STL Cardinals: How do they always do it?

[AJAY]

I don't know about you, but I am so sick of the Cardinals and their perennial ability to field a playoff caliber club. What is it that they have figured out that other teams haven't? It just seems unfair that the Cardinals and their spoiled fans haven't had to endure a 12-15 year streak of losing records like the rest of us have. It seems like every crappy player manages to turn their career around after going to STL. Even when they miss the playoffs, they jump back into contention within a year or two. They always seem to trade for the Jim Edmonds, Scott Rolens, Chris Carpenters, Larry Walkers, Mark McGwires, Matt Holidays, Edgar Renterrias etc. at just the right time. It seems like they hardly give up anything in these trades either.

 

I know Dave Duncan is one of the best pitching coaches and Tony LaRussa always manages to get the most out of his little guys. I know they also have the financial resources because they have very strong attendance and TV ratings . . but I wish I could figure out what their real secret is. Is there something about their draft philosophy? Why are their pitchers always good hitters too?

 

Can someone share any insight on why everything always seems to go their way?

[AJAY]

I forgot to mention that it also seems unfair that they win a championship despite winning only 83 games in 2006. It just seems like the gods are always helping them out.

[pitchleague]

hmmm, this is a very good topic.

 

I'm sure some of it is that players (i.e. free-agents) have a desire to go to a town with a baseball history (recent and long-past), have a history of great fans (whether they are or not is truly up for debate), have perennially good weather (that's debatable, too, depending on your personal definition of "good weather"), and whatever intangible there may be.

 

But that doesn't answer the question of trades. I still would like to know how Oakland feels now that Holliday is raking the way he is. Sure, he had no protection in Oakland, but he played seriously uninspired baseball until the trade.

 

St. Louis is technically considered a "small-market," by definition. At least, I believe that I read that somewhere. But the money flows like milk and honey. It probably helps that they have a steady income stream from a profitable television contract and a fan base that stretches out throughout the midwest in all directions.

 

Who knows? Maybe they hire a hypnotist or something. Maybe they take all the real players and lock them up in a dungeon while their cyborg dopelganger takes the field night after night (see ESPN Pujols commercial.) Then, when they cut a player or trade him or whatever, they release the real guy to the new team while destroying the android.

 

This is indeed a baffling case. You could say the same thing about several teams, I think. But I know and understand how you feel, AJAY. The Cardinals do, indeed, have some sort of magic to them. And it is very perplexing. It doesn't bug me much that they are a good team as it does me wondering how the Brewers could get to that level. Maybe someday, we'll see this kind of thing in Milwaukee.

 

I've got to think about this some more. I might have more to say tomorrow.

[sgtcluels]

Class. They smoke cigars and drink Champlain in top hats served by men with white gloved hand. Perhaps it's the heat of St Louis, keeps their players form running amuck because they ahve to stay indoors.

 

Seriously though, good coaching, combined with smart GMing and avoiding over valuation of players. It'll be interesting to see what happens with Halliday in the off season. Pooooohole and him make a wicked combination, but remove that, and their lineup is very pitch aroundable. (I just made up a word)

[OldSchoolSnapper]

Welcome to how the Bears fans of the last 15 years feel about the Packers.

[The Heartbreak Yid]

This year was different after the 2007 and 2008 Cardinals both seemed very much in it before collapsing like they were supposed to. As for the 2009 team, they have the Cubs and Brewers to thank. It was supposed to be down to those 2 teams again for the division, but neither team seemed ready to do anything about it. St. Louis saw an opening. They knew their team was mediocre at best behind Pujols and occasionally Ludwick. They knew that with the right moves, they could take the division and run, and thats what they did when they revamped their lineup adding DeRosa, Holliday, and Lugo. They took a lineup that looked like

 

Schumaker

Brendan Ryan

Pujols

Ludwick

Ankiel

Molina

Greene

Pitcher

Barden/I forgrt the name of the 3rd baseman who looks like Jermaine Dye

 

and seeming gly overnight turned it into

 

Ryan

Lugo

Pujols

Holliday

Ludwick

DeRosa

Molina

Schumaker

Pitcher

 

I dont know their exact batting order, but its a pretty drastic difference. That and the fact that Chris Carpenters arm hasnt fallen off. yet.

