Tagged: Fernando Salas

It’s a good thing we have offense

This is not the first time this season, we have seen the Cardinal offense errupt.  Normally, it is over 9 innings and not in one, but nonetheless, when these guys are clicking, it’s clear what they can do.  And that’s good because our pitching is shaky at times, especially the relief pitching, as well as our defense.

The defense is actually painful to watch at times.  The Cardinals have the fourth highest number of errors in the NL and the only teams that have poor are sub .500 teams.  Over the years the Cardinals have been known for outstanding defense.  In the 80s you had the Wizard and even more recently, guys like Edmonds and Rolen were just fun to watch.  Rolen was a vacuum at 3rd base.  Not only did he make the routine plays with ease, but he made the ridiculously hard plays look easy.  Edmonds had a flair all his own, laying out to catch fly ball after fly ball or hopping the fence to rob a home run.

These days the defense is abysmal at best.  Only Yadier’s cannon is exempt.  With the rest of them, if they make the routine plays I’m happy because that doesn’t always happen.  And spectacular plays are certainly few and far between.  Most of our outfielders aren’t going to be throwing runners out at the plate and our infield has struggled to catch anything hit sharply.

This combined with a not so strong effort from the bullpen last night again allowed a last place Houston team to feel like they had a shot to win, even as the Cardinals led by 6 runs in the late innings.  And indeed they did.  For the second day in a row, the ‘Stros had the tying run at the plate.  Fortunately, after a wild pitch by Salas, backup catcher Laird dove over home plate as Hunter Pence raced home, just in time to get the inning ending out.  If it wasn’t for that, who know what would have happened that inning?

Of course for the Cardinals the big inning was the 6th inning, where they put up 9 runs on 9 hits and 1 walk.  Most remarkably, all of the hits, minus Berkman’s home run, were singles.  Small ball at its best.  In that inning, 4 players (Freese, Pujols, Holliday and Berkman) each had 2 hits.

Overall, the Cardinals scored 11 runs on 15 hits.  Lance Berkman had quite the game against his old team, as I mentioned here that he probably would.  The only two extra base hits of the game, a double and a home run, belonged to Berkman.  He went 4 for 5 with 5 RBIs, heavily contributing to that powerful middle of the order lineup.  The 3-4-5 guys went a total of 8 for 14 with 8 RBIs.  And that’s what these guys are paid to do.  To continue to go after opposing pitchers, unrelenting hit after hit.  Many people have questioned the contract of Matt Holliday, but I think he has showed himself worthy of every penny.  He hasn’t had the career of Albert, of course, but he has proven himself quite valuable and a much more affordable price.  And you can’t say enough about Berkman.  He was gambled on, in the offseason and Cardinal fans everywhere are so glad he was.  He has continued to rake and has now hopped to 2nd in the NL in average, behind none other than?  Matt Holliday.

In today’s game, it would be nice to finally get Chris Carpenter a win.  It’s an unfair world where Carp is 0-2 and Kyle McClellan is 4-0.  The biggest reason for that, of course, is run support.  Carp has only allowed more than 2 runs, in one of 5 starts this season.  But his teammates have not returned the favor.  He has the worst run support on the Cardinals staff and the 11th worst in the NL.  On the other hand McClellan has the 6th best run support in the NL, at a crazy 9.10.

Taking on the Braves,
Tiffany

Not Again

I have blogged two previous Opening Days here at MLBlogs.  In fact, my first blog entry on here was Opening Day of 2006.  It was a great opener and that year I picked the Cardinals to win it all that year, because I thought they had the best team on paper.  That was before they lost Mulder and Izzy.  I would have not picked them if I had known that.  But a young kid named Adam Wainwright stepped up to the plate to fill the role of closer.  Wainwright would go on to give me the single greatest moment I have ever seen in Cardinal history….the big strikeout of Carlos Beltran with runners on in Game 7 of the NLCS.

It gives me hope about this season.  Yes, we are missing Wainwright, who has since transitioned from closer to ace.  Yes, we are missing Punto and there are ridiculous number of question marks in guys like Freese and Berkman.  But you never know which young kid is going to step up and hit the game winning shot off the bench.

The 2007 Opening Day was my next and final Opening Day blog. I blogged off and on over the next few years, more off than on.  And now here we are in 2011.  Five years since that incredible year of 2006 and the impossible run of the team that nobody thought had a chance.

It’s time to prove yourselves again, Redbirds!

