Shelby Miller has a 1.60 ERA. Just decided to look that up.

artie_fufkin wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

I doubt that it will be addressed post-game, but I'd love to hear the reason for batting a LH Wong 6th while batting RH Bourjos 1st.  And please tell me it's something more than Matheny wanted to go RH-LH-RH-LH

I think part of it has to do with Wong going 0-for-9 in the leadoff spot the last two games. 
 

Probably, which makes it all the more confusing that a guy who hasn't had a solid hit since May 3 is at clean-up.

Boom

And that's where the loss of Walden hurts. Seth Maness isn't a guy you want pitching repeatedly in high leverage situations.

Damn. Another run would have been huge there.

7-8-9 coming up for the Indians, and they've already used Rayburn. I expect we'll see Murphy hit for Ramirez.

Careful with Kipnis here ....

Might get some help from the Phillies today ...

tkihshbt wrote:

Plenty of rain in the forecast for tomorrow and Saturday. Might be best to call off the Detroit series and bring the Brewers into town.

I'm OK with that. The next 10 games are against the Tigers, the Mets and the Royals, with the last two series on the road. 

artie_fufkin wrote:

Careful with Kipnis here ....

Ate his lunch with a change-up

artie_fufkin wrote:

[From following his chats, I think Strauss now that he's columnist has become almost completely infatuated with provoking responses. I'm sure his bosses at the P-D appreciate it, but this "Back to the Future" mentality about an alternate timeline is purely speculative.
 

Yeah, it's speculative, but probably not far off from what might have happened. From the reports of those final hours of Pujols's free agency, it seems that Mozeliak was about to relent and give Pujols whatever he wanted. My memory is sketchy now, but I'm thinking Moreno jumped in at the last minute. If the Cardinals miss the playoffs (again), does Mozeliak have the juice to turn Pujols down? I have my doubts.

As for Matheny, I don't think there's any way the Cardinals could sell him as manager without a strong playoff run. Maybe it wouldn't have been Francona, but I think Strauss is right that Mozeliak had to get an established guy to follow La Russa, plus another year of no playoff baseball.

The past four seasons have basically been a balancing act for what 2006-2010 were. They collapsed or treaded water in September for five of those seasons. 2009 was a playoff year, but they were 84-57 on Sept. 9, went 7-15 down the stretch and were swept right out of the playoffs. And we all remember what a drag 2010 was. I just get the feeling had 2011 ended on a sour note (no playoffs), Mozeliak would've been forced into the dreaded panic moves. We could be watching a 35-year-old Pujols hobble around right now.

Last edited by tkihshbt (5/14/2015 7:03 pm)

artie_fufkin wrote:

If the Cardinals end up signing Pujols for, say $250 million for 10 years, I'm not sure it changes much, at least so far. The four big contracts they've given since Pujols left are to Wainwright, Molina, Peralta and Carpenter. Do they let Yadi or Wainwright walk? Probably not. They probably find a cheaper option than Peralta and maybe don't extend Carpenter as far as they have, but the makeup of the team isn't substantially different.

I agree here, except for Carpenter. Carpenter probably doesn't emerge if Pujols re-signs. The opening day lineup in 2012 has Molina, Freese, Furcal, Schumaker, Pujols, Holliday, Jay and Berkman, with Craig on standby after getting hurt.

You're right the team wouldn't look too much different, but they definitely wouldn't have Peralta; Carpenter might not have gotten much of an opportunity in 2012; Wacha is never drafted; and the team is burdened by paying a one-footed first baseman $25 million. I think Mozeliak would've made moves to fix this at some point, but I strongly believe winning the World Series in 2011 saved them from a semi-bleak future.

There was some outrage locally, but just in my opinion, I think Didi Pujols could've been the most gracious wife of the second-richest baseball player of all-time and the Cardinals still survive. The memory of that World Series was too fresh; people were enamored with Allen Craig and other than his 3-homer game, Pujols didn't exactly dominate the Rangers.
 

The one thing that I always said when we had these discussions with Max is I firmly believe that DeWitt's sense of urgency as an owner diminished after they won the World Series in 2006. Getting a 2nd one in 2011 was a bonus.

To their credit, going into the 2011 off-season, they believed more strongly in than farm system than probably any of us (with the likely exception of TK) felt they should. As of 2011, there had been only signs that the minors might start producing talent. Craig had emerged as a valuable utility player, and there were pieces in the bullpen like Motte and Lynn, but up until that point the most significant contribution any of their draft picks had made were Brett Wallace, Chris Perez and Colby Rasmussen being traded. Since then, the system has produced enough talent that may have been able to withstand signing Pujols, but there's no doubt it's better that they didn't.