Cards Push Through

Well, that's a winner. The Cards take care of the Pads in nifty fashion and move ahead to face the only real baseball team in NYC. What we lack on paper we've managed to make up for with swagger and grit. This is probably the least talented team we've put in the playoffs in the last several years, but I can't help feel some hope against the Mets this series.

Of course, it all starts with our super stars Pujols and Carpenter, who should by any reasonable account go back-to-back with MVP and Cy Young awards. Not sure how many times that's been done before, not only two guys going back-to-back on them, but those two guys being on the same team. I am finally pacified now that most announcers no longer stutter when proclaiming Pujols the best overall baseball player on the planet. I was slightly sideways, however, at the underwhelming reserve used by announcers to conclude that Carpenter is clearly a number 1 pitcher. Carpenter is more than an ace, he is the best starting pitcher left in the playoffs, the best starting pitcher in the national league over the regular season and remains a perennial combination of innings workhorse and big-gamer. There are only a few pitchers in MLB who can match up against him, and at this point in October, Carpenter stands alone. He deserves more credit; there should be more gushing.

After the way the games this series have unfolded, there should be a lot of hope in Budweiser country right now.

First of all, our corner OF platoon of Encarnacion, Wilson and Duncan is superior over our corner OFers from last year. I mean, these guys aren't superstars or anything, but they have the ability to strike at any time, get streaky and punish mistakes. Last year, I had a hard time justifying keeping Taguchi on the bench with the sad performances of Walker and Sanders, but this year, Taguchi is a defensive roll player or a last resort, and I like it that way. Many on this blog lamented the loss of Sanders, and some of my friends have tried to stall my current favor by reminding me of his performance last year against SD. My simple response is that Larry Walker is now retired, Reggie Sanders is barely playing ball in KC and aside from that grand slam Reggie bombed, I mostly remember the pleasant and steady breeze created by Sanders and Walker trying to catch up to strike after strike thrown by Houston's pitchers. That situation has changed.

Rolen and Edmonds. These guys continue to be the support structure for Pujols and a Jekyll and Hyde to each other. Both players are on the down swing of their talents, and both already have supporters for Cooperstown mention. Critics of Edmonds abound, often accusing him of being wimpy and offensively nonexistent during the playoffs. But now we see the dramatic California boy playing through pain and demonstrating some veteran grit. Rolen, on the other hand, having a reputation of playing the game "the right way," may have gotten benched for trying to be a little too tough. And in reality, it has been every bit as much of Rolen who has had a career of season and post-season injuries that have hurt the teams he has played for. We will see if Rolen will be healthy enough to contribute this October, otherwise, I'm happy with the way Edmonds is playing.

Our roll players and above average guys. Eckstein is the main roll player on our team, and you can never count him out. He appears constantly caffeinated, and what he lacks in natural athleticism he makes up for with consistency and fiestiness. Ron "Belly" Belliard has seriously grown on me. Not since Tommy Herr have I been this happy with our second baseman. He shows nice range, soft hands, and an all around quick bat at the plate. Spiezio is a great backup for Rolen, has plenty of playoff experience and is a sneaky dangerous bat in our lineup. Still not sure how I feel about the red soul patch, but I like the guy. (The announcers tonight tried to call it an "Imperial." Weak...)

Adam Wainwright and the setup boyz. I am personally very happy with the poise Wainright is showing as our ad hoc closer. Johnson just humiliates opposing lefties, and Kinney keeps keeping the other guys confused. They may not stand up in comparison to the Mets superior pen, but they are getting the job done so far and are showing some pluck.

Having Yady in the lineup is like batting two pitchers sometimes, but whatever he lacks in his ability to wave the bat, he more than makes up for behind the plate. This kid is the best defensive catcher I have ever seen play baseball.

Tony LaRussa. I have never been a huge fan of TLR, but I do credit him with being possibly the game's best tactician manager. He proved himself right by benching Carpenter to close the season down leaving him available for 2 compact, early wins against SD. He has shown both touch and smarts in his handling of games too. I think he knows we are under-dogs now and is taking less for granted than he may have in previous years. I like starting Spiezio tonight, whether it was a no-brainer or a message sent. Unlike Joe Torre 2006, TLR is showing that he is very in tune with his club and is using his guys and his many, many stats in the right way.

We just had to know we would eventually hurt Woody Williams tonight. All our hitters were showing patience through the first three innings. We were taking breaking ball after breaking ball, getting our timing down and getting WW's pitch count up. Then the 4th happened. Three pitches, three outs. What the...? 5th inning, and the only one who looked like he had a clue at the plate was Carpenter. Again, what the...? We have Woody up against the ropes and give him 6 outs on 9 pitches? Clearly, this was a strategy. Someone in the Card's dugout had flipped a switch. And what we gave up in the 4th and 5th innings by aggressiveness, we made up for in the 6th. My brother had told me early that he thought we'd knock Woody out in the 5th, and he wasn't far off. That appeared to be our strategy against the well-known, well-scouted Woody Williams. Spar with him the first couple times through the lineup then start trying to rip the cover off. It ended up working.

Cardinal Magic? Something maybe we've been lacking for a few years is good luck. Yes, of course, I'm not discounting the incredible win last year when Pujols shoved 50,000 socks in the gaping yams of Houston's fans with a forget-me-not off of Lidge. But I'm talking more about the middle-of-the-game punches every successful team needs to get away with to make a difference in a series. That throw pulling Bard off of home plate when all they had to do was throw-catch, followed by the perfectly called and executed squeeze play made me think we might have a little mojo going in our locker room.

Let's hope we can keep this going against the Mets, a team I grew up absolutely hating; and a team we will need more than talent on paper to beat.

How Low Can You Go?

(AP - credit in more ways than one)

The Streak is finally over. Albert made sure of that. However, the Houston Astros seem to have forgotten how to lose - they won their ninth game in a row this afternoon in Pittsburgh - so the division lead remains at two games in the loss column (one overall), and the magic number remains at four.

Can the Cardinals hang on to the division lead? Sure, here's some reasons why. And in case you forgot about them, here's some reasons why they won't.

WHY THE CARDINALS WILL WIN THE NATIONAL LEAGUE CENTRAL

1) Despite all the ugliness, they're still in first place. Yes, it's true. The sky has not fallen completely in. The Cards are in the position of power, and after last night had an 87% chance of winning the division. Because of that, even if the Cards split the series against the Brewers, Houston still has to win two of three in Atlanta to force the Cards to play the Giants in a makeup game - which the Cards would have to lose in order to cause the one-game playoff for the division title.

2) Their last four games are at Busch Stadium. Say what you will about the Padres series, the Cardinals' home record still stands as the second-best in the National League at 47-29 (.618). Conversely, their main remaining opponent, the Brewers, have posted the second-worst road record in the NL at 25-52 (.325) - and are 2-4 in Busch in 2006. Those rather simple numbers add up to a pretty huge advantage going into that series. And, if you're wondering, the Giants are 33-47 (.413) on the road this season.

3) Their best two pitchers of late close out the final series. Despite some ugly performances against the Padres, Jeff Suppan and Chris Carpenter have been far and away the Cards' best starters in the second half. Both have posted ERAs in the 3.00-or-below range since the break, while no other Cards starter has an ERA under 5.00. If they can steal a game from Weaver or Marquis in the first two games, it puts them in position to win the series and force Houston to sweep to even remotely have a chance.

4) Revenge. Believe it or not, after not winning a playoff series in their first 42 seasons, the Houston Astros eliminated the Atlanta Braves in the postseason not once, but twice in the past two years. Despite being eliminated about two weeks prior, the Braves have destroyed the Mets in the first two games at Turner Field this week, and have scored 43 runs in their past four games. With the Braves hosting the final chapter of the Astros' miracle run at the Central Division crown, I'm sure Smoltz & the Joneses would like nothing better than to get a little revenge and knock the Astros out of the playoff race themselves.

