Brad Penny should be a solid middle of the rotation pitcher in 2010.

                Matt Holliday has obviously been getting most of the attention from Cardinal fans this off-season, and deservedly so, but signing Brad Penny was also a significant move for John Mozeliak this off-season. Penny is expected to fill the hole in the middle of the rotation that was created when Joel Pineiro became a free agent. On the surface, it would seem like a downgrade for the Cardinals to replace a pitcher that threw 214 innings of 3.49 ERA ball for a pitcher who had a 4.88 ERA in 173.1 innings, but what Pineiro and Penny did in 2009 may not be what to expect from these hurlers in 2010.

                Joel Pineiro had his “career year” in 2009 at age 31, when he went 15-12 with a 3.49 ERA in 214 innings. Pineiro started throwing a sinker, and it helped him increase his ground out to fly out ratio, decrease the number of line drives that batters hit off him, hardly ever give up home runs (.46 home runs per nine innings), and lower his walk rate to a career best 1.14 per nine innings. These are all good things for Pineiro, but it should be noted that very few pitchers in baseball can maintain consistent success when they rely on pinpoint command like Pineiro does, and because of that it’s reasonable to expect some regression in his numbers in 2010. The Chone projection system, one of the most accurate systems out there, expects Pineiro to post a 4.37 ERA in 169 innings over 28 starts, which would be 24 runs better than what a replacement level pitcher would be in the same amount of innings and starts (for an example of what a replacement level pitcher is, think Brad Thompson). So while Pineiro is still expected to be a quality pitcher in 2010, it appears unlikely that Joel will duplicate his stellar 2009.

                Brad Penny is coming off of a very rough 2009 in which he went 11-9 with a 4.88 ERA in 173.1 innings. Most of Penny’s peripheral statistics fit in line with his career averages, but Penny suffered from gopher-itis. Penny’s career home runs allowed per nine innings is .88, but in 2009 that number rose to 1.14. Chone expects Penny’s home run rate to return to his career levels in 2010, calling for him to have a 4.13 ERA in 159 innings over 27 starts. Those numbers would make Penny 22 runs above replacement, which is two runs below what Pineiro is expected to post but in ten less innings, so basically Chone thinks Pineiro and Penny will provide equal value in 2010.

                Just because Chone projects Penny and Pineiro to be equal in 2010 doesn’t mean that they will be, however, as Penny and Pineiro have different pitching styles. Pineiro’s success and failure relies almost entirely on the defense behind him, while Penny garners more strikeouts. Simply put, Penny’s projection is less likely to vary because he doesn’t rely on his defense as much, while Pineiro’s numbers could be much worse if he has bad luck on balls put in play. Also, Penny signed for 1/$7.5 while Pineiro might still get a multi-year deal, so contractually the scale slightly favors Penny again. Overall it appears John Mozeliak made the right call in choosing Penny over Pineiro, both statistically and financially, and Cardinal fans shouldn’t worry about seeing Joel sign with another team.

No Comments »

-Since McGwire admitted his steroid use several days ago, I am going to take a page out of his book and “not talk about the past.” I personally am very tired of hearing about performance enhancing drugs, and the sooner the media finds another topic to focus on the better.

-There isn’t a lot of other Cardinal related news at the moment besides Big Mac’s admission, but there are a few tidbits about players of interest to the Redbirds.

-Ryan Church, possible candidate for the 4^th outfielder role, is close to a contract with the Pittsburgh Pirates. Church would have been a nice fit for the Cardinals, but seeing him sign with the Pirates is not a big deal. Church is just the type of player that John Mozeliak could have considered for the bench, not the only one. There are still many other players out there that can provide similar production that Church could have provided.

-The signing of Church likely means the Pirates will be staying away from Rick Ankiel. Scott Boras, Ankiel’s agent, has scared off a lot of teams because he is looking for a multi-year deal, which teams are obviously scared of giving him. Ankiel struggled horribly in 2009, and until Boras comes down on his demands, Ankiel will continue to remain a free agent while others sign. Ankiel’s best bet at his point would be to accept an incentive laden one year year deal in a place that would offer sufficient playing time, which shouldn’t be St. Louis.

