forsberg_us wrote:

"In signing Westbrook, the Cardinals successfully avoided the three-year, $33 million guarantee that the Los Angeles Dodgers gave Ted Lilly before the lefthander could reach the free agent market."

Read more: http://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/cardinal-beat/article_96f8513e-f1d6-11df-9c00-0017a4a78c22.html#ixzz1Snp2U22y

"The Cardinals became pessimistic about Westbrook's return last month, but talks regained momentum last week. The rebuilding Indians attempted to get involved earlier this month but were eventually rebuffed by a veteran now intent on competing in a pennant race.

Read more: http://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/article_a85a9809-c596-504f-8fbf-41042cc842fe.html#ixzz1SnmB4CNC

Strauss and Strauss again.  And there's no claim of any offers. 

Look you might be right, and it could be the case that Moz made the wrong call for all the right reasons, and the Ludwick trade played no role.  Since there is no ultimate arbiter in this case other than God, it's down to a judgement call of each individual.  You seem particularly defensive of Moz in this case, not sure why.  But the idea that part of his motivation was that he was trying to polish a turd is not that hard to sell.

Who cares whether or not we traded someone to get Lohse.  The point is that they gave a 4 year deal, with full no-trade protection, to a back of the rotation pitcher.  Rather than arguing that the Suppan deal set the market for Lohse, why not ask the qusetion why Moz didn't learn from the catostrophic mistakes of the Suppan or the Carlos Silva deals.  By the time the Cardinals signed Lohse, both Milwaukee and Seattle were lamenting their mistake and we followed right down the exact same path.

You're trying to justify the Lohse contract with the Suppan deal signed 2 years prior, but then analyzing the Westbrook contract in a vacuum limited by only 2011 contracts.  If you are going to compare the Lohse signing to contracts signed in years prior to his, then compare Westbrook's deal to the Marquis or Pineiro deals signed in 2010.  Both Marquis (2 years, $15M) and Pineiro (2 years, $16M) signed almost the exact same contract. 

No one has ever suggested that Westbrook having been traded for Ludwick didn't play a role in the decision to re-sign him.  But you seem to be arguing it was the primary reason without a single shred of evidence to support that.  It's easy to look back now and say the contract may turn out a bad contract.  But rather than saying that with the benefit of hindsight, find a link from anyone during this past off-season saying the signing was a mistake or that the Cardinals significantly overpaid.  It might add a little credibility to your position rather than simply saying "Westbrook sucks now, see I was right."

So I say you're using hindsight to support your argument, and you post a quote showing that you were in favor of the signing when it occurred, and that supposedly disproves my point?

Ludwick was a guy I hated to see go but he isnt a guy you worry about justifying trading.  If anything Ludwick has made Moz look smart by playing like he has.  He is still batting under .250.

forsberg_us wrote:

Max wrote:

Only if refuse to see the main thrusts of the disagreement between you and I, part of which finally disappeared when you acknowledged: "No one has ever suggested that Westbrook having been traded for Ludwick didn't play a role in the decision to re-sign him."  Then also, that in hindsight, Moz has not had a good record signing FA starting pitchers.  Seems to me like that's what you have been disputing for the past 6-8 months.

Not at all.  If you had articulated that as your point, there wouldn't have been any disagreement.  I agree Moz's track record for free agent starters isn't good.  It's a track record that includes Matt Clement and 2009 Kyle Lohse.

Yeah, I buried my lede as the opening post in the thread.  My bad.

No one has a crystal ball, but GM's will be judged, regardless.  It is interesting to go back and read this thread, since everyone mentioned in it is pitching better than Westbrook. 

tkihshbt wrote:

Jake Westbrook is also better -- and substantially so -- than those other pitchers.

Max wrote:

He'd better put up much better numbers or Moz will look worse than he already does.

tkihshbt wrote:

Being better than Freddy Garcia or Bruce Chen isn't that hard.

forsberg_us wrote:

The fact that Aaron Harang or Freddie Garcia signed for less is irrelevant. Bad pitchers are abundant and they get paid less for a reason.

APRTW wrote:

after actually reading I saw that it was about the Yankees overpaying for a marginal player and I stopped caring.