WHY THE CARDINALS WILL NOT WIN THE NATIONAL LEAGUE CENTRAL

1) The Houston Astros cannot be stopped. It's hard to imagine the Astros losing right now, especially not tommorow with Roger Clemens going to the mound. At 44, Clemens has been one of the best starting pitchers in the league over the second half of the season. The dominance of Clemens and Roy Oswalt are givens, but they've even managed to win games started by the likes of Matt Albers and Jason Hirsh during their nine-game winning streak. Yikes. Albers starts Saturday against Lance Cormier, in what will almost surely be the biggest game of his career, and Andy Pettitte, solid once again in 2006, starts on Sunday versus John Smoltz.

2) Chris Carpenter is gassed, and Jason Marquis is terrible. Carpenter's last two outings: 122 pitches, 6 ER (4 in last inning); 106 pitches, 6 ER (4 in last inning). He's been a workhorse the past two seasons, both of which have surpassed his pre-Cardinal career high in innings pitched. Supposedly his velocity has been decreasing late in games, he's had issues with cramps... perhaps he's beginning to wear down a little bit. Hopefully his start on Sunday will be different, but he's only had one rather uninspiring outing against the Brewers this season. Marquis, on the other hand, has posted an ERA of 6.08 over the past month, which ironically hasn't raised his season ERA much at all since it was so awful to begin with. Yet, he's starting tonight against the Brewers. That won't kill the momentum of last night's win, will it?

3) The Astros would host the one-game playoff. Houston has a 44-37 (.543) record at home, and the Cardinals have a 34-47 (.420) record on the road, including 3-7 in Minute Maid Park. The pitching matchup for this game? Likely Roy Oswalt for the 'Stros against... well, Jason Marquis would be next in line if this game were to happen, but I can't imagine La Russa would start Marquis in a game like this. Possibly Carpenter could be pushed back two days if the situation called for it. Either way, this game doesn't look like a good situation for the Cards, and it would be much in their best interest to avoid it.

So, at this point, it could go either way - although as I write this, the Cardinals are off to a poor start in the first game against the Brewers, trailing 4-0 in the second inning. A one-half game lead with three games to play would be excruciatingly close for a team that had the division all but wrapped up nine days ago. Provided it doesn't appear to be a waste of my time, I'll be back this weekend with an update and a perhaps-a-bit-optimistic look at what might happen if the Cardinals do make the playoffs.

Poor Brad Lidge

This season has been so ugly at times, that continued emotional investment in this team must be difficult for even the most diehard of fans. Tonight the Cardinals, a mediocre team, faced another mediocre team in the Astros, and on the line is the right to be slaughtered by the Chinese dodgeball team. It's certainly not easy to watch Jeff Weaver or Ronnie Belliard or even Scott Rolen right now (last homer was August 23rd), enough so that I'm wanting to stick my nose in spreadsheets for the express purpose of not watching a game. So I've been wondering if I still care about the season, and then something like tonight happens. The adrenaline rush as Spiezio rounded third (Lane's still chasing the ball) tells me that heck, yeah, I care. Keep hope alive, boys.

In case you didn't see it on the FSMW broadcast, Albert Pujols is now 2-11 lifetime during the regular season against Brad Lidge. It's conventional wisdom that Albert broke Lidge last October, and I've got my suspicions like everybody else. But this psycho-analysis based on performance is iffy territory, and the implication that it was over when Pujols walked into the batter's box bothers me a bit. Pujols is facing his own pressures, and it's not like Lidge was throwing 82 mph fastballs.

Oswalt versus Marquis in the afternoon, which isn't a favorable matchup straightup. Throw in the fact that Marquis is going on short rest, and, well, I'll probably miss Chris Narveson again. The Cardinals and Astros have been in this position before, and I don't mean last year's NLCS. Four years ago to the day, Oswalt faced off against Jason Simontacchi. By my count, the Simo-man allowed 14 baserunners in 6.2 innings, but thanks to some dominant fielding from JD Drew and a little help from Jeff Fassero before his name was a word of curse, the Astros were held to two runs. In the 10th Jimy Williams had Tino Martinez intentionally walked to get to Edgar Renteria, who smacked one through the hole to drive in the winning run. In a must-win game with their ace on the hill, the Astros were beaten by the tow truck driver, a guy the Cubs dumped when he had a 6+ ERA and a waiver claim (Rick White). Their season basically ended that day.

Isringhausen

On second thought, maybe Isringhausen isn't holding it together. Two walks and a hit batsman? I'm convinced LaRussa will have to make a change at some point, this year or next. I wonder what it will take.

A Pujols Game

I made it to Busch III for the second time yesterday. The first time I made it, I marveled over Albert's, uh, defense. It turned out I was a day early for the more famous of Albert's skills. I was more fortunate this time around. We're running out of superlatives for Albert Pujols, but it suffices to say that he's the reason people make 8-hour round trips to spend hundreds of dollars at the new stadium. Other notes from the game:

• Albert probably shouldn't have admired the second homer quite like he did. I don't care about the "showing-up the pitcher" stuff. Rather that second shot was a bullet that barely cleared the wall. It would've been embarrassing to end up with nothing more than a single on a ball hit that hard.

• Anthony Reyes threw nothing slower than 88 in the first inning, and he K'd the side. That's an indication of the movement and location of his fastball. Obviously he looked solid overall, although it was the Pirates and Phil Cuzzi can cut both ways. I didn't have the greatest vantage point, but it looked like Cuzzi gradually evolved from a generous strike zone at the beginning to a miserly strike zone in the 7th.

• One thing that was clear from my seat was that Ronnie Belliard came unglued against Ian Snell. In the unlikely event he returns next year, LaRussa might want to sit Belliard against Snell. Actually if Snell had lasted longer, I would've pinch hit Jose Vizcaino for Belliard the third time through. Belliard looked that bad.

• Jason Bay looked like he was trying to run with cement shoes on Yadier Molina's double down the left field line. When Yadier looks faster than you do, then it might be time to run a level-two diagnostic. After the series Bay had, I'd be wondering if he caught that concussion disease from Jim Edmonds.

• Jason Isringhausen in 2006 reminds me of Mark Mulder in 2005. He's managing to hold it together to be an average reliever, but it wouldn't surprise me if he goes Danny Graves on us in 2007. The stadium had cleared out by the 9th LA-style, so the people giving him the sarcastic cheers probably weren't the Cellphone Sonnys.

• There were only four ticket sales/will call windows open on the Sunday before Labor Day. The Triple-A ballparks I've visited have that many queues and their crowds are one-fifth the size of yesterday's at Busch. The lines predictably were long for us poor regular folk, but there were plenty of windows for VIPs and ticket adjustments. Put that on the fix-it list.

Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

Thankfully I'm not old enough to remember the 1960's. On June 1, 1987, the local newspaper celebrated the 20th anniversary of the release of the Beatles' Sergeant Pepper's, and when I started listening then I was hooked. I bought all their albums -- vinyl! -- and even though they're the Beatles, there was plenty of stuff new to me. Without a doubt the most unfamiliar work was the White Album, which as you probably know is completely different from the "I Want to Hold Your Hand" music. It was a fascinating mess, all the more so for a suburban kid who liked to question authority, but, well, not too much. "Revolution Number 9" really took hold, as I never had heard anything like it and yet it was the Beatles, and that combination meant of course it was the coolest thing in the world.

Then not long afterwards it dawned me that "Revolution Number 9" was garbage. They say McCartney and the Beatles' producer George Martin fought hard to keep it off the album, and I can't blame them. I've imagined a 13-year-old in 1968 spending his lawn mowing money on a Beatles double album, only to find twelve minutes of noise on the fourth side. What was Lennon thinking when he pushed that on his audience? Was his goal to see how many fans he could drive away? Or was he trying to find out how absurd he could be and still get paid doing it?

Like the White Album, 2006 has been an uneven set, and Mark Mulder's two starts are "Revolution Number 9". There's not much more to say here. Everyone's frustrated, even Al Hrabosky, hoping Mulder or LaRussa or DeWitt stops fighting the obvious. I only wish there was some way to blame this on Yoko Ono.

Clean Sweep

Like the tired horse finally catching the exhausted horse, the Reds stand tied with the Cardinals tonight. That bothers me less than the exceedingly poor play of late. Two months ago I suggested this was a play-out-the-string season, and I still believe that. I'll admit it's been harder watching Team DFA than I had expected.