-The Cubs are kicking the tires on Ben Sheets. Sheets was one of many pitchers that the Cardinals would likely have had interest in if they didn’t sign Matt Holliday, but is likely too expensive for the Cards at this point.

-The Mets and Dodgers like Joel Pineiro. Back in October, I said that the Cardinals should stay away from the multi-year deal that Pineiro would likely command. Pineiro’s market was likely set by Jason Marquis’s 2 year 15 million dollar deal, which would be a fair price to pay for Pineiro if the Cardinals had a bigger budget.

-In a XM radio interview with Bill Dewitt III over the weekend, Dewitt stated that there is a “slight urgency” to begin discussing a contract extension with Albert Pujols. Dewitt said that the Cardinals don’t want to go into the final year of Pujols’s contract, which runs out after the 2011 season, without an extension. He also said that ideally a deal would be done within the next 3-6 months. I agree with Dewitt in that the Cardinals shouldn’t go into the final season of Pujols’s contract before getting an extension done. I firmly believe that both the Cardinals and Pujols will get something worked out in the end. Both sides have stated that they would like to continue their relationship, and I believe the Cardinals have the finances to get this done.

-That seems to wrap things up in Cardinal nation for now, and it seems that the best hope for Cardinal fans this week is that the media finds a new whipping boy to talk about.

No Comments »

Cardinal fans are hoping this duo stays together for a long time.

Let’s get straight to the point today:

                Holliday’s deal is a fair one for both the Cardinals and for Holliday, and I think it was a win-win for both sides. Holliday got a large multi-year deal, but not the Mark Texiera money he was after, and the Cardinals can pencil in one of, if not the best left fielders in the game in their lineup behind Pujols. Some are complaining about the amount of years the Cardinals gave Holliday, and it is concerning, but in reality we have no idea if there weren’t any other teams bidding like so many are saying. When a team decides to sign a high caliber free agent, they typically don’t come for three or four year deals. Honestly I would rather have Matt Holliday for 7/120 than Jason Bay for 5/80. Holliday is the far superior player with a better track record of durability (for my take on Bay/Holliday click here). There is also the “Pujols Factor” when analyzing Holliday’s deal. Albert has stated that he will wait and see what improvements the team makes before deciding to sign an extension or not, and signing Holliday ensures that Albert won’t have to carry the offense on his back the way he has in years past. However, this isn’t a post about the contract signed about Matt Holliday, there have been countless other posts on this subject on the internet, and there’s no need to re-hash what everyone else is talking about. Now that Matt Holliday is signed, sealed, and delivered, the elephant in the room is the upcoming extension that the Cardinals would like to give to Albert Pujols. The popular statement among analysts and fans today has been the concern that the Cardinals can’t give 40% of their payroll to two players and still be competitive in the division. It is a concern, but I would like to point out that although that is a lot of money to pay two players, the players that the Cardinals would be paying are obviously tremendous. In the past, there has been a lot of money “wasted” on players and the Cardinals were still able to be competitive. Consider the percentage of payroll given to these players last year:

2009-The Cardinals were able to win 91 games while committing $30.5 million dollars to Scott Spiezio, Adam Kennedy, Rick Ankiel, Chris Duncan, Khalil Greene,Todd Wellemeyer, and Troy Glaus. Collectively, these players combined to produce -1.7 Wins Above Replacement for the Cardinals. To call the group “dead payroll” is being generous, as producing 0 WAR would have been a large improvement.

