STL Cardinals: How do they always do it?

[JohnBriggs12]

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

Piniero doesn't just look good. He is good. Just look at his first 3 years in Seattle. What separates the Cardinals is they figure out why a guy like Piniero struggled after his first few outstanding years, and they fix it.

 

Other teams take guys and hope they regain past form, Cardinals understand why they've lost form. It's that simple. I also agree with the statement that LaRussa knows more than one way to win. He wins using the strengths of the guys he has.

 

What should bother Brewer fans is not that the Cardinals have been so good so long, but that they've jumped light years ahead of the Brewers who now have a huge gap to make up.

[BREWCREW5]

1. Pujols

2. Consistently good defense

3. Duncan as a pitching coach

4. Seizing the opportunity when there is a window. Such as trading for Derosa, Holliday and obtaining Smoltz

[Ennder]

1. Pujols

2. Consistently good defense

3. Duncan as a pitching coach

4. Seizing the opportunity when there is a window. Such as trading for Derosa, Holliday and obtaining Smoltz

This pretty much sums it up but I'll add they understand the statistical side of the game better than most teams. They don't overvalue slugging and undervalue fielding like most teams do which is just huge. Duncan+LaRussa are also probably the best combo in the NL which is worth a few wins a year as well.

[dadofandrew]

No one wants to even discuss they've barely averaged a .500 record the past 3 years. Duncan is a factor, and their huge fan base, leftover from the days of KMOX, means they have huge crowds and good TV money, compared to their market size. That said, other than having the good fortune of making the playoffs once only winning 83, they haven't exactly won a ton of titles (is it 1 or 2 in 25 years?).

 

One minor advantage they have is how hot is in in SL...it hits 110-120 on the field often, and teams wilt under that if you only do it a couple times a year. Of course, they will argue it wears them out having to play in that heat 30 times a season. Back when they had turf there, players would come in and stand in ice water, as their feet would be suffering minor burns during a long inning.

 

So, other than minor advantages in money, they seem like another team to me. Considering the money they gave Lohse, they pay aplenty for mediocre pitchers too.

[Ennder]

No one wants to even discuss they've barely averaged a .500 record the past 3 years.

 

But they have done it with rosters that looked terrible for most of it. I remember when they made their run last year I looked at the roster and was like... this can't be a .500 team even, it is terrible. They faded last year some but I still feel they almost always outperform my expectations of the team.

[Thurston Fluff]

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

 

Don't forget Kip Wells. I do think Duncan is pretty good but like any coach gets too much credit when things go well and too much blame when things go wrong. If you look at some of the success stories it appears to have less to do with who is the pitching coach than a bit of luck combined with good personnel decisions. Suppan had already started to get it together in Pittsburgh. He had the same ERA in Pit as his best year with the Cards. Pinero has always been up and down. In his time with the Cards he got fixed got broke then got fixed again. If it was really Duncan I don't know why he would have had the same sort of pattern he had his whole career in three years with the Cards. He always gave up a lot of hits and had a fairly high BAA but some years he got outs with men of base while others he gave up those runs. Lohse has a career ERA of 4.67 his ERA this year is 4.62 I don't see that as much different.

 

They aren't scared to trade prospects for proven players.

 

They pick their spots. Last year Pujols was mad because they didn't make any moves when the Brewers and Cubs did. That left them with a couple more trading chips this year. This year everything fell into place for them and it made sense to trade some of their prospects. That is part of what makes them such a sound organization IMO. They know when to go for it and when not to. Same can be said of the Brewers the last couple years. I wouldn't be all that surprised to see them struggle next year as they did the last couple. Nor would I be at all surprised to see the Brewers raise back towards the top next year.

Now that they traded their best players for short term fixes they will have to make do with what they have next year. Doesn't that sound familiar to Brewer fans these last two years?

 

The other thing is injuries. When the Brewers were healthy this year and the Cards were not the Brewers beat them. When the tables turned so did the team's fortunes. At this point all their horses run and no chipped paint. The Brewers OTOH not so fortunate.

[Baldkin]

It doesn't hurt that they signed the best player in baseball for 8 yrs/111 million.

[jeffy]

I don't buy that the temperature is an issue at all. Why would that not be just as much a factor for KC and Texas?

 

It also is clearly not payroll, their payroll was not significantly different from the Brewers, only about 10% higher to start the season and both teams are in the middle of the pack.

 

http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/salaries

 

I don't pretend to know the reason, but they are definitely the opposite of the Cubs who have one of the highest payrolls but continue to suck. Folks here do not want to give LaRussa credit and maybe they are right about that. But I know if I were given a choice of hiring LaRussa or Pinella, I'd take LaRussa.

 

However, I think far more amazing than the Cardinals is the amount of success the Florida Marlins have been able to achieve.

[joepepsi]

No one wants to even discuss they've barely averaged a .500 record the past 3 years.

I pointed this out on post 16: The previous 3 seasons they are averaging 82 wins a year, just like the Brewers.

 

As Baseball Prospectus pointed out, they haven't had back to back losing seasons since the 94-95 strike shortened years. Before that you have to go back to 1958-59. The bottom line, they have a solid, stable organization buoyed by a tremendous fan base for their market size.

 

In the last decade they've been helped by a pretty weak division. The won/loss record looks pretty good when you play a third of your games against some of the worst teams in baseball.

 

Although it's true their 2006 83 win World Championship season seems a bit cheap, it's only fair to remember they won 105 games in '04 but lost the World Series. In 2005 they won 100 games but lost in the NLCS. Playoffs are a crapshoot.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

I agree with a lot of the points above, but let's not forget to mention luck in the equation. There are so many luck based factors to winning a championship in baseball from maintaining health or in the Cardinals case having a pitcher (Chris Carpenter) come off the DL after being dormant for 2 years turning into a Cy Young winner (If that isn't luck than what is?), or getting serviceable years out of journeymen pitchers like Todd Wellenmeyer, Kyle Lohse, Jeff Suppan, Braden Looper, and the list goes on.

 

Other lucky events in the Cards season include their bullpen which was about as poor as could be last year with more blown saves than the Badger hockey goaltender last year, but then 2009 comes around and the bullpen doesn't have many major changes, and Ryan Franklin turns into a Mariano Rivera look a like.

 

Let's give credit where credit is due, though. Their front office has realized that things have come together this year and they added the necessary pieces (DeRosa and Holliday) to move on to the next level, but this team hasn't been short of very good luck in this decade.