Derrick Goold's latest has ownership's perspective on this season, and they're not happy. DeWitt's defensive about payroll and the sweep at the hands of the Mets may reinforce his point. According to USA Today's salary database, the Cardinals have three pitchers they're paying more than Chris Carpenter. Those three pitchers are, in order, Jason Isringhausen, Mark Mulder and Jason Marquis, who just happen to be the three pitchers who took the L's in the recent series.

Why?

The stakes were high enough tonight, that this had a playoff-caliber tension. Unfortunately it's turning into Game 5 of the 2000 NLCS, with Mulder playing a strange version of Ankiel. Unless the point of this exercise was to humiliate Mark Mulder, what happened tonight made no sense. Tony LaRussa, Dave Duncan and anyone else involved with this decision should be ashamed of themselves.

Dirty Dozen

No fancy stats tonight. No spreadsheets, no SQL, no tables. I swear I could feel that one coming. Right after the Pujols grand slam that was my thought "Could they find the way to lose this?" I'm not claiming to have great instincts and I didn't just read Jonathan Livingston Seagull or something. I'm sure I wasn't the only one with this feeling, as obviously this team isn't good and it knows it isn't good.

Tonight's game felt like a Columbo episode. You knew who the killer is and you know Columbo will catch him. It's just a matter of how he'll catch him. After the Pujols slam, here's the plot:

(1) Staked to a six-run lead in the 5th, Jeff Weaver walked the first batter he faced
(2) During the next at-bat Yadier Molina made a lazy stab at a Weaver pitch for a passed ball.
(3) Still the same batter, Chris Duncan and Aaron Miles approached a popup to short left tentatively, both looking out of position. The pop dropped and, thanks to the passed ball, there was no force at second.
(4) Then after a clean single to load the bases with nobody out, Carlos Beltran -- who looks like he'll be the first Met to be named NL MVP -- grounded one right back to Weaver. An easy 1-2-3 double play, right? No, Weaver was so unprepared for something positive, he threw a 50-foot underhand lob to Molina to get only one.
(5) With the bases still loaded, a warm Randy Flores was not brought into face Carlos Delgado.
(6) Weaver fell behind 3-1 to Delgado, then gave in. Grand slam returned.
(7) Looking for some insurance on a two-run lead, Juan Encarnacion led off the 6th with a single and a stolen base. Two strikeouts and a groundout later, he was stranded at second.
(8) After a well-executed bunt single from Endy Chavez, Adam Wainwright walked 8th place hitter Chris Woodward (620 OPS coming into tonight's game) to move Chavez to second. Once he was sac bunted to third, Chavez would score on a groundout, bringing the Mets to within a run.
(9) In both the 8th and 9th the Cardinals had first and second with one out. Albert Pujols and Ronnie Belliard rolled over Chad Bradford's offerings for inning-killing double plays.
(10) It didn't cost a run, but Tyler Johnson plunked recent AAA callup Michael Tucker and then froze in the headlights on a hard sac bunt attempt. After staring at 2B for what seemed an eternity, he took the sure out at first.
(11) To start the 9th, So Taguchi played a line drive single tentatively. Maybe he should've had that, maybe Edmonds would've had it, I'm not sure. To add to the ugliness, Taguchi took his eye off the ball after it bounced, and barely managed to save an error.
(12) Jason Isringhausen served up his 10th homer of the year.

At some point Peter Falk turns and says "Just one more thing, Mr. Badguy." The negative waves actually started before the grand slam, when Belliard for some odd reason was thrown out at the plate with the Cardinals up 3-1 with nobody out in the 5th.

Pujols had a fantastic game, sadly reminiscent of the "Pujols Game" against the Cubs in 2004. That game was emblematic of the 2004 season, that you couldn't count the Cardinals out. With the lead over the Reds slipping to one game, tonight is a microcosm of the 2006 squad. They have their positives, one big positive in particular. Overall though this team lacks talent and lacks confidence, and that won't be solved before the season's end.

On a more immediate note, if the Cardinals make the playoffs, tonight also demonstrated they have some significant matchup problems with the best team in the NL. The Mets have two good switch-hitters, a good lefty and a good (if fading) right-hander, and Josh Hancock is the only reliever who in 2006 has shown the ability to get out both left-handed and right-handed batters. Hancock of course didn't pitch tonight, so we can see how highly his success is regarded. The Cardinals are right-handed-heavy with hitters too, which Chad Bradford can neutralize effectively.

Now let's see how the plot unravels with Mulder.

Two Out of Three Ain't Bad

Bernie Miklasz has a column up on the Duncan/Encarnacion at-bat on Saturday. This gets to the heart of what I've been contemplating all summer long. "Stats versus instincts" miscasts the discussion; really what we're talking about here is "good stats versus bad stats". Even if he didn't quantify Duncan's recent performance, the argument for Duncan batting in the ninth was based on his very recent numbers, and once it becomes a numbers debate, then Miklasz has to play by the stats geeks' rules.

That said, as a stat guy my impression of the decision changed on one pitch. Ohman started Encarnacion off with a fastball that looked to be a few inches outside, and Encarnacion's response was to open up his hips and try to yank the ball. Lucky for him he just got the top of the ball (not so lucky for him was that he kept topping the ball throughout the at-bat), because if he had put it in play, it probably would've been a 6-4-3. Encarnacion demonstrated all the awareness of an untrained walrus in that at-bat, and I suppose that's not a surprise.

As for real baseball discussion, as opposed to meta stuff, after this weekend I'm worried about the starting rotation. Um, actually what I mean is that I'm worried specifically about its stamina. Marquis could manage only five innings on Friday, Suppan looked like the pitching equivalent to a punch-drunk prizefighter by the fourth inning, and Carpenter was pushed to 114 pitches. This isn't a good Cubs lineup, especially with Barrett out Saturday and Sunday, so it's not getting easier. Even though the AAA squad is dreadful, Anthony Reyes, Chris Narveson, Brian Falkenborg, Josh Kinney and Brad Thompson all could eat some innings in September. Each is already on the 40-man roster. Generally I've refrained from attacking the ownership as cheap -- $95 million in the NL Central should've been more than adequate this year -- but if all five of those guys aren't on the roster in eleven days, then my mind may be changed.

Marquis de Sad

I didn't see it, but John Rooney and Ricky Horton kept talking about it -- Jason Marquis was hit hard and hit often last night.

According to the ESPN.com box score, in 60 pitches he threw 41 strikes, and if it weren't for double plays in the first and second innings, it could have been a lot worse. Of course, after Jorge Sosa left the mound, it did get a lot worse.

Since Marquis last pitched well (the 8 innings of shutout ball in LA on July 23rd), the three subsequent outings have resulted in the following composite:

12 2/3 IP
26 H
14 R, 11 ER (that's a 7.82 ERA over those 3 games, if you're counting)
2 HR allowed (to make his NL-leading total 26 HR allowed)
7 BB
5 SO
3 L

The AP article that appeared in yesterday's Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette praised Marquis for eating innings during last week's 8-1 loss to Philadelphia, since the bullpen was used up during the 16-8 loss on the previous night. He threw 118 pitches to the Phillies in 6 innings, giving up 4 ER on 9 hits. I guess that's what passes for praiseworthy these days from Cardinals' starting pitching: don't make us use the bullpen extensively two nights in a row.

For those who don't recall, I am a TLR supporter. Doesn't mean I agree with every move, just means I'd rather have him than a whole bunch of managers out there right now. Having said that, here is a plea -- Tony, please skip Jason's next start. Flip him and Wainwright for the next 9 games, give Wainwright Marquis' turn in the rotation next time, let Jason do his side work in relief. I'm not suggesting he be removed from the rotation for good. Just give the guy (and us) a break, and let him come back strong(er) for the next start and build momentum for the playoffs. Surely he is ahead of Weaver in the playoff rotation, yes? (Oops, did I type that out loud?)

And yes, I think the 'Birds are in the playoffs. I don't see Cincinnati catching them - I expect a Cardinals win tonight against Harang and a loss against Arroyo tomorrow. At this point, I think .500 ball from here on out wins the division -- the Cardinals would finish with a stellar 86-76 record if they split the rest of their games, and the Reds have to go 29-20 to top that.