Max wrote:

My main point is that Mozeliak is making choices, taking risks, as he is supposed to do, and I see a strong potential for these to backfire and to be used against him in the ubiquitous game of office politics.  Let's face it, he hasn't brought much success to St. Louis.  So, if Westbrook and Berkman perform great, Moz is vindicated.  If not, there will be a lot of what if's. 

One 'what if' that leaps out at me just looking at that list is what if we had gone after Fuentes and 1-2 of those budget SP (aware that several of those budget SP have had great success in the past)?

To me, Westbrook is just another horse who slots in at 3-4 in the rotation, pitches 200 innings, and if the team is good, he wins some games.  He's Jeff Suppan.  We shouldn't have had to trade anybody to get him, let alone our one tradable chit with any value. 

As for the rankings, I note that Westbrook is the highest ranked, unranked FA on the list.  Everyone above is a type A FA, and six or more of those below him are also Type A.

.....................IP       H    R    ER    HR    BB    K    ERA    WHIP    BAA   
Chen:           73.2    76    32    27    9    24    44    3.30    1.36    .270   
Harang:        98.1    94    38    36    9    32    70    3.29    1.28    .254    
Garcia:       103.2  105    41    37    9    31    69    3.21    1.31    .264   
Westbrook: 102.2     122    64    60    12    40    57    5.26    1.58    .298   


http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bernie-miklasz/article_819d1525-22d5-5ec6-9079-f12226e87fc9.html

Last edited by Max (7/22/2011 5:18 pm)

Max wrote:

My main point is that Mozeliak is making choices, taking risks, as he is supposed to do, and I see a strong potential for these to backfire and to be used against him in the ubiquitous game of office politics.  Let's face it, he hasn't brought much success to St. Louis.  So, if Westbrook and Berkman perform great, Moz is vindicated.  If not, there will be a lot of what if's. 

One 'what if' that leaps out at me just looking at that list is what if we had gone after Fuentes and 1-2 of those budget SP (aware that several of those budget SP have had great success in the past)?

To me, Westbrook is just another horse who slots in at 3-4 in the rotation, pitches 200 innings, and if the team is good, he wins some games.  He's Jeff Suppan.  We shouldn't have had to trade anybody to get him, let alone our one tradable chit with any value. 

As for the rankings, I note that Westbrook is the highest ranked, unranked FA on the list.  Everyone above is a type A FA, and six or more of those below him are also Type A.

I am glad you looked this up.  This is the type of stuff that is worth debating.  The kind of stuff that makes or breaks the case.  In this case breaks it.  I would rather be on the hook for Wetbrook's contract then Fuentes'.  A left handed pitcher who cant get lefties out, only throws 60 innings a year and makes 5 million is pretty much worthless.  If Moz would have done this you would be bitching about it as well.

forsberg_us wrote:

I'd also point out that this past off-season you predicted Westbrook would have a career year under Duncan with an ERA between 3.5 - 4 and 200+ innings.  At that point, you didn't seem all that disappointed.

That's not quite I remember, can you find a link/quote?

forsberg_us wrote:

And quite frankly, the final judgment of Mozeliak's tenure won't have anything to do with the Westbrook for Ludwick trade, the decision to re-sign Westbrook, nor his failure to sign any of a laundry list of bottom of the barrel pitchers.  Mozeliak's tenure will be judged, fairly or unfairly, by what happens with Pujols.

To which I'd add that my concern is that Moz was brought in, at least in part to be the fall guy for not resigning Pujols.  But this little stuff adds up, too.

Max wrote:

APRTW wrote:

I am glad you looked this up.  This is the type of stuff that is worth debating.  The kind of stuff that makes or breaks the case.  In this case breaks it.  I would rather be on the hook for Wetbrook's contract then Fuentes'.  A left handed pitcher who cant get lefties out, only throws 60 innings a year and makes 5 million is pretty much worthless.  If Moz would have done this you would be bitching about it as well.

exactly, i think the posts i quoted showed that we all kind of blew it on our takes.

Then why are you so harsh on Moz when your own plan was worst?