And with that here are my notes about Opening Day 2011….in no particular order:

  • Hitting – The Cardinals hit plenty and got on base.  Rasmus got a first inning triple and Holliday came through with 2 outs.  Berkman and Freese, two big questions got back to back hits.  But they never got that “big hit.”  This was the proverbial thorn in the side from last year.  Quite the opposite, as they grounded into way too many double plays.
  • Beards – Um, what was with all the man scruff?  Carpenter, Berkman and Pujols all had decent beards going on while Schumaker looked like Grizzly Adams out there.  And Rasmus looked like he was trying.
  • Defense – Defense has been a concern with the loss of Brendan Ryan and this ground ball heavy staff.  And the worries proved accurate.  Freese made a tremendous play up the line, but the middle infield guys made a couple of huge mistakes.  Skip muffed a ball that should have been an easy strike ’em out, throw ’em out double play and instead turned into a run.  And Theriot made an 11th inning error that led to the game winning run.
  • Pujols – The guy who has 3 opening day home runs to his credit, couldn’t get the job done today.  He would end up 0 for 5 and hit in 3 double plays.  Pujols wasn’t worried and neither am I.  All I got to say is tomorrow’s pitcher better look out because when he breaks out he will break out BIG.
  • Bullpen – Franklin looked very uncloser-esque today.  I hope this will be the exception and not the rule.  The game winning run was given up by Augenstein.  This is significant because he was the last guy to get a spot on the Cardinal roster, even beating out Salas who played in the bigs last year.

Overall, it wasn’t a horrible game.  But it sure felt like 90% of our games from last year.  Decent hitting, decent fielding and good pitching.  But….they found a way to lose a game that should have easily been won.  So much different than the champion Cardinals who always seemed to find a way to win.  It is just the first game of the season so I am willing to cut them quite a bit of slack.  I just hope I’m not still saying this at All-Star Break.

Disappointing start,
Tiffany

The Returners, part 2

The Pitchers

Chris Carpenter – The once obvious clear ace in the Cardinals rotation, though some would now perhaps give that distinction to Wainwright, he is still a part of one of the better 1-2 punches in baseball (Philadelphia beastly rotation aside).  Carp has always been a no-nosense type of guy with the media, fellow players, in pitching and it’s one of the things I love about him.  He is going to have a lot to prove this year, namely that at 35 years old, he can still deliver the good stuff.  Otherwise, it’s very conceivable that it may be his last year in a Cardinal uniform.  And even if he does, that could still well be the case.  The Cards have an option on him for 2012, but a lot of his future could depend on the Pujols situation.  If they can’t sign Pujols and Carp is still healthy, I’m sure they pick up his option.  If they do sign Pujols, Carpenter could be a guy that they buy out.  They’ll have to save money somewhere and an aging pitcher, however, good, seems the first place to do that.

Adam Wainwright – Maybe Wainwright hasn’t been “the face of the franchise” in so much the same way Carpenter has been over the last few years, but he’s getting there.  As I said above, many seem him as overtaking Carp in that ‘ace’ role.  For my money, as soon as he K’ed the mighty Beltran to end the NLCS, I was a Wainwright fan for life.  I love listening to Adam give interviews.  Still a southern boy through and through (though not as much as Colby), he just seems to enjoy talking baseball and pitching.  Nothing fancy about him, he just does his job.  I fully expect to see him make another run at a possible Cy Young.  And perhaps one of these years, the other pitchers will actually let him reach it.

Jake Wesbrook – Now this guy will be interesting to watch.  He was a Cardinals for only a little while last year, but now has been signed for two additional seasons.  He didn’t do anything spectacular last year, but he was also brought over only in time to try and save an already sinking Cardinal team.  What will he be like sitting under Dave Duncan for an entire season?  Will he crash and burn a la Brad Penny?  Or will he be the latest Duncan testimony a la Jeff Weaver?  Time will tell.

Jaime Garcia – Jaime is the player I am most excited to watch in 2011.  He had a totally unexpected and awesome breakout season last year.  The question on everyone’s minds will be whether or not it was a fluke thing or if he can step up again this year.  The Cardinals need him to be as good as he was last year if they’re going to think about getting to October.

Kyle Loshe – The guy that the Cardinals for some reason badly want to be their 5th starter.  I have no idea why.  This guy is completely maddening to watch pitch.  Maybe they feel they have invested too much into him, but at some point you have let him go.  Even at his best, this guy’s not a front of the rotation type of guy.

Ryan Franklin – The solid closer.  I trust him in a ballgame and he’s cheap for the Cardinals, considering the money they’re pouring in to a lot of other places.  But the problem again is that this is his last year before free agency.  The plus is that hopefully he’ll want to make a good impression, but the negative is that it serves as a distraction.

Mitchell Boggs / Kyle McClellan / Trevor Miller / Jason Motte / Fernando Salas / P.J. Walters

Various members of the Cardinal ‘pen that have pitched from a little to a lot.  A lot of arbitration eligible players in this group and also unclear in what they have to offer.  There’s a couple of exceptions to that, such as that Motte throws heat.  But for the most part, it’s always hard to know what your set-up men and other various bullpen roles are going to do.  We’ll see soon enough how this is going to all shake down.

The Cardinals have a returning starting rotation in Carp, Wainwright, Garcia, Westbrook and Loshe.  But that is doubtful to be the starting rotation come the end of the season.  There’s no guarantee for some of the staff who will be in St. Louis at the beginning of the season and who will have to work their way up there.  Spring Training will help get all of that sorted out.

Next up are the newcomers.

One of the best 1-2 combos out there,
Tiffany