Dan (aka TSF)

Mr. Mulder Goes to Davenport

In case you haven't heard, Quad Cities has a beautiful setting for a ballpark, located literally next to the Mississippi. The Centennial Bridge seems to jut from the 1B side of the park over the river to Illinois. Periodically lefties plunk one in the drink, making the park something of an A-ball answer to PNC or whatever they call PacBell these days. I really wanted to make a trip to QC this year, and with it being August, I was running out of time. The Cardinals gave me a kick in the pants by sending Mark Mulder on a rehab assignment there, so I made the five-hour drive to log what I saw.

The executive summary is that Mulder looked like Swamp Gas. He was throwing fastballs almost exclusively, and when he did throw his curve, it usually ended in the dirt. A smart, reasonably talented hitter like John Mayberry, Jr., could exploit that. On the other hand, Mulder kept everything down, and that may have expanded the bottom of the strike zone a bit. I logged all 57 pitches using the scoreboard radar gun. There's the standard caveat for scoreboard radar guns, although in this case the hometown folks think theirs is a couple of miles per hour slow. That fits with what Baseball America has said about the opposing starter Omar Poveda, who was throwing a couple of mph faster than Mulder, and it fits with what I've read on Chris Perez, who was timed at 92-93 (and he did look faster than that). I'm comfortable saying Mulder was living around 87-88. With all the qualifiers you can think of, based on what I saw, I'd expect Mulder will be a shade ahead of Jeff Suppan, and well ahead of Weaver and Marquis. Keep in mind I'm convinced Suppan is the realization of the Platonic abstract of mediocre (as in average) pitching.

OK, here's my notation:

C = Called Strike
S = Swinging Strike
B = Ball
F = Final
HH = Hit Hard
HE = Hit Easy

1. 84 B, 87 C, 86 S, 83 S (K)
2. 89 F, 88 B, 88 F, 86 B, 83 B, 88 B (BB)
3. 88 HE (543 GIDP)

4. 84 B, 83 B, 84 HH (Mayberry double to RCF)
5. 86 B, 83 C, 79 S, 68 B, 87 B, 84 B (BB)
6. 87 F, 78 B, 83 B, 86 HE (5U tag, then throwing error to first)
7. 86 B, 87 C, 86 HE (3U, run scored)
8. 86 B, 87 F, 85 B, 87 HE (3U)

9. 87 C, 82 HE (7)
10. 84 B, 84 B, 83 HH (7)
11. 86 C, 86 F, 67 B, 69 B (ugh), 84 F, 82 HE (63)

12. 86 B (where was that, Blue?), 80 F, 76 B, 83 S, 77 HE (Foul 3)
13. 81 C, 76 HH (D8, 400 ft flyout)
14. 86 C, 81 HE (Foul 7)

15. 84 HH (8)
16. 84 C, 82 F, 81 HE (43)
17. 84 HH (HR, ~400 ft bomb to left)
18. 86 HE (43)

You'll notice they were hacking away in the 5th. The "ugh" was prompted by a weird looking delivery on that particular pitch. Otherwise Mulder's much-discussed mechanics looked OK to me. Of course I'm an amateur, and I may have been distracted by that lovely blue belt (picture from the Swing's site). Incidentally Mulder wore his pants long; what a weird symbol of status.

Bryan Anderson caught Mulder. He's a decent prospect thanks to his bat, and while his glove has had iffy reviews (~13 passed balls, last time I checked), he had a solid game today. Back when Ankiel was having his problems, the Cardinals sent him wherever Yadier Molina was catching. At the time the point was to help Ankiel, but in retrospect it probably helped Molina just as much. At the very least Anderson clearly was enjoying this opportunity to work with a big-time pitcher in a real game.

Boom

Did you know that the Cardinals are on pace to score 799 runs? That's just 6 runs fewer than a year ago. They're also on pace to allow 787 runs, and that's only 153 runs more than last year. Um, maybe "only" isn't the right word there. I'm sticking to my story that the pitching talent isn't all that different from a year ago, but questions must be raised.

A couple months back I mentioned Taleb's book Fooled by Randomness, which is an evil, evil book for me, because it appealed to schadenfreude towards Wall Street traders who "blow up." How they blow up is interesting in this context though. According to Taleb, these traders make all kinds of money using models based on historical data. Then one day they walk into work, something happens that never happened before, and that day ends with an escort from security showing them the exit. Taleb thinks the storm could've been avoided with a broader logical analysis.

Tonight's game featured a thorough and diverse meltdown from Cardinals pitchers against a team that's playing for nothing. I'm starting to think the problem with the Cardinals pitching staff is the bland sameness to the group. The non-Carpenter starters (including neo-Reyes) have all thrown around 90 mph fastballs and have a predilection for the groundball. They don't really trust their stuff, especially when they have two-strike counts. The non-Wainwright relievers do more or less the same thing, while throwing a couple of miles per hour harder. None of the non-Wainwright relievers have (or had) killer breaking pitches, except maybe Tyler Johnson, but he can't throw strikes. While individually their average-ness might work, putting them all together sets them up to fall like dominoes as they did against the Phillies. Maybe it took three seasons for the rest of the majors to get the dominoes aligned, I don't know.

Changes will be made, even in August. While I still find the logic behind the Jeff Weaver acquisition sound, he's a long way from usefulness. The walk to the goon pitcher should seal Weaver's fate. Much will be learned of Jason Marquis when he goes Thursday. He's been in this position before, with the previous starters getting blitzed and the bullpen tired, and he's turned in some thoroughly ugly performances. Games like Thursday's are why I follow baseball in August.

Dog Day Afternoon

While I don't like the Molina stuff, one stat from THT to which I cannot object is the projection of 85 wins against a neutral schedule. BPro's analysis of the Cardinals to this point isn't even that kind. The best numbers say the Cardinals are a mediocre club, and the machinery to build a numerical counter-argument isn't stable.

In case you don't buy the numbers, Saturday's game at Wrigley is Exhibit 1A for why you should consider renting them at least. I'll moderate my first impressions ("freaking pathetic" and "freaking disgrace"), and say that Saturday's effort was a different kind of game that sometimes happens upon a mediocre club. My view of the 2005 and 2006 squad has evolved this weekend, as it dawned on me that the difference from last year is that this group knows it is mediocre while last year's did not. It's tough to maintain your focus and drive when you think the end of the road is an ignominious defeat at the hands of the Mets or Tigers. It's probably at its toughest in a day game at that charming dump, with a heat index around 100, and you're facing a Hall of Fame pitcher who's getting funky movement (yeah, that's an allegation).

Tony LaRussa had Albert Pujols hit-and-run on Saturday. The results were incredibly ugly -- Pujols popped out to right and So Taguchi forgot to re-touch 2b when returning -- and the idea of telling Albert Pujols when he should swing the bat is dubious. Of course LaRussa isn't just interested in the raw mathematical value of the h-n-r. He's trying to shake things up, establish some aggressiveness or, as they say in basketball, force the tempo. Jocketty finds himself in a similar position, in need of doing something to re-establish a commitment to winning. I'm not the person to make an argument for either act -- I'd bet LaRussa was overreacting to the "Pujols can't hit the Cubs" headlines -- but if the Cardinals don't want to get their 2006 lunch taken from them by a hungrier team, either in the Central or in the playoffs, then they really need to do something in the next couple of days. Failing that, the only other magic feather that could get this team flying in October is Mark Mulder. He's got one last shot at redemption.

Tough Loss

One of these days they'll have fancy new metrics that take the speed and distance of batted balls into account, and when they do, things like the second half of Thursday night's game against the Cubs will confound those metrics. On offense: Rolen lining one back up the middle to Walker, Pierre running down Molina's drive to deep right center, Ramirez diving for a Duncan line drive, Jacque Jones backwards-somersaulting on a Pujols drive to right and Rodriguez grounding one not too soft and not too hard for the game-ending double play. Furthermore in the fourth Albert Pujols, with the bases loaded, took a slider down the middle, swung wildly at a slider well off the plate and then tried to pull a fastball out and up; he had decided he was going to hit a home run and not even Pujols can do that. On defense you had the sickening three-run sixth: Nevin and Murton grounding out just softly enough to prevent the DP, Neifi lofting a single just in front of Encarnacion, Juan Pierre slapping a single just in front of Duncan and Rolen botching a groundball.

