2018 STL Cardinals Thread

[BigRedChief]

Opening day lineup

Fowler RF
Pham CF
Carpenter 3B
Ozuna LF
Martinez 1B
Molina C
Dejong SS
Wong 2B
Pitcher

Edit:
Matheny fired 07/14/2018




Opening Day Roster

Spoiler!

St. Louis has opted to carry 12 position players and 13 pitchers to begin the new season, with a four-man bench and eight-man bullpen.

Outfielders:
Dexter Fowler
Tommy Pham
Marcell Ozuna

Infielders:
Matt Carpenter
Paul DeJong
Kolten Wong

Catchers:
Yadier Molina
Francisco Pena

Utility:
Jose Martinez
Greg Garcia
Yairo Munoz
Jedd Gyrko

Starters:
Carlos Martinez
Michael Wacha
Luke Weaver
Miles Mikolas
Jack Flaherty

Relievers:
Dominic Leone
Tyler Lyons
Bud Norris
Brett Cecil
Sam Tuivailala
Matt Bowman
Jordan Hicks
Mike Mayers

On the DL:
Adam Wainwright
Luke Gregerson

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

I saw an interesting tweet - pretty short: "It seems the Cardinals are always 'making room in the outfield...."

They're exactly right. I mean go back to dumping Craig to clear space for Oscar. We've been hearing about how stacked our outfield is throughout the system for seemingly a decade now and yet we never seem to have any OFers that actually matter.

I mean hell - go take a look at Lane Thomas. Who? Right - nobody has any idea who that guy is but he's actually had a really good season and you can make an argument that he should be considered as highly as Arozarenas and higher than Jose Adolis Garcia. He's played a strong CF while hitting 20+ bombs already in AA before wrecking AAA. He may be the #2 or #3 OF prospect in the whole system but it doesn't really matter because just like the rest of them, he's probably a fairly fungible guy when all is said and done.

We just build this organization full of guys that are pretty easy to swap out and never seem to come across anybody truly irreplaceable. All the talk now is about Elehuris Montero and yeah he's hitting damn well at 19 in A ball right now. But I'll bet you even money he just ends up another guy who plays solid baseball in AAA with strikeout issues and/or defensive deficiencies that keep him from amounting to anything more than a 2 win player.

And we never seem willing or capable of separating the wheat from the chaff before the word gets out and bundling them for guys that can actually matter long-term. And in a world where the corpse of James Shields netted Fernando Tatis Jr, why the hell do we sit on assets like Lynn and not go scooping up more guys that might become breakout players?

There's just a lot wrong with this team and the 40 man is gonna be damn interesting in a few months when we have to start protecting this giant assortment of misfit and redundant parts.

this is again on Mo. hang on to all these prospects until a “crisis” with the 40 man or and Rule 5 draft causes them to dump prospects for a fraction of their prior worth.

I could see in the past of keeping a player because if they left through FA you’d get a 1st rounder. We have Wacha, Flaherty etc with those 1st rounders. But now that’s changed, you need to move players who have skills that are valued by other teams but that you have other players that can take their spots in the prospect order of things.

They must be better about moving players before their value drops.

Like in this case today, surely you can get a good prospect for Norris. In 6 weeks your not getting shit for him. Jose Martinez surely has value to an AL team?

[Prison Bitch]

Originally Posted by Marcellus

That really nothing more than a good indicator of how bad a season Harper is having.

Did you know Tommy Pham last year (6.1 fWAR) had a better season than all but 1 of Bryce's 7?

[BigRedChief]

Archer to the Pirates

Dozier to the Dodgers

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

Archer to the Pirates

Glasnow is a lot of potential, as is Meadows. That's a heck of a package to surrender for an Ace in reputation only.

Glad we weren't involved in that. An equivalent package from us is probably O'Neill, Hudson and maybe someone like Junior Fernandez (who I don't like but he has asset value).

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Glasnow is a lot of potential, as is Meadows. That's a heck of a package to surrender for an Ace in reputation only.

Glad we weren't involved in that. An equivalent package from us is probably O'Neill, Hudson and maybe someone like Junior Fernandez (who I don't like but he has asset value).

