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 Marcellus

Cards walk off win in the 9th after going into the inning down 2-1.

Yup they will stay just mediocre enough to miss the playoffs by 1 or 2 games.

ive at least enjoyed watching the games more. Going 1st to 3rd. Taking risks and putting pressure on the defense. The manager seeing what we all can see when a pitcher has lost it and pulls them before the game gets away. Trusting his young pitching. Line ups that at least make some sense.

I don’t think he has a choice about the Fowler thing. Bet he was told to play Fowler when he got the job.

O’neill looks like a keeper. He made two great catches in RF today. He has drawn walks. Taken the outside pitch to RF with two strikes. Almost got the 3 run homer today. He is fast on the base paths.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

ive at least enjoyed watching the games more. Going 1st to 3rd. Taking risks and putting pressure on the defense. The manager seeing what we all can see when a pitcher has lost it and pulls them before the game gets away. Trusting his young pitching. Line ups that at least make some sense.

I don’t think he has a choice about the Fowler thing. Bet he was told to play Fowler when he got the job.

O’neill looks like a keeper. He made two great catches in RF today. He has drawn walks. Taken the outside pitch to RF with two strikes. Almost got the 3 run homer today. He is fast on the base paths.

Going 1-3 on a single then stealing 2b with 1 out and the tying run on 3rd with a professional hitter at the dish in Hose.

I mean that's balls of solid steel right there. If he's out, the ability to get the sac and drive that runner in is gone. Not sure it's the 'smart' play but when it's a guy with Bader's speed, it's a worthwhile attempt. Especially since Hose has been hitting the ball hard and on the ground so often; the odds of a DP there were pretty decent given his recent groundball tendencies and Davis's downward movement on his split. If nothing else, they're not just sitting around and waiting for the 3 hits it would take to score a run and with enough justification for the attempted SB, you have to like the aggression.

It's a night and day different team to watch play. This Rockies series was among the more top to bottom entertaining series I've seen from this team in 4 years. It was a lot of damn good baseball.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by Jewish Rabbi

The good news is Matheny is already fired, if they miss out narrowly this year I don’t really care.

The better news is the team was fun to watch today. A couple of great plays by O’Neill, only 7 strikeouts instead of the 15 we were seeing earlier in the year, and Bader’s speed winning the game is a welcome change.

Yup.

Matheny's gone - just root for wins and as much crisp baseball as we can get at this point.

I don't give a shit about draft position when you're talking about 18 vs. 12. If you're sitting at 7 and can sneak up to 3 then it might make a difference but at that point in the draft, who really cares? Move up 5 spots this year and I'd STILL have taken Gorman. Hell, move up to 10th and I probably still would've taken him.

Let's just see the kids play with their hair on fire and develop some killer instinct. Lets see the young pitchers learn how to get hitters out at this level.

We're seeing good baseball even in most of the losses and that's such a welcome change from where we were.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

It's a night and day different team to watch play. This Rockies series was among the more top to bottom entertaining series I've seen from this team in 4 years. It was a lot of damn good baseball.

I was thinking that as the game went along today. They’d only scored one run but it just felt different. It wasn’t the “meh” brand of baseball we are use to seeing for the last 2 years. They were trying to make something happen. They were hustling in the outfield to make plays. Even when Mikolas made his bonehead play there was some player telling him very loudly no no no.

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Going 1-3 on a single then stealing 2b with 1 out and the tying run on 3rd and a professional hitter at the dish in Hose.

I mean that's balls of solid steel right there. Not sure it's the 'smart' play but when it's a guy with Bader's speed, it's a worthwhile attempt. If nothing else, they're not just sitting around and waiting for the 3 hits it would take to score a run.

Put pressure on the defense and good things can happen. We have this speed now. Use it as a weapon. They even started Carp to stay out of the double play with Molina.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Jewish Rabbi

The good news is Matheny is already fired, if they miss out narrowly this year I don’t really care.

The better news is the team was fun to watch today.

This! Don’t care if they make the playoffs either. We need more talent to realistically compete.

But for right now, I’m happy to see them doing their best with what they have to work with.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

I was thinking that as the game went along today. They’d only scored one run but it just felt different. It wasn’t the “meh” brand of baseball we are use to seeing for the last 2 years. They were trying to make something happen. They were hustling in the outfield to make plays. Even when Mikolas made his bonehead play there was some player telling him very loudly no no no.