To be fair, Weaver lived on the edge for six innings, giving up two homers (why do people try to steal against Yadier Molina?), two doubles and six singles. Maybe it all evened out. It's still hard to believe the Cardinals lost that game.

In other news, the Hardball Times went after Molina not once, but twice today. Thus spoke Bryan Tsao:

Okay, I get it, he's a great defensive catcher. But let's face it, no one's this good.

I sent Bryan an email saying basically "Yeah, actually he is." I've established I'm not a Yadier fan, but anyone who watches the Cardinals everyday can see his value. The weird thing is you can build a statistical defense for Molina. At this writing, BPro has Yadier at 14 runs below average the catcher as a batter and 11 runs above average on defense. Assuming we can trust their defensive numbers for catchers (and since they're using SB, CS and pick offs, I think we can), there's a stronger argument that a future Hall of Famer is a hole than there is for Yadier Molina.

So This is the New Coors

The Cardinals managed six hits in two games at Coors and they're 1 and 1. Part of that is Carpenter and the Rockies pitching of course and maybe there's some bad hitting there too. However there were a couple of at-bats on Tuesday where the ball just didn't seem to carry the way it used to. Actually the ball didn't seem to carry the way it does at Busch III. While it's well-documented that the humidor is having this kind of effect, it's a little different seeing it with your own eyes when your own team is playing.

My hours were a little messed-up from the Dodgers series, so I didn't see the Monday game against the Rockies on TV. It was just as well, I suppose. The best positive spin on Reyes's progress is that he's being remade into a major league pitcher, that he's a work in progress. Unfortunately in my own personal hell, I'm imagining LaRussa trying to teach Reyes how to sing "The rains in Spain fall mainly in the plains." If this keeps up, then I may need to skip another Reyes start and watch the original Rex Harrison/Audrey Hepburn version instead.

Tuesday's game had all kinds of plotlines. Carpenter's a great pitcher and Pujols did what needed to be done again. Isringhausen finished it his way and Rolen had another defensive gem, a ridiculous throw from the muck. The Rockies broadcast crew brought up Rolen's Hall of Fame case, and I'd like to check that out. But what got my attention was Clint Barmes extending his hitting streak to 13 games. As you may recall, a couple of weeks ago Barmes was the only major league regular with a worse OPS than Yadier Molina. ESPN.com's sortable stats do in fact show that Molina's 581 OPS is dead last among qualified batters, trailing Ronny Cedeno of the Cubs by about 15 points at this writing.

So here's the question I had for the Lahman database: How have young players with a 400 AB season with a sub-600 OPS fared historically? By young, I mean under the age of 24 and I'm only looking at player since WWII. I've compiled a list of such players, and it's an eye-opening stroll down memory lane:

Player	Age	Season OPS	Career OPS	Development
Gair Allie	22	562	562	0
Rick Auerbach	22	546	572	26
John Bateman	22	583	621	38
Ed Brinkman	23	508	580	72
Jack Brohamer	22	565	633	68
Mike Caruso	22	577	641	64
Mike Champion	22	557	564	7
Julio Cruz	23	588	620	32
Mariano Duncan	23	589	688	99
Kevin Elster	23	594	677	83
Tim Foli	23	591	593	2
Wayne Garrett	21	558	691	133
Ozzie Guillen	22	576	626	50
Cristian Guzman	21	543	671	128
Jack Heidemann	20	557	532	-25
Enzo Hernandez	22	545	550	5
Glenn Hoffman	23	573	623	50
Paul Householder	23	592	667	75
Cesar Izturis	23	597	633	36
Sonny Jackson	22	568	611	43
Tim Johnson	23	502	539	37
Hal Lanier	23	546	529	-17
Roy McMillan	23	591	635	44
Roger Metzger	23	593	584	-9
Ken Reitz	22	589	649	60
Billy Ripken	23	518	612	94
Dave Roberts	21	595	644	49
Brooks Robinson	21	597	723	126
Aurelio Rodriguez	21	579	626	47
Ramon Santiago	23	576	600	24
Dick Schofield	21	527	624	97
Derrel Thomas	22	559	649	90
Hector Torres	22	510	542	32
Mike Tyson	23	577	612	35
Del Unser	23	560	677	117
Curtis Wilkerson	23	561	591	30
Robin Yount	20	593	772	179
AVERAGE	22	566	621	55

I didn't realize Brooks Robinson was that un-accomplished as a hitter, even adjusting for era. I also didn't realize Reitz was that bad. Back to Molina, it's not that promising, but what really got my attention is that there's only one catcher on that list, John Bateman. Bateman played for the 1963 Houston Colt .45s, a bad club only in its second year. Now I assume Yadier will improve as a hitter, maybe soon enough to make this list moot, but he still is an odd duck. What the Cardinals have done and are doing with him is unique and it's remarkable that they're doing it while competing for pennants.

How Bout That Edmonds Homer!

Watching that game I'm reminded of why they have scouts. Weaver's arm slot is lower than I remembered, and not surprisingly lefties have teed off on him. Uh, my bad. He looked more like Braden Looper (minus a few mph) than Matt Morris. After that trade that shan't be named, I've been wondering if the Cardinals evaluation of major league talent is along the lines of "Weaver? Decent name. Yeah, he's worth a lower tier prospect." I'm not making any sweeping statements based on one game -- Weaver's first start in three weeks -- but I hope that brain trust conference at the time of the trade didn't end with "Sure, Dunc can fix him."

Tomorrow I think I'll go watch Lastings Milledge rather than ride the Jason Marquis roller coaster. At the very least I can learn if the recently demoted Jose Lima performs his dugout schtick at AAA.

Waves

I spend too much time thinking about baseball. How bad is it? A few months back I had a dream I was chatting with Dodgers reliever Giovanni Carrarra and his wife while in line for a roller coaster. Maybe there's some Freudian interpretation that I'm missing, but I don't think I'm really supposed to be playing "what-if" scenarios involving random-chance meetings with AAAA relievers and a wife that may or may not exist.

It gets worse. When visiting Acadia National Park a few weeks ago, I saw this picture:

And the first thing I thought of was baseball statistics. You see the ripples in the foreground and the midground? They seem to disappear and converge somewhere in the background. That area in the background, where everything seems so nice and flat and stable, is where baseball statistics work. In the foreground, where the water looks rougher, what we notice first are the waves, and it's bloody hard to explain those fluctuations. The season-to-date has featured a franchise record for wins in April, the Cardinals holding down the fort for .500 ball during Pujols's half-month absence, a pitching collapse in June and now a seven-game winning streak. You even have a wavelet where they struggle to score runs against the crappy Mark Hendickson and the next day bombard All-Star starter Brad Penny. It defies substantive analysis. It's like the butterfly effect. The whole thing is too unstable and our measurements too clumsy to make any kind of sense of the results on a day-to-day, week-to-week or even month-to-month basis.

Maybe year-to-year as well. Watching the games over the weekend (and listening to the game that Fox and MLB wouldn't let me watch), I'm ready to conclude that the 2006 team isn't all that different overall from the 2005 team. Breaking it down, C, 1B, 2B and SS are basically a combined wash versus last year, maybe a slight improvement. There's a merry-go-round for RF, 3B and CF: Encarnacion replaces 2005 Nuñez/injured Rolen, Rolen replaces 2005 Edmonds, Edmonds replaces 2005 Sanders/Walker. While he managed a respectable OBP, Honest Abe has a 355 OPS -- OPS, not OBP -- in 2006 to remind us that the stable talent just wasn't that good. The non-Sanders/Walker corner outfielder -- the two geezers combined for 610 at-bats -- is more or less the same in 2006. The bench looks similar to a year ago.

