June 30: DeRosa is an Impact Bat
1. Mark DeRosa is not a judy hitter: One can only laugh at the whining by the minority (but loud) minority of media and fan voices out there who pan the DeRosa trade because he isn’t an “impact bat.” You’d think that the guy was just barely a notch above, say, Brian Barden or Joe Thurston. Do these folks even bother to do any homework? Have they paid any attention to the 2009 season?
At the time of the trade that sent DeRosa from Cleveland to St. Louis, DeRosa was 18th in the majors in RBIs. He had more RBIs than Matt Holliday, Chipper Jones, Chase Utley, Jim Thome, Hanley Ramirez, Miguel Cabrera, Carlos Lee, Lance Berkman, Adrian Gonzalez, Paul Konerko, Ryan Zimmerman, David Wright, Kevin Youkilis, Mike Lowell, Nick Markakis, Miguel Tejada, Andre Ethier, Matt Kemp, Derrek Lee, Carlos Beltran, James Loney, Nate McLouth, Johnny Damon, Scott Rolen, Vernon Wells, Jermaine Dye, Bobby Abreu, Brandon Phillips, Alfonso Soriano, Dan Uggla and J.D. Drew.
De Rosa had as many RBIs as Adam Dunn and as many homers as Thome. DeRosa had more homers than a long list of guys including Holliday, C. Lee, D. Lee, C. Jones, Brad Hawpe, McLouth, Zimmerman, Wright.
DeRosa may not be, say, Ryan Howard in the slugging department. But he’s been one of the better run producers in baseball this season. I have no idea what the mewling is all about; what exactly did you expect GM John Mozeliak to do here, more than a month before the trade deadline? Babe Ruth, Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams were unavailable, and Stan Musial wasn’t prepared to come out of retirement. Do you see any other sluggers being offered or traded these days? Where are they? And what is an “impact” bat, exactly? If adding a guy who has more RBIs than Beltran, Berkman and Utley isn’t “impact” in your book, then please educate the rest of us. Thanks.
2. Enough already, for now, about Matt Holliday: Can we move on from this? The talks between the Cardinals and A’s for the overrated outfielder were contentious. Oakland’s demands were unreasonable, to put it mildly. The requested package included top hitting prospect Brett Wallace, Chris Perez or Jason Motte, plus at least one elite prospect. A Cardinals insider described it this way to me: Oakland GM Billy Beane’s goal here wasn’t to make a good trade; he wanted to destroy the trading partner. No one should blame Beane for asking for a preposterously big return on Holliday; if a team is stupid enough to cave into his demands, then Beane gets the props. But Beane has said that he’s happy to take the two No. 1 draft picks as compensation should Holliday walk as a free agent. Unless Beane comes off that, and drops his price dramatically, there is no deal to make. So can we hit the mute button on all of this nonsensical Holliday talk, at least until there is a legit reason to revisit this? By the way, have you noticed the way Holliday has hit once he lost the benefit of playing half of his games at Coors Field? Holliday has 8 homers and 40 RBIs this season. Less than DeRosa in both categories.
3. If anything, the Cardinals should be looking for a starting pitcher: Todd Wellemeyer has the third-worst ERA (5.53) among MLB starting pitchers and is allowing more base runners per nine innings than any big-league starting pitcher. After being plugged into the rotation as an injury replacement for Kyle Lohse, Brad Thompson was terrific for a while but has gotten bopped around in his last two starts, allowing two of the lesser offenses in the NL (Mets and Giants) to rack him for 9 ER in 11 IP. The Faberge Egg propagandists would have you believe that the Cardinals can install one of the Class AAA pitchers from Memphis, but they are not an upgrade at this point. When I spoke to manager Tony La Russa about possible needs that could be filled by trade, he mentioned the need to deepen the lineup (this was before the DeRosa deal) but quickly added that if there’s an opportunity to land a starting pitcher, the Cardinals should take a look at it.
4. Question for the minor-league experts: I wanted to say this up front — I’m being sincere when I ask this: is there anything down below that suggests the Cardinals are well on the way to developing a power-arm starting pitcher? The guys who keep coming up here – Mitchell Boggs, P.J. Walters, Clayton Mortensen — tend to nibble and throw a lot of pitches instead of going after hitters. Seems to me that this is a genuine void in the system; perhaps Lance Lynn (at AA Springfield) fits the profile. My friend Derrick Goold thinks Adam Ottavino qualifies. If there’s someone in the system who is a legit hard thrower (a starter, not a reliever) please let us know. This is another reason why the Cardinals must sign No. 1 draft pick Shelby Miller, who is a power arm.
5. DeRosa vs. the NL Central: I was curious as to how the new Cardinal did as a Cub against the rest of the NL Central in 2007-2008. The answer: very well. The Cardinals were the one team that shut him down (for the most part) as De Rosa batted .220 against them with 3 homers and 10 RBIs in 91 ABs. That’s why when DeRosa joined the Cardinals on Sunday, one of the first things he did was to go to teammates and ask about the Cardinals’ plan in attacking him so he could close the weak spots.
Anyway, this is what DeRosa did against the other NL Central clubs:
Houston: 112 ABs, 4 HR, 15 RBIs, 8 doubles, 12 runs, .277 BA, .325 OBP, .455 SLG.
Cincinnati: 93 ABs, 5 HR, 21 RBIs, 4 doubles, 18 runs, .387 BA, .482 OBP, .591 SLG
Milwaukee: 98 ABs, 1 HR, 20 RBIs, 5 doubles, 15 runs, .286 BA, .374 OBP, .388 SLG.
Overall in 2007-2008, DeRosa had 14 homers and 79 RBIs in 500 ABs against Central teams; only 13 players had more RBIs in intramural competition, and only seven had more doubles.