                    So if the Cardinals can give over 30 million dollars to a group of players who provided negative value to the team and win over 90 games, I firmly believe the Cardinals can win while committing around 40% of the payroll to two outstanding players. If Jeff Luhnow and the rest of the player development department can supplement the roster with cheap 0-3 service time guys, the Cardinals can win. The Cardinals won’t need a Colby Rasmus or a player of that caliber to come up every year, as the core of the team is already in place. What the Redbirds will need is a steady stream of talent to help supplement the marquee players. Also, with the Cardinals ability to bargain shop on the waiver wire like they did in 2009 with the Julio Lugo and John Smoltz acquisitions, I believe the team is in good shape going forward. In short, be happy Cardinal fans, this team is in good shape, and also did the first step to ensure that #5 will stay in town for a long time.

*I wanted to have this post up Wednesday, but the site was down.  Continue to expect the Wednesday/Saturday post format from now on.

No Comments »

No Comments »

Incidents like these fill Vincente Padilla's past.

                 With the Winter Meetings starting next week, the next couple of days figure to be a very busy time for the Cardinals. There will be rumors flying, and since it can be hard to decipher fact from fiction coverage surrounding the Winter Meetings has little backbone to it. It’s truly a crazy time of year for baseball fans to try to keep things straight. In Cardinal Nation, Joe Strauss’s article and tweets were once again the story that has Cardinal Nation buzzing, so let’s cut to the chase.

                -Strauss stated that John Mozeliak and other members of the front office have expressed their concern on how much to offer Holliday since Pujols will need an extension sometime soon. I am sure John Mozeliak did say that, but I also think others are blowing this out of control by questioning why the Cardinals didn’t realize that in the first place. I don’t think the front office was naive enough to think that Holliday would come cheap, and it’s not like the fact that Pujols’s contract will expire after 2011 is breaking news either. The Cardinals knew that it would be expensive to keep Pujols and Holliday, and why it’s a big story that they might not be able to afford both isn’t exactly shocking news. All the Cardinals ever said was they would make an aggressive attempt to sign Holliday, and they very well might. They never stated that they were going to bring Holliday back at any cost or would be the highest bidder.

                -Strauss said that the Cardinals might be interested in bringing Derosa back if Holliday walks to split time at third and in left with David Freese and Allen Craig, which I don’t think would be a bad idea. Signing Derosa and having a three man rotation for two positions would be a better option than signing two players like Miguel Tejada and Xavier Nady. Tejada and Nady would be pricey, and I think the best way to spread around the dollars this off-season is to bring back Derosa then put the rest of the dollars into pitching. The offense wouldn’t be the strength of the team, but it would be a better offense than most of last year where Joe Thurston, Rick Ankiel, Khalil Greene, Chris Duncan, and an injured Mark Derosa took a lot of plate appearances.

                -Speaking of pitching, according to Matthew Leach the Cardinals could have some interest in Vincente Padilla. Padilla has a live arm and a sinking fastball, which could be a good match for Dave Duncan, but he also comes with some serious baggage and a poor reputation in the clubhouse. Personally I’d much rather see someone like Jon Garland brought in than Vincente Padilla. Consider their Bill James Projections for next season:

Basically, Garland is better in every category except strikeouts, which he offsets by posting a lower walk rate. If the Cardinals are going to spend money on an innings eating #4 type starter next season, I’d rather have Garland, who is a better pitcher than Padilla and doesn’t come with the negative reputation.

                -Derrick Goold believes that the Cardinals could enter the bidding for one of the high risk pitchers that I’ve discussed, which is an idea that I am obviously on board with. It’s hard to say what pitchers are healthy from a fan’s point of view, but if the Cardinals were able to get 140-150 innings from a guy like Sheets, Harden, or Bedard, it would probably end up being a very nice value to the club.

                -By my next post Wednesday, I’m sure we will have a clearer picture of what John Mozeliak is going to do this off-season. Eventually the club will have to decide on what side of their parallel tracks off-season plan they are going to follow, and it will be very interesting to see how it all shakes out.

