"Official" 2011 St. Louis Cardinals Thread

[BigRedChief]

This is so unreal. We were dead. No hope. A season over. Somehow, someway we find some team chemistry and squeak into the playoffs on the last day of the season.

Only to find us facing one of the best pitching staffs assembled in years with home field advantage. We somehow, someway find a way to beat the best pitcher in baseball on the road in an elimination game.

We have to go on the road and beat the team with the best home record in baseball. A team who mortgaged their future to make this run .We somehow, someway find a way to beat them on the road and make our 18th World series trip.

We take game 1, we give away game 2 and home field advantage. Albert goes off for probably the best performance in World Series history and we take game 3 easily. Games 4 & 5 our bats fall asleep, Phone gate happens and its not looking too good.

Game 6, one of the best baseball games of all time and it takes place in a season ending go home game. Cardinals are down 2 runs in their final chance on the season, twice. They are down to their final strike of the season, twice. They give up a 2 run homer in extra innings. In the bottom of the inning their final 3 batters are a combined 3-26 in the Playoffs and a pitcher because the bench is empty. Somehow, someway they get some runners on and the comeback player of the year drives in the tying run. Mr. Freese hits the walk off home run. We will see you tommorrow night.

Game 7, With our bulldog on the mound pitching on 3 days rest he is able to give us 6 good innings and get us to within 9 outs of our 11 World series title. Texas meltsdown, probably left over from last nights game and its over.

The underdog, come back team who had no business even being in the playoffs wins a World championship. They make movies about events like this in life. Events that you remember even if your not a fan of the sport or team for the rest of your life.

When it is your team.......Priceless


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[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by raybec 4

If you wanted to stay in house Jose Oquendo has done a great job with the world baseball teams he's managed. If we were to go outside there are a LOT of names who could really do well here. I wouldn't be opposed to giving Terry Pendleton or Tony Pena a shot if we wanted to keep it in the family.
DJ said anybody but Dusty but I'd like to add Bobby Valentine to that list.

Jose Oquendo would be more of the same.

I want the entire major league staff shown the door, all the way down to the bullpen catcher.

Blow this bitch up. If Oquendo stays, the cliques and double standards stay.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

At the risk of being 'that guy' - I'd honestly take any major league manager other than Dusty Baker. LaRussa's done here. His clubhouse his poison because he's poisoned it. He has unfettered control over the organization and he's become a curmudgeonly dicatator. It's like Congress to me at this point - I don't care who you put in, but get the present guy out. He's a carcass that's rotting the well.

However, I'm not completely devoid of substance here. Here are candidates I'd actually like to see get a look:

Ron Warner in Springfield has always impressed me a great deal. From a developmental standpoint, AA is the most important step and he's done a pretty solid job with some of our better prospects down there. He has a great rep among the players and he's come up with the organization (drafted and played in the Cardinals minor league system for 9 years). He's the kind of guy that could step in with a bench coach like Mike Matheny and really get you a re-built organizational attitude.

Bochy could've been had and he's been, IMO, the best manager in baseball for several years. The job he did in SD was outstanding and he finally got the credit he deserved in SF. He's probably not leaving now, though.

Hurdle would've been more of an old-school manager but he still had a players manager approach in Colorado. He'd have definitely taken the STL job over the Pitt job.

Girardi was rumored to be interested in the Cardinals job before we showed no interest and he moved along.

Terry Pendleton would love to come here and get a shot and I think he'd be a great manager; he's been a very good hitting coach and was always a smart player. He would be my 1a with Warner being my 1b.

Fredi Gonzalez could've been had after the Marlins fired him for daring to insist that his superstar hustle, but we missed the boat there as well (though in fairness, Albert would not have been please with the Gonzalez hire as he can't be bothered to run out groundballs).

Bobby Valentine never got a fair shake because he was stuck with incompetent management in NYM, but he still did a very good job with those teams and has shown he still has the touch in Japan.

Ted Simmons has the pedigree and managerial track record for the role. Tony Pena could be in line for another crack at a ML job as well.

If you want more names, I can keep on giving them to you; it wouldn't be hard at all. But here's the important part - I wouldn't have made the hire, Chris Antonetti would have.