On the pitching side, in spite of the waves, Carpenter, Marquis and Suppan aren't that different talent-wise from last year. Carpenter elevated his game to Gibson standards in June and July 2005, but he also had a dull April and poor September. I don't want to say he was lucky, but he just couldn't maintain that summer pace. Nobody can. While Mulder has declined from a year ago, he was getting by on Swamp Gas in 2005 more than stuff or command. Talent-wise that's at worst a wash with Reyes. Morris-Weaver is also tricky; both once had "electric stuff" and were/are learning how to deal with the deterioration of said stuff. With a significant caveat that comes with shoulder surgery, I suppose there's an edge to Morris talent-wise. Mulder could come back (the Mulder mending article from Goold is weird) to displace the worst of the bunch, so there isn't much in the way of talent loss here, assuming Carpenter stays healthy.

In the bullpen, I don't know how Isringhausen-2005 managed a 200 ERA+, as he just isn't that good. Give another slight edge to the 2005 squad talent-wise there on the theory than maybe he's lost something, even though I haven't detected it. Looper is Tavarez, Wainwright is Al Reyes (Gio Carrara's inspiration), Hancock is Thompson, the lefties are blah and whoever is Eldred.

OK, so maybe the team is a couple of games worse in terms of mythical stable talent. That isn't to say I'm that high on the 2006 team. Rather, the more I think about the 2005 team, the more I wonder how the heck they did it. The key word is almost certainly overachievement. We statboys are supposed to call that career years or something. After a lackluster offseason Brian Gunn commented that we were seeing the end of an era. Upon further review, I think he got it wrong, that 2004 was the exception and the era of beautiful baseball only lasted one year.

* * * * *

For reasons that should be clear to all concerned, I believe the Kearns trade was awful for the Reds. Kearns may well have been the Reds' best player, offense and defense considered. The thing I've been wondering about is whether it makes him more available to the Cardinals. It seemed to me the Reds didn't value him that highly while also not wanting to trade him inside the division. OK, worrying about a non-valued player's destination doesn't make much sense, but this was an odd trade. Anyway, as far as Kearns-as-LF is concerned, on the one hand that division restriction is removed obviously and on the other you have Jim Bowden, the GM that drafted and helped develop Kearns. That doesn't sound too promising, does it? I suppose I should hope that Chris Duncan makes that moot.

Lidge

So who wasn't prepared for a Pujols homer in the 12th? I envisioned a city-wide serenade of Lidge with "Who's Your Daddy? Albert Pujols!" the next time the Astros came to St. Louis. Instead it's... well, read the previous post. Aaron Miles?

There was plenty to criticize in the late innings: LaRussa letting Carpenter hit for himself in the 9th against Russ "good pitcher except the home runs" Springer (then yanking Carpenter after one batter), Encarnacion pulling a groundball just like Qualls wanted, Rodriguez's fielding gaffe and Looper's HBP on an 0-2 count. These are symptoms of a deeply flawed team. Nonetheless the Cardinals go to the break with a four game lead and I'm going to do my best to enjoy it even if it hurts.

The Fringe

Albert Pujols hits a game-winning homer, and all I can think about is that ninth inning against Brad Lidge.

- S. Spiezio homered to deep right
- C. Duncan singled to center
- D. Eckstein walked, C. Duncan to second
- A. Miles singled to right, C. Duncan scored, D. Eckstein to third

At this point in their careers, the most talented player on that list is David Eckstein, AKA the little train that could. You can read Lidge's mind just by looking at the picture:

"Aaron Freaking Miles?"

If this is or was a post-season-class slump, then I suppose it's fitting that we got to follow in the footsteps of the 2005 NLCS. Lidge blows it and Garner answers with Oswalt. This time the Cardinals got to that other Wizard of Oz.

On the other side of the tracks, last year's favorite fringe player Scott Seabol was sold from the Albuquerque Isotopes to a Korean team. The current state of affairs in Korea isn't exactly an invitation to a worry-free lifestyle. That's par for the course though for those guys not quite good enough to stick on a major league roster. I don't envy them.

Halftime

I will amend a previous comment and say that the Cardinals are a mediocre team playing awful baseball. Actually a word that rhymes with "pretty" would be more accurate than awful. I've got a question about whether slumps just end on their own or do teams make some sort of adjustment/shakeup. I hope it's the former, because the adjustments I'm seeing don't seem to be helping.

We can start with Anthony Reyes. Part of me wants to scream "LaRussa's an idiot! Duncan's ruining him!" Starting with Ankiel (and with Neyer's accusation that TLR and DD were war criminals), the brass have come off as overprotective parents with their young pitchers. The best recent example of this overprotectiveness is last night's unintentional intentional walk to Andruw Jones in the first inning to load the bases with a .350 hitter on-deck. However, before I fire LaRussa in my imaginary world, I will note that his spring training squeamishness with a flyball pitcher earned about 1100 feet of credibility in only five innings of work. Watching Reyes against the Braves Monday was like seeing a "Road Construction Next 15 Miles" sign on the interstate.

Even with the pitching staff struggling for over a month now, I'm going to question the conventional comparison with the 2003 staff. I think this group has much deeper talent than that one had. You may not want to go back and look at that 2003 staff, seeing as its #3 starter was supposed to be Brett Tomko, and its second-best reliever (behind the DL-induced amalgamation Jako Isrinero) was Cal Eldred. There are plenty of reasons to be uncomfortable with Jeff Suppan, Jason Marquis, Braden Looper and Randy Flores, but they're not just not in the same class as Garrett Stephenson, Tomko, Esteban Yan and Jeff Fassero. At least not yet. Give that 2003 team a couple of guys like Josh Hancock and Adam Wainwright, and Bartman never happens.

I'm certainly not here to praise the pitching staff. The bigger reason that I'm willing to dump the 2003 theory is that this group as a whole reminds me more of other recent Cardinals efforts, namely the LaRussa NLCS squads. What happened on offense Friday and Saturday against the Royals and in the 5th inning Monday against the Braves was ugly in its own right. I know, I know, those things happen over the course of a 162-game season. It's that those things are happening now that bothers me. In addition, the defense has been spotty (as an aside, Chris Duncan looks as awkward as an inexperienced European actor portraying a left fielder for a baseball movie) and there have been a couple of odd tactical maneuvers. This team is pressing. That leaves me with another question: Supposing they make the post-season, is this team brittle or will it be a case of Nietzsche's "That which does not kill makes me stronger"?

So Far From Home

The Cards have won six straight series. Just as in 2005, it seems the team got a little worse than the previous season, but they just keep on winning. Once again, everyone should be reminded how much we all should appreciate the continual success of the La Russa era - like him or not.

In other news, Chris Carpenter missed a start with an inflamed bursa sac. While that's fun to say, I'm sure it's not fun to have, especially if you have to pitch in a major-league game. Ironically, this continued my streak of players going down soon after yours truly made a purchase of their jersey (see: Warner, Kurt, & McGwire, Mark - hopefully this one won't turn out as badly). So perhaps skipping Carp wasn't the worst thing in the world, especially with Sidney Ponson scheduled to come off the DL to pitch Saturday night against the Padres. El Sid hasn't been a big strikeout guy - 13 K/11 BB in 32 IP - but he's managed to not kill the Cards by keeping his ERA under 3.00 thus far despite some lackluster peripherals. Ironically, including Reyes' sterling outing in Kansas City, the Cardinals "fifth" slot has the lowest ERA (2.39) of the entire starting rotation. Ponson's re-appearance also causes Mark Mulder's start to get bumped back a day, creating a solid matchup on Sunday with the Pads' scheduled starter, ace Jake Peavy.

Note: Incidentally, I'll be heading out to the games in San Diego this weekend. I'll be back with a full review of Petco Park, and perhaps also one of the Big A, where I'll hopefully be going on Saturday night after the Cards play. Cross your fingers for a good series.

Viva 2003

The Cards got swept by the Reds tonight in a game reminiscent of several in the first week of May, 2003. Flashbacks are imminent - as in why Brian Falkenborg (who?) opened the bottom of the 9th on the mound in a tie game. Can you say Dustin Hermanson? I'll admit, I'd been paying so little attention to the Cards lately that I didn't even know Falkenborg had been called up. Izzy's struggles have obviously caused greater issues within the bullpen, but, with Looper pitching better, why put him in so early (bottom 7th) against the bottom of the Reds' lineup? And then leave Falkenborg in to start the 9th with a slew of other right-handers available in the pen? ...Interesting, Tony. With the lineup struggling aside from God and a few others, the Cards can't afford to see the bullpen fail like it did today - especially with the chance to pick up a big win against a divisional opponent on Albert's day off.