No Comments »

After an eight year break, TLR and Big Mac are together in the dugout again

                Unless you were living under a rock these past couple of days, you know that Tony La Russa is back for one more year and that Hal McRae is out as hitting instructor, with former redbird Mark McGwire taking over the position.  The press conference formally announcing these two moves was Monday morning, and although McGwire wasn’t even in attendance, he was the focal point of the interviews with Dewitt, Mozeliak, and TLR.  The questions were a bit of positive and negative, with most of the positive obviously being about the Card’s skipper returning for a 15^th season.

                Personally, I am very happy about La Russa’s return.  Although it can be frustrating to watch TLR on a day to day basis when he does things that don’t seem to make sense, what TLR is able to do as a whole is outstanding.  In short, TLR on a micro level can drive fan’s crazy, but on a macro level I think it’s pretty safe to say he’s one of, if not the best manager the Cardinals have ever had. 

                It’s pretty remarkable that the return of the winningest manager in team history wasn’t the biggest news of the press conference, but that was exactly the case when the rumor that Mark McGwire was going to be the new hitting coach was confirmed by TLR and other members of the front office.  Obviously this is a very controversial hire, and I feel the best way for the Cardinals to minimize the media circus that will surround Mark is for him to just address what happened in the past, apologize, and move forward.  We live in a pretty forgiving society, for proof just examine the two Yankee heroes this postseason, Andy Pettitte and Alex Rodriguez.  I think if Mark just explains what he did and sincerely apologizes, the media, the fans, and he himself can all move forward in a more positive direction. 

                I have no idea how much a hitting coach can actually influence performance, all I hope is that Big Mac will come in and help to change the philosophy of the “grip and rip” approach of this year’s team.  The 2009 Cardinals were aggressive to a fault at the plate, swinging at 26.8% of pitches outside the strike zone, the 6^th worst percentage in all of baseball.  For comparison’s sake, the Red Sox and Yankees are baseball’s most disciplined teams, with both swinging at just over 22.5%.  Swinging at pitches out of the zone doesn’t allow the offense to work counts, which means that the hitter is more likely to swing at a pitcher’s pitch instead of getting one he can handle.  It also means that opposing team’s starting pitcher doesn’t have to throw as many pitches, so he can go deeper into the game and the Cardinals don’t get to hit against a team’s middle relievers, the weak spot on most clubs.  This was painfully apparent in the playoffs as the Cardinals chased ball after ball out of the strike zone while more disciplined teams like the Phillies and Dodgers were able to work counts into their favor, and then get a pitch they could handle and do something with it.  The Cardinals will be much better off if McGwire and others can help change the philosophy to be more patient, and to really focus on getting the best pitch they can and then hopefully do something with it.  Big Mac seems like a perfect guy to come in and teach this approach, as he had a .394 obp for his career and walked in almost 18% of his pa’s when anything over 10% is considered good.  Mark also seems to have a good relationship with several current players, with the most notable being Matt Holliday and Skip Schumaker.  A lot is made both good and bad about Holliday listening to Big Mac’s advice about ditching his signature high leg kick early in the year and then struggling, before going back to the leg kick and subsequently taking off again.  I personally believe that it has little bearing good or bad on the Holliday negotiations, and that people who think Holliday won’t sign with St. Louis because McGwire gave Holliday advice that didn’t work are overreacting . I also believe  people who think Holliday respects McGwire enough to change his stance even though he was already a .300 plus hitter  means Holliday will sign to just be with McGwire are doing some wishful thinking as well. 

                In conclusion, it’s great to have La Russa back.  He seems to have tremendous respect from Pujols and other players, and it would be hard to imagine Cardinal baseball without #10 in the dugout.  I am also on board with the Mark McGwire hiring, on the condition that he deals with his personal business before the year so he doesn’t become a distraction.  It’s tough to quantify how well a coach does, so the only thing to base an opinion on is from the players that play for them, and both Tony and Mark seem to have ringing endorsements.  McGwire isn’t going to make Brendan Ryan hit .350, or suddenly teach Colby how to hit 40 homers, but what Big Mac can do is help the Cardinals change their philosophy at the plate and hopefully turn the hitters into a more disciplined bunch.   The Cardinals have completed the makeup of their 2010 coaching staff, and now the ball goes into General Manager John Mozeliak’s court as he trys to give his manager and his new hitting coach some more talent to work with.