I actually got a 'well, these games happen' vibe from the game.

I expected an L but not because they were sleepwalking as they had in the past. It just felt like one of those games that happen sometimes where you just cannot get the big hit to string a rally together. Even in the 9th with Garcia on 1b and Bader lugging his 0-3 w/ 3 Ks to the dish against a tough righty, I felt the same way.

And then somehow he Davis gets in his kitchen, Bader doesn't actually bring his hands in to stay on the ball, he just doesn't bring the head through and flares a single out into RF. I honestly don't think he did that on purpose - if he could do that, he'd have shown it by now. But sometimes you just have to get lucky and low and behold they did.

And once they finally got that bit of lucky contact, they pressed the advantage. It's nice to see...
[/QUOTE]

[Marcellus]

No doubt the results have not been a ton different but the games are funner to watch.

A lot of that is just knowing MAtheny is gone and some of it is the young guys.

[Jewish Rabbi]

Originally Posted by Marcellus

No doubt the results have not been a ton different but the games are funner to watch.

A lot of that is just knowing MAtheny is gone and some of it is the young guys.

Let’s be honest, we wouldn’t be seeing the young guys if Matheny was still here.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Jewish Rabbi

Let’s be honest, we wouldn’t be seeing the young guys if Matheny was still here.

nada chance. We’d still be seeing Holland. He would have allowed Martinez and Ozuna to stay in the game. Several games he would have allowed the pitcher to go 5 innings or leave them in to blow the game.

Matheny being gone has improved our enjoyment of the game and the on the field results.

[BigRedChief]

Truth from STL Today?

Forget Fowler’s lackluster season statistics for a moment. Shildt gave him a fresh start, so this argument will, too.

Since the managerial switch, Fowler’s batting line reads .180/.288/.340 in 50 at-bats while starting 14 of 16 games. During that same time, Bader is slashing .320/.393/.400 in 25 at-bats while starting six games. O’Neill only has 50 major league at-bats to his name, and his line reads .280/.309/.480. With 53 games to go, which players might improve with more at-bats?

Defense and baserunning should not be overlooked. Fowler has a career-low five steals, and checks out at four runs below average in Fielding Bible’s Defensive Runs Saved in right field. Bader is the team’s best defensive outfielder. O’Neill has been impressive in small sample sizes.

O’Neill’s powerful swing became too hard to ignore at Memphis, and he’s even harder to ignore now.

Bader doesn’t have brakes.

About the only thing he tiptoes around is commenting on the case he and now O’Neill are making.

“At the end of the day, the ball doesn’t think,” Bader said. “So, if you just play the baseball, it’s going to show up.”

From a revamped bullpen to the outfield, the baseball says the Cardinals’ kids are more than all right.

Not tilting playing time in their favor suggests winning isn’t the bottom line.

[VAChief]

Originally Posted by 'Hamas' Jenkins

That's what separates teams like Boston and the Dodgers. They are willing to eat shit on a bad contract, like Carl Crawford, whereas the Cardinals won't.

They could still bring up O'Neill and give Bader run with Pham here if they were willing to eat Fowler's deal, but just like Holland, they embody the Sunk Cost Fallacy.

They had to relieve the outfield logjam, but Pham was not the one that should have gone.

Throwing out the money and just looking at performance(PGM's irrational Pham hate aside)and Fowler, by a large margin, should have been the odd man out. Pham was not going to replicate his last year, but even with his streaks he was light years ahead of Fowler.

[MarkDavis'Haircut]

Pirates-Cardinals tonight!!

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Carr4MVP

Pirates-Cardinals tonight!!

what did you think of trading Cole and then trading for Archer? You and the Pirates fans happy with the trades?

[MarkDavis'Haircut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

what did you think of trading Cole and then trading for Archer? You and the Pirates fans happy with the trades?

Loved both trades. Cole was disgruntled and was leaving anyway. Archer is controllable for three more years. Most fans seem to be happy but some Yinzers (ugh) are not happy. But they are never happy.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Carr4MVP

Loved both trades. Cole was disgruntled and was leaving anyway. Archer is controllable for three more years. Most fans seem to be happy but some Yinzers (ugh) are not happy. But they are never happy.

What’s a “Yinzer”? The 1979 WS song thing?