaching job with the Cardinals. In 2022 in watching the games the young players all went to Albert, Yadi and Waino to talk about their perforomance rather than to Jeff Albert or Maddux.
When you surround yourself with weak people you get a weak performance. If the facilities are sub-par, who is responsible. If our technology is not up to date then I guess Giersch was not the man for the job. Or does DeWitt penny pinch to the point of not letting people do the proper job.
And I wonder why the Dodgers would be interested in Aranado when they have and .852 OPS guy playing third named Muncy. Possibly for defense. I really don’t think we have much trade value on the team and even if we did we certainly have not had an impact of the guys we traded for at the 2023 deadline. Maybe in the future but I am not encouraged by the 2024 performance.
Unless Bloom is really in charge behind the scenes we are looking at another bleak year.
We have a relatively inexperienced field management team.
The Cardinals have a strong trend where players have had early success and faded, subsequently performed well with other teams. That reflects on field management who should help them make adjustments for continued success.
Too many free agent contracts to performers who were once good but are coming off poor seasons and performed poorer yet for the Cardinals.
Mo hangs onto prospects until they have lost all value. think what we could have gotten for Carlson earlier in his career. Our management and scouts shoud know we have someone who is incapable of maintaining their good perforomance before others.
We once had a strong Latin program but it has faded badly. The Cardinals signed players who had the 5th highest total WAR in the majors in 2024. But we gave away over 90% of that productiion with little in return. I think Alex Reyes was the last Cardinal Latin signee who made the MLB or BA to 100 prospect list.
We have been trying to build a home run hitting team in a pitchers ballpark. Too many popups and strikeouts at critical times in the games.
It appears that Mo has relied heavily on the free agent draft as a source of talent while the leading teams use a more diversified approach. And it looks like that source is drying up for the Cardinals.
The quicker Mo goes the quicker this thing can be turned around. I don’t expect him to do much different or anything significant.
They have to offer him 80% of his current salary or non tender him. Doesn’t fit a team that is looking to cut salaries.
It is how much of the problem is DeWitt?, Mo?, or all of the above.
Mo has a poor record in almost every phase of the game, free agents, trades, international. I have always questioned the major league level scouts.
The international program is a disaster. Luhnow had it turned around. I did a study in mid September. Current Latin sourced player who have played this season. Cardinals were 13th in number signed, 5th in career WAR of those signed (86.0) and 27th in career WAR currently in the organization (6.4). There is no longer an excuse. Everyone is working with a cap. The Cardinals have been going for quantity over quality and signing a lot of older prospects. Everyone wailed over the big spending year but that is one of the few recent years of success. The whole system has to be reworked.
Mo has had some spotty success with both free agent signings and trades but not nearly enough. Too many of what I term as “Mo’s Misfits”. Players who were once succesful, aging and coming off a bad year. Hope for rebound. Not very often. I often wonder how much room he gives his subordinates to operate.
I am not for keeping Ollie. His lineup decisions are a puzzle and very few can count on a consistent role. He is far too platoon oriented. For example he has on some occasions pinch hit for a hitter early in the game only to have the rejplacement having to face a same side pitcher in crunch time. He seems to like to give young player a chance but is also very impatient with them and some are sent to Memphis at the first sign of difficulty. He removes too many pitchers in the middle of an inning for platoon reasons only to have the replacement pitcher get torched. In a number of occasions resulting in the pitcher being pulled is stuck with a loss or even loses a win. Not good for the club house. A bad clubhouse usually results in uninspired play. With the sweetheart press coverage in St. Louis it is hard to measure the atmosphere in Ollie’s clubhouse. I also don’t like his use of green pitchers in late innings when we are a run or two behind.. It is like he has given up on the game.
Finallly he has no sense of roles. Players want to understand their role on the team and be able to count on it. Not in Ollie’s clubhouse.
My dilema is Flores. He has had some good drafts but has been spotty and I think his drafts after 2020 have not been productive.
The Cardinals have a history of finding diamonds in the rough but I fear those days are gone forever. There will be exceptions but fewer with current technology measuring so many things like spin rate on breaking pitches, movement on pitches, bat speed, etc. I don’t think in todays world the Cardinal would have picked up Kieth Hernandez in the 42nd round. If there was a 42nd round. The whole scouting system may need to be modernized.
Welll lour boy genius struck again. With two out and a runner on first he pulls a 30 hold pitcher to match up with a right handed hitter. Then our right handed pitcher gives up a hit, then a game winning hit to two right handed hitters. So JoJo gets a loss out of his control. How do you think he feels about Ollie’s managerial genius tonight.
then in the bottom of the ninth everyone is swinging first pitch rather than working to get on base. Like let’s get this game over and get the hell out of here.
I saw a segment on MLB.com a few days ago. The Cardinals were criticized for pushing Walker so hard to hit fewer ground balls. There may be a hint about some our hitting woes. As I understood it the conflict between Shildt and Jeff Albert is that Albert wanted the hitters to pull most everything and get more loft in their swings. Shildt disagreed and got fired. Previously the Budda Bedansky was let go for disagreeing with Albert.
Apparently the Cardinals want to be a home run team in a pitchers ball park.
We have a young player trying to hit low outside pitches in the air. He only set a Cardinal rookie record for hits in consective games to start his career which has now turned to ashes.
We have Aranado chasing a lot of pitches out of the zone and while he hits some of them he also misses a lot in crucial situations.
And I wonder if the statistics people are making up the lineup every day.
How is that for conspiracy theorys.Good win and nice game by Walker.
Still perplexed by Ollie’s bullpen strategy. O’Brien has been scored upon in his first two appearances and Ollie puts him in with a lead and then it goes away. Then in the 8the with a 5 run lead he uses Kitteredge instead of saving him for the next game against the Brewers.
Did Ollie just give up. Sent probably our worse pitcher out in the 9th trailing by only one run and sure enough he made it 3 down. that is just a dumb decision. There had to be someone else available.
Our boy genius manager really messed this one up. Pinch hit for Burleson with Pham who comes up in the 8th with the tying run on second and fans. Then Baker hitting 3rd fans. Why have Baker hitting 3rd. No other manager above little league would have Baker hitting 3rd. Anywhere but third. He didn’t even hit above .250 at Memphis. ou have your best hitter hitting third.
As a final stroke of genius, down one run in the 9th he brings in a player with 4+ major league innings and a career average of over 8 ERA and sure enough we go into the bottom of the 9th down 2 runs.
How can players get excited about playing for a manager who makes such dumb decisions. Meanwhile Shildt has the Padres up 18 games over .500 while we are 2 games under. How can the fans enjoy watching the clown show Mo and Ollie are putting on.
Kind of premature but Shildt has the Padres 17 games over .500 and is on the Dodgers heels for the Division Championship along with the Diamondbacks. This after taking over a team that missed the playoffs last year and lost their best player to free agency. Similar to his seasons with the Cardinals he has had a strong second half. I call him Second Half Shildtie.
I first saw Shildt when he was managing the Johnson City Cardinals in the former Appalachian League. It was very apparent to me that his players were motivated and playing the game with confidence. I thought at the time that we have someone special here. It was clear that the players were enjoying playing the game. I also got to see Oscar Tavares in those games. He was sensational.