Thanks as always for reading …
-Bernie
“Do these folks even bother to do any homework?”
With all due respect - shame on you for even thinking that question as it relates to the message boards.
Most people have all the homework they need already done in their head.
No they dont Bern, because the “smartest” fans are becoming dumber as the years drag on. Irrationality and overreaction permeate through the fanbase, unjustifiably so.
Thanks for setting the record straight on a couple of issues here Bernie. I could never figure why so many people have declared Matt Holliday to be the second coming. Your report points out what many of us already knew, he is not the same hitter he was as a Rocky at Coor’s field. DeRosa has better stats then him anyway, and we didn’t have to give up the farm to get DeRosa. Then secondly, you confirmed what I have suspected all along, the lack of power arm starting pitchers in our minor leagues. For a system that is so highly touted by some, it is surprising that we appear to be so lacking in potential there. All of the starting pitchers that has been promoted this year appear to be no more than bottom of the rotation guys at the major league level, unless I’m missing something.
First of all, let me say that I am happy overall about the DeRosa trade. But that hapiness is somewhat tempered. There is the obvious fact that no franchise likes to lose an arm like Chris Perez. I am in a long line of folks who would offer that up. There is one factor though that must be mentioned. DeRosa comes with some serious baggage! He was a cub! Yes I lowercased that on purpose. He was a key member of a team that was swept out of the playoffs back-to-back years. I sure hope that fact doesn’t come back to haunt us! (This is just my attempt to draw up some anti-cub sentiment…) Have fun with that!
STLguy, people aren’t becoming dumber… the internet just makes it easier for dumb people to share their dumb thoughts with the universe. as a whole, i’d say we’re just about as dumb as we’ve ever been…
I’ve been sitting here thinking (watch out) about some of these comments from you Mr. M, and I feel like I’m seeing a slight pattern with the pro teams in STL.
Recent trends suggest teams are trying the “improve from within” mantra. Blues seem to have a wonderful grasp on that, but maybe that is more of a product of high picks for 5 straight years (and in some cases, multiple high picks in a year). Rams, cutting older vets and giving the current younger players a chance. They also are signing younger guys rather than the stop-gap, marginal vets.
Then there’s the Cards. They seem to want to improve from within, but they do not have the resources because: 1) failure to draft well, or 2) trading the talent away, or 3) failure of the farm system in teaching our players so as to get the best talent from them.
Our wonderful interweb thingy here is chock full ‘o opinions and ratings. Having said that, based on trade demands, who are the big-time prospects within the organization that OTHERS covet, not who we read about or our FO raves about. Who do we have that other organizations ask about when we approach them with trade offers.
What I also find interesting is a comparison of the Blues drafting vs the Cards. Many Blues fans are up in arms over the fact this team has 723 defensemen with only 6 spots open. What would the Cardinals do if they had that many infielders/outfielders? Understanding baseball has roughly 6+ other positions to fill, why don’t the Cardinals try and build the same type of system with catchers (for example).
How logical and possible is that in baseball, to develop a glut of wicked talent at one crucial position and then deal from that strength later? Personally, I think the Blues have it right.
Seriously, if the Blues offered Washington: Erik Johnson and Alex P for Ovechkin… THAT is the kind of deal I’d like to see. Yeah we give up alot, but we’re also getting a stud in return. (Extreme example that I’ll take a hammering on and would probably never happen, but oh well.)
The Cards could not even think of something like this right now, as they don’t have the talent to offer for somebody in baseball’s equivalent.
THANK YOU Bernie for pointing out the stupidity in the Holliday dealings. After ‘07, Matt was average at best. Living in Denver now the talk shows here howled when the Rockies dealt him to Oakland but I could understand given his past season. Many thought he would rebound in his walk year but he’s proven to be a good, perhaps even VERY good hitter and outfielder but NOT a game changer. He’s certainly now worth the money Boras will be asking for this winter.
At one point, I was hoping the Cardinals could put together a package for the Rockies’ Ian Stewart since he can play both 3rd and 2nd but given his resurgence and the collapse of Garret Atkins, I think the Rockies will be content to keep him now.
No, they don’t do their homework — Internet whiners and complainers are mostly people who want to show off (but don’t have anything to show).
Derosa will be fine. This was a good move.
The best part for me is that the fans in Chicago (as well as his former teammates) are in shock! “How could he end up in St. Louis?” And… they have Milton Bradley! They will never, I repeat never, get in right in Chicago.
I also agree with you… forget Holliday. We need a starter. I am not sure how that will play out yet, but Thompson and Wellemeyer cannot keep being sent out there and expect to get wins for the Cardinals. If a commoner like me can see this…… How can management not see this?
You’re right Bernie, DeRosa is not a judy hitter. He’s good for 20 plus homeruns and 30 to 40 doubles every year. He puts me in mind as an up grade over Mark Grudzelanek when Gruds was in his prime because DeRosa hits more homeruns. And Yes, DeRosa is a very solid impact player for the role he plays. I think he is best suited to hit in the two hole or the six hole. I just do not see him as a clean up hitter batting behind Pujols. I do agree with you that if we picked up a quality starting pitcher that would be huge. With Lohse out we are hurting. A #3 rotation type pickup might cushen the blows we take from the lack of production we are getting from the 4 hole in the lineup. Ankiel and Ludwick have got to hit because they are usually in the middle of the lineup. If they continue to struggle we “might win” because Pujols can carry a team, but it sure “might” be ugly watching them strand all those runners. Lastly, Cardinal Nation wants what Pujols wants because we want him to retire as a Cardinal. Thats why there is a lot of unreasonable ranting roaming every degree on the compass. Cardinal Nation will go absolutely madd if Pujols does not retire as a Cardinal.