To walk or not to walk

Using ZiPS, some career stats and some wild guesses, I'll try to determine whether Jim Tracy was right to face Pujols in the ninth inning. It gets messy, and I fully recognize what they same about what happens when I assume. The executive summary is that pitching to Pujols gave the Pirates a ~20% better chance of taking the game to the 10th, roughly 55% versus 35%. Tangotiger found something similar for Bonds in a tie game with runners on first and second and one out.

Again, there are big assumptions here. I need Roberto Hernandez to be an average pitcher, for Juan Encarnacion to be better than he's looked most of the month (and for that matter, not to be a 900-OPS hitter with the bases loaded, as his career splits have been to this point), for Scott Spiezio to be horrid, for guesses about baserunning to be reasonable, no balks, no wild pitches, no passed balls, no stolen bases, yadda yadda yadda. The difference I'm computing is pretty substantial though. Somebody let me know if I got something wrong.

Here's the dirty work:

Starting off, here's ZiPS again:

Name                 AB    R    H  2B  3B  HR   BB    K  AVG   OBP   SLG 
Pujols              603  134  203  42   2  48   98   61 .337  .434  .652
Encarnacion         536   70  152  35   3  16   43   95 .284  .342  .450
Spiezio#            392   44   93  20   3  10   45   56 .237  .318  .380

(By the way, if you use ZiPS, you should probably send a thank you to Dan Szymborski.)

Here's what happens when you walk Pujols:

Tie Game, Bases Loaded, One Out, Bottom of 9th
Encarnacion
- Reaches base = 34.2% (ignores reach on error, worth roughly +10 points of OBP)
- GIDP = 9.2% (96 GDPs in 1045 career at-bats with runners on <2 outs, ignores other DPs)
- Sac fly = 12.7% (32 in 251 AB + BB + SF with R3<2O)
- Strikeout = 17.7%
- GB Productive Out = 7.1% (WAG based on G/F ratio)
- GB Force at Home = 7.1% (WAG based on G/F ratio)
- FB Non-Productive Out = 12.0% (WAG based on G/F ratio)
Meaning:
- 54.0% chance game ends there
- 9.2% chance inning ends there
- 36.8% chance it gets passed down to Spiezio

Spiezio
- Reaches base = 31.8%
- Doesn't reach base = 68.2%

In total: Chances of Cardinals winning in 9th are .540 + (.368*.318) = 65.7%. That a productive out from Encarnacion could end the game is huge if you walk Pujols.

This is what Jim Tracy chose instead:

Pujols
- Singles 18.4%
--- Eckstein scores 40% of time (WAG) = 7.4%
--- Eckstein stops at 3rd 40% of time (WAG) = 7.4%
--- Eckstein thrown out 20% of time, runners move up (WAG) = 3.6%
- Doubles, Triples, Homers = 15.3% (damn)
- GIDP = 10.3%
- Strikeout = 10.1%
- Productive out = 15.0% (WAG)
- Nonproductive other out 30.9%
Meaning:
- 22.7% chance game ends there
- 10.3% chance inning ends there
- 7.4% chance bases loaded (same as walking Pujols)
- 18.6% chance of lead runner on third, two outs
- 41.0% chance of lead runner on second, two outs

Encarnacion
Lead runner on third, two outs
- Hit = 26.3%
- Walk or HBP = 7.9%
- Ordinary Out = 65.8%
Meaning:
- 4.9% overall chance of game ending here
- 1.5% overall chance of bases loaded, two outs for Spiezio
- 12.2% overall chance inning ends here
Lead runner on second, two outs
- Singles 16.9%
--- Eckstein scores 80% of time (WAG) = 13.5%
--- Eckstein stops at 3rd 10% of time (WAG) = 1.7%
--- Eckstein thrown out 10% of time (WAG) = 1.7%
- Doubles, Triples or Homers = 9.4%
- Walk or HBP = 7.9%
- Ordinary Out = 65.8%
Meaning:
- 9.4% overall chance of game ending here
- 3.9% overall chance of bases loaded, two outs for Spiezio
- 27.7% overall chance inning ends here

Spiezio
- Reaches base = 31.8%
- Doesn't reach base = 68.2%
Meaning:
- 1.7% overall chance of game ending here
- 3.7% overall chance inning ends here

Whew!
- Total Good Stuff = .227 + .049 + .094 + .017 + .074*.657 = 43.6%
- Total Bad Stuff = .103 + .122 + .277+ .037 + .074*.343 = 56.4%

Eyewitness News

Yadier Molina drew a walk! And it was against a pitcher with talent too. Now he need another so his OBP exceeds his batting average.

Of course it was a good night overall offensively. While some of the bloopers fell in, there also were some hard-hit outs and unofficially Monday night's game had more "good rip" foul balls back to the screen than any other game this season. I'm always on the lookout for an explanation of why people who matter swear by Tony LaRussa. I mean, Bernie Miklasz has declared Bill DeWitt's an evil miser, and yet he's willing to pay millions for LaRussa's managerial services. Oliver Perez evidently is healthy, so is part of the explanation for his demise his management? Can the Pirates not field a popup to the mound because of management?

* * * * *

I caught a game at Fort Wayne over the weekend. The park in Fort Wayne is not a favorite of mine, as it has all the charm of a concrete bunker. However the Cardinals A-ball affiliate from Quad Cities was visiting, so I checked out a few of the Cardinals' lower level prospects. The executive summary was there's nothing exciting to report.

First, the pitchers from Sunday's game all had trouble throwing strikes. You may heard that the minor leagues currently have replacement umps working the games, but I don't think that was the problem. The starter, Cory Meacham, fell apart in the fourth, walking three straight and then hitting a batter. It wasn't easy to watch.

Colby Rasmus, the Cardinals' #2 prospect according to Baseball America, looks like a 19-year-old kid, maybe because he is. I took some pictures, but they don't convey how thin he is relative to the other Cardinals that played on Sunday. My first instinct is to compare him to Jason Tyner, which Rasmus made silly by homering on Monday night. He's going to need a few years and his numbers may under-estimate his long-term ability.

AJ Van Slyke went 0-for-5 and, as you'd expect, didn't look good doing it. He looks like he might be a little thick in the midsection actually. Bryan Anderson is a highly regarded catching prospect, and he looked fine behind the plate, in spite of a couple of problems with popups. Randy Roth's defense at 3B looked Mabryesque, but he homered on one of the hardest line drives I've seen in the minors. When I started writing this up, I realized I should've paid more attention to Dan Nelson, the shortstop for Quad Cities. He's not on any prospect lists and he's hitting .200 right now, but he had decent OBPs in 2004 and 2005, he's still young enough (22) to improve and he looked like a legit ballplayer. Maybe I've seen a few too many erratic shortstops in the Midwest League.

The bad guys, the Fort Wayne Wizards, did leave a few impressions. Josh Alley, Sunday's center fielder, had some significant problems judging flyballs. While it was a windy day, the Baby Birds had a couple extra bases hits that I think most center fielders turn into outs, even at A-ball. Kyle Blanks is 6-6 and close to 300 pounds. He could use some time on the stair master (does anybody still use stair masters?), although he's reasonably agile and he's not a pig. It also seemed to me both sides were more keen on working the count than when I first started going to Midwest League games five years ago.

Walks

The theme to Friday's game was obviously "Walks". Consider:

• While the discussion on the Internet and on the airwaves is whether Albert Pujols will get the Bonds Treatment, Pujols had zero walks last night. I can't see Dusty Baker cowering before Pujols, even if he should be.

• The game was headed for a breakout when Jerome Williams walked Aaron Miles to load the bases with nobody out in the second, and then Mark Mulder to force in a run. Miles has exceeded his 2005 walk total already.