He's the guy that was going to take the Cardinals GM job when we canned Jocketty. He's one of the best young baseball minds around and he'd have been a fantastic hire for us. But he was told that he was stuck with LaRussa and Luhnow so he declined the job and decided to wait out the Indians gig (he was an assistant when we made him the offer). Worse still, any other qualified candidate did the same thing and we got stuck with an organizational stooge in John Mozeliak.

LaRussa should've been fired the day Jocketty was (or more accurately, LaRussa should've been fired instead of Jocketty). When the organization insisted on keeping him, they virtually eliminated the entire pool of front office talent and got left with this worthless coffee-getter we currently employ. So he essentially jumps when LaRussa tells him to and we have a completely dysfunctional organization for our efforts.

The ultimate blame falls on Bill DeWitt for being a gutless piece of shit and putting us in this position.

This is what happens when you allow unchecked control of an organization. Bright minds don't want to come into the job and you end up with organizational group-think run amok. You end up with career yes-men like John Mozeliak tasked with running the ship. You end up with crotchety dictators like Tony LaRussa running talent out of town and building his teams around 'scrappy' hustlers that won't rock the boat...or play baseball worth a shit.

In short - you end up with a bad baseball team.

It's coming, folks.

your just a bowlful of sunshine today.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

your just a bowlful of sunshine today.

"You're"

Asshole.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

"You're"

Asshole.

Don't worry dude, its looking like Pujols won't get the big long term money you say will ruin us long term anyway.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

Don't worry dude, its looking like Pujols won't get the big long term money you say will ruin us long term anyway.

Yeah, but that was before I realized that Mo can't be trusted to spend the money wisely anyway.

If we don't re-sign Pujols, we're going to allocate his money to Jimmy Rollins (I'm think 4/60), Mark Ellis (2/8) and Jonathan Papelbon will get the rest, with Berkman moving to 1b. Oh sure, he'll make some noise about signing Jose Reyes and Ricky Weeks, but he'll **** it up. And since he's essentially a monolith that's incapable of doing two things at once, he'll end up overpaying for leftovers like Rollins after the market dries out. Then he'll have to get LaRussa his big money closer in order to appease his hurt feelings after we let Albert walk.

John Mozeliak is comically bad at his job. He's truly truly awful at it. In fact, he's so bad at it that for the first time in baseball history, a team has geared its entire offseason around fleecing another GM in July. From their roster moves all the way to who they hired as their Vice President, the Padres have geared their offseason around Mozeliak being a shitty horsetrader.

Think about it - what players have the Padres gone after? Harang, Bartlett, Hudson and now Cantu, all guys that would be great fits for the Cardinals (not to mention Ludwick). Now why the crap would the Padres go hard after all those guys?

Simple - because when July rolls around they know that Mo only has their number in his rolodex. Edmonds, Greene, Ludwick....he pretty much only deals with the Padres at this point. Then they signed away Mo's right hand guy in John Abbamondi in order to further grease the tracks. The Padres see that the Cardinals have a shit roster and they know that LaRussa is a tool that will refuse to admit his failings. As such, he'll stamp his feet until Mozeliak is forced to make a deal, preferably ridding him of another one of those damn kids that screw up the clubhouse.

So when we trade Colby Rasmus to the Padres for 'veteran leaders' Aaron Harang, Jorge Cantu and Orlando Hudson in July, don't say you weren't warned.

[BigRedChief]

You do realize that if Pujols does leave, he has a good chance of going to the Cubs. You really want to face a motivated Pujols that many times a year? Watch him start to break record in a frikking Cuibs uni?

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

You do realize that if Pujols does leave, he has a good chance of going to the Cubs. You really want to face a motivated Pujols that many times a year? Watch him start to break record in a frikking Cuibs uni?

Now now, you misunderstood me.

I now fully favor a Pujols extension. Give him $40 million/season if you have to. Afterall, the extra $10 million was just going to go to another glorified 4th starter like Jake Westbrook anyway.

**** it, might as well spend on the known quantity. At least Mozeliak won't screw that up.

Though I can't shake the idea that he'll simply skim over the contract and miss the language that AP's agents add in later giving Albert exclusive dominion and control over Busch Stadium after he retires. Oh well, maybe they'd get the Ballpark Village built at that point.

[Rams Fan]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

You do realize that if Pujols does leave, he has a good chance of going to the Cubs. You really want to face a motivated Pujols that many times a year? Watch him start to break record in a frikking Cuibs uni?