 

Hopefully, next year Holliday is whisked away by the Red Sox, Yankees, Mets, or Giants. I know he says he loves St. Louis, but this is Scott Boras were talking about, and he tends to get his way.

[Baldkin]

When they get career years out of two pitchers in the same season, and make a trade for a guy who comes over and hits like Babe Ruth for 2 months....

[brewmann04]

they have Players that produce in all aspects of the game.

[The Heartbreak Yid]

They always seem to trade for the Jim Edmonds, Scott Rolens, Chris Carpenters, Larry Walkers, Mark McGwires, Matt Holidays, Edgar Renterrias etc. at just the right time. It seems like they hardly give up anything in these trades either.

I dont think theres anyone who would consider Brett Wallace as hardly giving up anything.

[Invader3K]

It seems like their ownership a few years back made a concerted effort to stop fielding a mediocre team, and spent the money to do so. It's certainly easy to be envious, but they've had a lot of help by playing in a very mediocre division, especially this season.

[hawing]

'Tis no team. 'Tis a remorseless baseball playin' machine.

[crewcrazy]

As much as I hate Tony LaRussa as much as a guy can hate someone he's never met, I have to give him credit for putting together coaching staffs that do an excellent job of bringing out the best in every player. Dave Duncan's one of the few pitching coaches around that truly makes a difference, and the coaching staff as a whole has done a very good job of maximizing strengths while "hiding" weaknesses. Of course, it helps to have the best player of this generation on your team, too. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

[sargennm]

Pitching. When they are good, they have it coming out of their sanctimonious ears.

[brewmann04]

Duncan would have had the same resulys here in Milw as Castro and Bosio.It helps if you have a better quality of Pitchers

[endaround]

They realize that pitchers like Suppan and Looper really aren't that good and so let them walk when the time comes

[snyttri]

It might be because they had Branch Rickey, the father of the minor league system as their GM from 1920-1942. IIRC the Cardinals continued to spend more on the minor leagues than other teams except the Yankess after Rickey left. Their large fan base comes from being the team farthest south and west, except the Browns who they eclipsed. If the Browns had hired Branch Rickey it might be the Baltimore Cardinals.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Louis_Cardinals.

[joepepsi]

The previous 3 seasons they are averaging 82 wins a year, just like the Brewers.

 

Here's what I think: Duncan is a genius and deserves more credit. LaRussa is a good manager, despite the fact I can't stand him. He does a great job of using his entire roster. It seems managers that do that produce winning teams more often.

 

They aren't scared to trade prospects for proven players. They are willing to pay top dollar for premium players, and avoid signing mediocre players to long term, overpaid contracts.

[MJLiverock]

Here's what I think: Duncan is a genius and deserves more credit. LaRussa is a good manager, despite the fact I can't stand him. He does a great job of using his entire roster. It seems managers that do that produce winning teams more often.

 

They aren't scared to trade prospects for proven players. They are willing to play top dollar for premium players, and avoid signing mediocre players to long term, overpaid contracts.

Couldn't have said it better, I was thinking of how to word it and you did it for me.

 

Duncan seems to turn guys around that aren't that successful elsewhere and then watch as the pitchers regress as soon as they leave. Defense has some impact but he gets guys to throw strikes who can't seem to do it elsewhere.

 

Sure they gave up a Dan Haren but it helped get them a World Series title. I think sometimes people forget most prospects flame out and getting good proven ML talent has a cost but also a benefit. Brett Wallace may be a total bust but they knew Matt Holliday is a proven ML hitter to help Pujols. I am not a bit surprised by Holliday's stats in STL, he had a bad April but since then was OPSing over .800 every month and has proven over his career to be a .900+ OPSer. If he walks they get two picks to replace Wallace, but they may be able to keep him and pair him Pujols for as formidable duo as any in baseball.

 

They spun a couple of prospects, even relievers, into DeRosa, a proven ML player who is versatile and allows LaRussa to contintue to put the best lineup possilbe out there by having a guy who can play multiple postitions.

 

They are willing to trade potential for proven players but not just crazily giving guys away, but they understand you have to give to get and that not every "prospect" is going to pan out into a star.

[FVBrewerFan]

Carpenter and Wainright. That's how they're better. Remove those two guys, and you basically have the Brewers. Or put another way, add Carpenter and Wainright to the Brewers and you have a World Series contender. Whena team in your own division has two SP better than your "ace" it's hard to make up for that.