What did they get for Cole? At the end of the day, As far as prospects go, did they just swap out Cole for Archer?

And **** us getting involved if that was the package to give up. My rays fan buddy I bet is happy now.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

What did they get for Cole? At the end of the day, As far as prospects go, did they just swap out Cole for Archer?

And **** us getting involved if that was the package to give up. My rays fan buddy I bet is happy now.

Colin Moran and a bag of dicks. And frankly, you can probably just toss Moran into the bag as well; all pedigree and hype - I'd be shocked if he's ever a meaningful starter.

I mean prospects are prospects and at least Joe Musgrove (in the Cole deal) is probably a major leaguer for a few more years, so there's that. And there's no way to know how well this deal actually turns out - Meadows could bust in his own right.

But if I were assigning a numerical value to each of the players moved at the time they were moved, I'd say that the Pirates got less for Cole than they gave for Archer (and that's with the 3rd piece still pending, though he's probably like the Ramirez kid we got in the Pham deal - a fungible long-relief arm sort).

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Colin Moran and a bag of dicks. And frankly, you can probably just toss Moran into the bag as well; all pedigree and hype - I'd be shocked if he's ever a meaningful starter.

I mean prospects are prospects and at least Joe Musgrove (in the Cole deal) is probably a major leaguer for a few more years, so there's that. And there's no way to know how well this deal actually turns out - Meadows could bust in his own right.

But if I were assigning a numerical value to each of the players moved at the time they were moved, I'd say that the Pirates got less for Cole than they gave for Archer (and that's with the 3rd piece still pending, though he's probably like the Ramirez kid we got in the Pham deal - a fungible long-relief arm sort).

I like Cole 10X better than Archer. Wonder what our Pirate fans that post in here think about this?

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

I like Cole 10X better than Archer. Wonder what our Pirate fans that post in here think about this?

If he thinks they got anything more than a borderline #2 starter and #3 on a legitimate contender, I would say that he's probably operating from a faulty premise...

[Miles]

Past the deadline now and not looking great for another trade of someone like Norris...

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by Miles

Past the deadline now and not looking great for another trade of someone like Norris...

The Dodgers made a deal for John Axford, so we know that mediocre right-handed veteran relievers were in demand...

[Miles]

Brewers getting Jonathan Schoop from BAL. He started off the year horribly after a breakout 2017 but has rebounded decently in the past month.

['Hamas' Jenkins]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Glasnow is a lot of potential, as is Meadows. That's a heck of a package to surrender for an Ace in reputation only.

Glad we weren't involved in that. An equivalent package from us is probably O'Neill, Hudson and maybe someone like Junior Fernandez (who I don't like but he has asset value).

I think Meadows is really, really overrated. He's never shown HR power in the minors and is probably a .260-.270 hitter and his walk rate has dropped significantly through every step up the ladder. Glasnow seems to have abandoned his changeup after going to the pen, which makes me wonder what he would get LHB out with, since his fastball and slider will both break into them. Is he just a relief pitcher with spotty control, a good-but-not-elite fastball, and a decent breaking pitch? Those don't seem terribly hard to find anymore.

[Miles]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

The Dodgers made a deal for John Axford, so we know that mediocre right-handed veteran relievers were in demand...

Saw that one and figured Norris had to be worth something. He’s having a decent year and seems just like the type of vet reliever teams usually trade for to fill out their pen for the final stretch.

['Hamas' Jenkins]

They think this team can win in 2019.

They're fools.

You've gotta move Norris at least, and have serious inquires about Mikolas and Martinez.

I would go out and buy Pham stock right now. He's hitting the ball just as hard as he was last year (where he got lucky), but his luck has inverted this year. Expect a late season bounceback. Not as severe as Carpenter's streak, but I would bet he hits .280-.300 with another 7-10 bombs before the season is over.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Miles

Saw that one and figured Norris had to be worth something. He’s having a decent year and seems just like the type of vet reliever teams usually trade for to fill out their pen for the final stretch.

yet he’s still on this team that’s going nowhere and in 6 weeks we don’t get diddly squat for him when he moves on to his next team.

A great example of the missed opportunities to sell high on a player that Mo just let’s slip away.