• Bob Brenly and Len Kasper theorized that John Rodriguez would get a lot of pitches to hit, since the Great Pujols was standing in the on-deck circle. So of course Rodriguez drew a walk in the seventh. I'm not sure I buy the theory that hitting in front of Pujols means you'll get a steady diet of strikes. For example, last year Pujols got all but a handful of his at-bats in the #3 spot, and the Cardinals drew 58 walks from the #2 spot in 2005. (Holy cow, Nuñez his .352 in the #2 spot a year ago.) That works out to about 1/9th of the Cardinals' total (534), and while the #2 spot gets a few extra PAs versus average, that spot had the disadvantage of possessing only 2 Pujols PAs. Pitchers probably try to trade OBP for SLG in that spot, but it's not a black and white issue.

• Yadier Molina doesn't have a walk yet, presumably not because he's hitting in front of Aaron Miles. It's time to pull out the anti-jinx jinx and proclaim that Yadier won't have a walk before Memorial Day. Jeff Passan has speculated that the WBC has hurt pitchers, but I'm wondering if Molina was hurt by his non-participation participation in the tourney. (Is Al Hrabosky allowed to blame Juan Encarnacion's slow start on the WBC?)

• Last, and most importantly, Mark Mulder only gave up one walk in eight innings. He's only given up two walks this season. Mulder's K-rate isn't the only thing that deteriorated starting in 2004. In 2001 and 2003 Mulder was among the top ten in the AL in BB/9, but in 2004 and 2005 he was thoroughly mediocre in that category. While that wasn't exactly a threatening Cubs lineup last night, I'll take all the good signs I can get.

I'll tack-on one extra, as AJ Burnett will be walking into Dr. James Andrews' office soon. Yes, I'm going to hell for that sentence, which I hope won't prevent some divine entity from explaining to me what the big deal was about Burnett.

Pujols, Pujols, Pujols

Nice game, Albert. Can we get hurry up and get that extension through 2020 signed?

Nice work from Marquis. And Juan should be worshing Pujols's car for the next month.

Restoring Order

I made it to my first game at Busch on Saturday and I've got a few more pictures from a ten-year old digital camera to prove it. Not much to add on the new ballpark. As MO Boiler commented, the unfinished state of the park is something of a shame. And I can confirm Press Box Phil's account of the second-class status of the second row of the press box. It's a mallpark cookie cutter and yet overall it's nicer than the previous Busch. In short, it's a good place to see a ball game.

As for the important thing, the game, Sidney Ponson looked solid. He looked like the typical Duncan pitcher actually, not blowing anyone away, moving the ball around, trying to get some groundballs and recording an occasional strikeout. Any indication that Anthony Reyes wasn't beaten out by a bum is a good thing. The semi-standing ovation when LaRussa pulled Ponson was a bit much.

Hector Luna has these flashes where he looks like a good ballplayer, and Saturday was one of those days both in the field and at the plate. LaRussa's will be trying to get him more playing time, and right now platooning with Aaron Miles fits him well. That doesn't sound so good for Junior Spivey. Some part of me thinks Luna, if given a progressively larger role, could put the tools together and be an average 2B by year's end. Some other part of me notices that he was warming-up with Juan Encarnacion prior to Saturday's game.

I called Scott Spiezio's home run. Like I said, the camera's old, and it takes some time to get it ready, but the last picture captures Spiezio's mighty blast to right field. Former least favorite Cardinal Tino Martinez did the same thing to me in 2003. I swear they homered out of spite. Ricardo Rincon officially became my least favorite Cardinal by walking a batter in the 9th with a 7-run lead, then plunkng another batter square in the back, and then forcing a pitching change by serving a double to Austin Kearns, all while the rain started to come down.

Albert Pujols is special. This should be repeated periodically like the tests for the Emergency Broadcast System. On top of the superlative hitting, we have our little secret about his stellar defense. Saturday he was like Jim Craig at Lake Placid. Friday night he dove to his right, then threw from his knees to force the runner at second; if Eckstein catches the throw a little more cleanly it's a GIDP. When's the last time you saw a GIDP on a dive from the first baseman? His focus is apparent from Section 353, even in the ninth inning of a six-run game.

On the other side, Adam Dunn must be an intensely frustrating topic for Reds fans. If you're a traditionalist, you hate the strikeouts and the infamous sac fly streak. If you're a statboy like me, you hate hearing about the strikeouts. While his defense looks like a 1B playing LF, Scott Hatteberg (677 OPS in 2005) is keeping him away from the infield. Dunn's about two months older than Pujols, and I have to wonder how things would've gone for the two of them if they had switched organizations.

Bronson Arroyo starts Easter Sunday against the Cardinals. Last year he had a massive L/R split (OPS: 831 v. 654), so Jim Edmonds would be welcome back with open arms. I'm assuming Edmonds has dropped "What Would Wily Mo Do?" as his personal mantra for success.

Not So Good Friday

Forget about Encarnacion and Isringhausen. Heck, forget about Miles and Looper, because Edmonds looks terrible.

The Carlos Lee Game

Suppose you're the marketing boss at Shop-n-Save. The St. Louis Cardinals call you and offer some ad space with the sales pitch "Your sign will be on the news whenever the Great Pujols homers!" Naturally you accept their offer. During the game on holey Thursday, your sign gets plenty of airplay, but... it's for a great catch by the other team. Do you frame the photo and hang it on your wall? Do you frame the photo and hide it in your desk drawer? Or do you wait and hope for a Cardinal highlight in that exact location?

The symbolism of this game hit me in the face, that if the Cardinals make a few mistakes, then the Brewers can beat them. There are mistakes like the fielding errors and wild pitches and a cutter over the fat part of the plate, and then there are the roster mistakes that leave Miles, Marquis, Spiezio and Schumaker batting in the 11th. Fielder and Weeks aren't Choi and Hill, Doug Melvin isn't Jim Hendry, and Ned Yost isn't Dusty Baker. This could get interesting.

Adventures of Baron von Isringhausen

It does seem like Jason Isringhausen keeps the game interesting on purpose, doesn't he? Like maybe when he's warming up, he's thinking to himself "Get three batters out of five, maybe three out of six, and we'll get the win." He gets the job done, so I'm not trying to run him out of town, but it's hard to be comfortable with Izzy. In part it's because he doesn't look like a Dominant Closer. Last night, for example, he just couldn't put a lackluster hitter like David Bell away and his 3-0 pitch to Ryan Howard was Stechschulte-esque for an unintentional intentional walk. Isringhausen just doesn't make it look easy.

The much-maligned 6 through 8 hitters got the job done for the second time. Yadier Molina had the game winner, Skip Schumaker had a key walk just before that and his first career homer, and Aaron Miles had a walk and an RBI single. The Cardinals needed it as Juan Encarnacion almost single-handedly killed the Cardinals scoring chances, leaving a whopping nine runners on. It's early and Encarnacion had a couple of well-struck balls, but he's taking my Tino comparison a little too close too heart.

There were a few interesting little pitching moves from LaRussa. First, he pinch hit for Mark Mulder in a tie game in the top of the 8th. Mulder's pitch count was only 84 and he'd pitched a good game. For whatever reason -- it's early, the 2-run homer in the bottom of the 7th, or a realization that the Cardinals don't have the offense to fool around -- LaRussa didn't leave Mulder in there to get a shot at the "W" though. The second noteworthy pitching move was his decision in the top of the 9th, when the game was still tied, to start Isringhausen in the bottom half. It's nice to see the recognition that with the heart of the Phillies lineup coming up in the 9th, the game situation called for the best reliever available. On the other hand, Ryan Howard has a career 406 OPS against LHP (sample size caveats apply, but that's a four-oh-six), and I doubt it crossed LaRussa's mind to bring in Randy Flores. Such are the unwritten rules.

Today the Jason Marquis saga restarts. Real minor league games start too, assuming "real minor league games" isn't an oxymoron. It's time to play John Fogerty's "Centerfield".

One Down, 94 + 11 To Go

A dozen silly thoughts organized in Harper's List fashion:

275 / 316 / 377 - Updated 2006 ZiPS for Miles, naively replacing average 5 of 507 at-bats with Monday's results
9 - Number of consecutive outs Aaron Miles would have to make for his OBP to fall under .300
22 - Number of scoreless outs Chris Carpenter needs to get his ERA below 3.00
86 - Carpenter's unofficial pitch count after 5 innings, not that letting him start the