The Cubs owner hasn't exactly paid any contracts near elite 1B level. Wouldn't surprise me at all if Pena stays there more than a year. Not to mention the Cards have like 42 million coming off the books after this season and after '12 if they don't pick up any options.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Rams Fan

The Cubs owner hasn't exactly paid any contracts near elite 1B level. Wouldn't surprise me at all if Pena stays there more than a year. Not to mention the Cards have like 42 million coming off the books after this season and after '12 if they don't pick up any options.

We don't have any money. In 2013 we will want to keep Waino (barring injury or production loss)that won't be cheap. Garcia will warrant big bucks and so will Rasmus. If I can have any of those or Pujols, I'll take Pujols. But to have them all on the team in 2013? Your talking 60-70 million just for those 4 players, thrown in Holidays 17 milion your over 80 million in 5 players. And now what about Molina? Going to let him walk?

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

We don't have any money. In 2013 we will want to keep Waino (barring injury or production loss)that won't be cheap. Garcia will warrant big bucks and so will Rasmus. If I can have any of those or Pujols, I'll take Pujols. But to have them all on the team in 2013? Your talking 60-70 million just for those 4 players, thrown in Holidays 17 milion your over 80 million in 5 players. And now what about Molina? Going to let him walk?

The owners of the team sold the parking structures that were a throw-in with the deal for more than they purchased the team for shortly after buying it.

I'm disinclined to believe they don't have any money. The DeWitt ownership group owns the team free and clear and the debt service on the stadium is reasonable. Hell, they could borrow against the franchise and come up with another several hundred million if necessary (ignoring whatever personal wealth they've accumulated outside of baseball).

The Cardinals have plenty of money.

[Mi_chief_fan]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Cantu is 29 next year...younger than our boy Skip, in fact.

Care to explain to me why he couldn't play 2b anymore? I mean it's not like he's a converted OFer or anything, he actually came up as a 2b. So why has he completely lost the ability to play the position during what would be his baseball prime years?Lance Berkman is 35, that's why he can't play OF. Cantu is still young and still has the ability to play the position.

Too bad it's blocked by superstars like Skip Schumaker and the utility role is now filled by stalwarts like Nick Punto.

This team blows. It absolutely goddamn blows.

He was a horrible 2B, and Berkman will be playing the OF, just not CF. Will Cantu be playing 2B for SD?

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by Mi_chief_fan

He was a horrible 2B, and Berkman will be playing the OF, just not CF. Will Cantu be playing 2B for SD?

Nope, he'll be playing primarily 1b/3b.

And he's no worse at 2b than Skip Schumaker, but unlike Schumaker, he can actually hit a baseball.

Cantu at 2b wouldn't be any worse there than Theriot will be at SS or Berkman will be in RF. In fact, the situations are extremely similar.

Theriot's range has fallen so badly that the Dodgers chose to play a guy at SS that had played more major league OF than he had infield over the last 4 seasons over him when Furcal went down (Jamie Carrol). Theriot could play it, but the Dodgers chose not to play him there because he can't play it very well.

Berkman was such a good defensive OFer that he hadn't played the position in 4 seaons. Hell, the Astros couldn't even get an NL trade partner for him so they essentially gave him away to the Yankees to be a DH. Sure, Berkman could play OF, but not very well.

And the Cardinals have made these two players the center of their offseason plans. Full time starters at positions that were manned by GG caliber players last season. And again, lets not even get into the fact that we're looking for an upgrade on Skip !@#$ing Schumaker. I'm not trying to replace Craig Biggio or Ryan Sandburg here - I'm talking about the worst defensive 2b in all of major league baseball.

[Swanman]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

And the Cardinals have made these two players the center of their offseason plans. Full time starters at positions that were manned by GG caliber players last season. And again, lets not even get into the fact that we're looking for an upgrade on Skip !@#$ing Schumaker. I'm not trying to replace Craig Biggio or Ryan Sandburg here - I'm talking about the worst defensive 2b in all of major league baseball.

Ryne Sandberg

Asshole.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by Swanman

Ryne Sandberg

Asshole.

Damn. I was pretty positive I'd spelled his last name wrong but I had no idea he spelled his first name Ryne.

I like him even less now. What kind of douche allows his parents to spell his name like that? He was literally born to be a Cub.

[Mi_chief_fan]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Nope, he'll be playing primarily 1b/3b.

Are you talking about Cantu?