*Be sure to check out the UCB Radio’s interview with Cards Team President Bill Dewitt III.  Fantastic job guys!

-Agree/Disagree? Leave a comment and I will be happy to discuss!

2 Comments »

Was great to see the Redbirds pull through once again against the Dodgers.  After a sub-par performance on Tuesday, the Cardinals played a solid game and came away with a 3-2 victory thanks to a sacrifice fly in the top of the 9th by Matt Holliday.  Wainwright pitched a very good game and the Cardinals got Kershaw yanked early.  That dude ran up some pitches in the first 4 innings or so.  McClellan grabbed the win while Broxton got stuck with the loss.  Franklin closed out yet another game and continues to be that reliable closer we have dreamed of over the past few years.  Brendan Ryan was the player of the game on offense with 3 hits while Molina chipped in a couple hits.  The Cardinals move to 69-53 and stay a solid 6 games over 2nd place Chicago Cubs – who beat the Padres easily tonight.  The Cards and Cubs flip flop opponents now as the STL Cardinals will go to San Diego and the Cubs will face the Dodgers.  Could be a weekend that puts this race completely out of reach for the lovable losers.

Smoltz is a Cardinal

I absolutely love this move.  The Cardinals added veteran pitcher, John Smoltz, to the roster for the league minimum $400,000.  Smoltz was released by the Boston Redsox just days earlier.  The Cardinals are known for taking veteran pitchers and making them “good” again somehow.  Smoltz will most likely finish the year as a 5th starter but will provide the solid 7th and 8th inning relief the Cardinals need as they move into October and the playoff.  The best thing about John Smoltz is he is a GAMER!  He has pitched in big games and knows what it takes to win.  If nothing else, he will be a great influence for some of these youngsters.  Good work Cardinals GM!

Pujols and Shaq square off

Anyone going to watch the Pujols vs. Shaq homerun derby on Thursday?  This ought to be interesting.  Shaq has his new reality show called “Shaq VS” where he goes up against other athletes at their own sport.  He has challenged Albert Pujols to a homerun derby and El Hombre accepted.  Shaq???? Don’t you know this is MVPujols you are talking about?!?!  The MACHINE?!?!  Good luck with that.  I’ll be tuning in to see how things go.  I know many are making the trip to watch the derby so get your “tickets” now.

No Comments »

Cardinalsgm.com will have another radio show to discuss off-season baseball. It is scheduled for Tuesday, November 18th at 8PM CST.

Feel free to call in and chat with me. The number is listed at the website of www.blogtalkradio.com/cardinalsgmcom

The UCB conducted a show last week and to the right of this is the widget so you can listen to the last show.

IT is a beaseball show but we will discuss ALL sports.

No Comments »

With the great success the Cardinals have experienced over the past several years, they have become one of the toughest tickets in baseball. Key games are often sold out before the average fan even has an opportunity to snap them up. Where do fans go to find great St. Louis Cardinals tickets, even long after the game has been sold out? Lone Star Stubs offers a huge inventory of baseball tickets to any ballclub in the bigs, including our own Cardinals. So if you are hoping to make it to a Cubs-Cards game this summer, or any of the other important series, check out LoneStarStubs.com to find yourself some great seats.

1 Comment »

He might be at an all time high as far as value. Would you trade him if you could? The question will be what will we get in return. well, what would he fetch in return?

I am not in favor of trading him due to the fact that I am not ready for Duncan to play on a regular basis. Chris has not shown the ability to hit left handed pitching.

Ryan Ludwick is simply ON FIRE!

I say, take a chance and keep Ludwick and trade Duncan as soon as you can.

6 Comments »