[rluzinski]

They are run well and have more money to spend than anyone in the division but the clueless Cubs. It doesn't hurt that they have the best player in the league signed at well below market. I think team salary is not being mentioned nearly enough here, however. They've had a salary over $80 mil for something like 7-8 years.

[monty57]

I think LaRussa utilizes the players he has, and isn't beholden to one style of play. When he has a slap hitter up, he'll hit-and-run, when he's in the right situation, he'll steal. I think too many people fall into the mindset that "x is always true," when rarely is anything always true. I think the valuation comment mentioned above is correct. The huge boom in popularity of the SABR movement recently has caused certain things to be overvalued, which naturally means other things will be overlooked. LaRussa definitely doesn't come off as a "SABR guy," so the Cardinals can probably find value at this time. For example, defense has become the hot-topic of the day (comments such as "Prince Fielder is average at best because of his poor defense" and Adam Dunn and Bobby Abreau having a hard time finding work are examples of this), so what do the Cards do? They stick an OF at 2B, a pitcher in CF and bring in all bat, no glove DeRosa.

They're good this year mainly because of their pitching, and it has been built by doing almost exactly what most people would say a small market team should never do but is a great example of taking advantage of undervalued players (posters like TheCrew07 may cry when they read this, as they've been pining for the Brewers to do some of these things):

-Back in 2003, when young pithcers were undervalued, they traded injury-prone JD Drew and Eli Marrero for Adam Wainright, Ray King and Jason Marquis.
-They picked up Wellemeyer off of waivers from the Royals.
-They got Piniero and cash from the Red Sox for Sean Danielson.
-Carpenter was signed as a free agent from Toronto after he was injured. They stuck with him (paying him $300,000/year while he was injured) and it's paid off.
-Theo Epstein's spreadsheet failed to recognize that Smoltz was tipping his pitches so he was thrown away. Duncan spotted this, quickly corrected it, and they've got another decent starter for nothing.

Duncan can be given credit for turning these pitchers around, but they were all high ceiling guys that were, for one reason or another, undervalued at the time the Cardinals picked them up, adn they've turned into one of the best rotations in baseball this year.

As Heartbreak Yid mentioned, they also took advantage of a situation this year where the two favorites in the division were struck with injuries and underperformance, and emptied their system to win now. At the time, I really didn't want the Brewers to try to keep up, and looking back, it would have been horrific if they had, as they would have a depleted farm system, and still wouldn't make the playoffs.

Historically, many of the Brewers' faults have lied with poor (as in non-rich) ownership and poor (as in non-good) general management. That seems to have changed. Many of the Cubs' foibles have come from wealthy corporate ownership wanting to put just enough talent on the field to fill the stands, and maximize profit (I work with someone who attended many Cubs GM meetings, and he's told me that wasn't just rumor, it was the rule of the day). This, too appears to have changed. The Cardinals have been able to be kind of a big fish in their division, as the true big fish (Chicago) wasn't taking advantage of their situation, and the Reds, Brewers and Pirates hadn't been consistantly good for a long, long time. By default, the Cardinals have been able to make a lot of playoff appearances, which will naturally lead to more visits to the World Series.

[rluzinski]

Money

Good Personel Moves

LaRussa

 

How would you weight these, in terms of credit for a good run? Here's my wag:

 

Money: 10

Personel: 10

LaRussa: 1

 

He's barely worth mentioning,in comparison.

[Never Outhustled]

Dave Duncan is hugely responsible for their success. He's made guys like Jeff Suppan, Kyle Lohse, Braden Looper, and Joel Pinero look good.

[monty57]

I remember a game early in this season where BA was going on about how everyone was so enthralled by how Looper prepared for a game. At the time, I thought that this was probably something Duncan taught. I think the Brewers lost a lot when they lost Maddux. Duncan's ability to turn pitchers around, coupled with the Brewers' drop off from every one of their pitchers this year while Texas' team ERA has dropped from 5.37 to 4.28 could somewhat validate that a really good pitching coach can make a difference.

[Patrick425]

It'll be interesting to see what happens with Halliday in the off season. Pooooohole and him make a wicked combination, but remove that, and their lineup is very pitch aroundable. (I just made up a word)

Not to nitpick, but Halladay is a pitcher for the Blue Jays. Holliday is the hitter in the Card's lineup...or perhaps you just mistyped an "a" for an "o"