Lanny, DG has well documented the kind of throwing program that Lohse was on before he signed. The guy is a veteran, and he doesn’t need a baby-sitter to teach him how to stretch himself out to be ready. His stuff looked good, and he wasn’t laboring through his innings yesterday. Beware of stats, they can be deceiving.

Brian, you are echoing something I hear on this board a lot. Somehow, Thompson’s contributions to this team has been completely overlooked. He was significantly better than anything that Wells provided, for a fraction of the price. To say that Reyes provides greater potential because he has pitched a couple of good outings can be countered with two words, Bud Smith. Every year you can look and find a pitcher that flashed that kind of promise, and within two years was drummed out of baseball. I don’t know how the scouts missed so badly on this guy, but he just isn’t consistent enough to be an MLB pitcher. Bad pitchers complain about run support (see Garrett Stephenson), good pitchers find ways to win.

Your comments about how a rotation of Carpenter, Wainwright, Mulder, Lohse, and Pineiro/Clement is somehow a 4A rotation is just absurd. Carpenter won’t be himself this year, but he’ll need this year to be ready for next year. If Mulder has found his form back, you are talking about one of the premier LHP in MLB. Wainwright seems to have developed a top-of-the-rotation mentality to go along with top-end stuff. Lohse/Pineiro/Clement all are most likely 4.50 ERA guys that will give you 6 innings (that is the definition of a quality start, do the arithmetic). Tell me how the Yankees provide a better rotation than that. If that puts Wellemeyer and Thompson back in the bullpen, with some good trade chips for the team, then the Cards are well ahead of where the East-darling Mets are right now. The starting rotation in May, is not going to be the starting rotation in July.

Your research for you
Looper 46
Wainwright 16
Pineiro 65
Thompson 13
Wellemeyer 9
Reyes 8
Clement 87

That’s 157 wins without counting Clement’s 87 (I assumed he was your “others”).

Thanks.

Thanks for the research Elliot, my 4A comment referred to the rotation pre-injury returns.

Even counting Clement\’s 87 wins (which is currently higher than his fastball speed), the rotation without Carpenter or Mulder hurts bad. Waiting for Carp and Mulder is risky, I wish the the last two years waiting for Mulder to either get through his injury or find his arm slot taught us something.

Last year was one of the worst rotations in the history of this proud organization, what did we do to shore it up? We signed Clement who didn\’t pitch last year.

After that failed in ST, we signed Lohse. I like Lohse, good signing, but seriously the opening day rotation is

3/31 … Opening Day vs. Colorado: Wainwright - good pitcher, hopefully an ace
4/2 … vs. Colorado: Wellemeyer - retread who was cut by the Royals, yeah his stuff might be good. I hope so.
4/3 … vs. Colorado: Thompson - my opinion has already been stated here
4/4 … vs. Washington: Looper - average ML pitcher.
Who\’s next after we get to 5 starters? Lohse I assume. Then Pineiro? I assume, based on his current schedule. Then Mulder, hopefully….

I think using the word \”hope\” happens too often with this team and management. Let\’s all hold out hope for pitchers returning from surgery. Anyone else tired of this approach?

Should a better question in my last comment been how many innings did these starters go last year?, instead of how many career wins? Would that show the real problem? They\’re counting on people who couldn\’t be counted on last year. Sure there\’s talent, but the majority of talent is recovering from surgery. Thompson\’s fine, he\’s not the problem, the problem is that he is pitching the 3rd game of the year.

How many of these starters went for 200 innings, or near it?
Wainwright did it. (202)
Looper went for 175, I can\’t understand why everyone loves him, his ERA was almost 5.00 last year
Thompson went 129.1 with an ERA at 4.73
Wellemeyer 78.4
Lohse 192.7
Pineiro 97.
Clement 0
Mulder 11.0
Carpenter 6.0
There\’s three. One is an above average starter, one is average and the other is below average.

What happens if Mulder has setbacks, or Clement or Carpenter? Or all three? The odds of all three return to pre-injury form this year is rare.

If this thread continues I\’ll look up PECOTA projections all three. I doubt they are pretty for this season.

Brian,

Good stuff. I agree that this is definitely not a contending rotation, as it stands. I also think you’re right, a lot of things have to go right. I think the “one of the worst rotations in the history of this proud organization” is a little bit of hyperbole. I remember the Juan Agosto years. I remember waiting every year for Joe Magrane to be healthy enough for us to contend. I’m too young to remember any of those stellar 50’s or 70’s rotations. In both cases, we went for entire decades with maybe one real starting pitcher. (Thanks Mr. Gibson for providing something in the 70’s).

Let’s not lose focus here. This organization ran the cupboard dry with a very successful run of contention over the last decade and a half. The new direction of the organization will allow the Cards to contend consistently in the future. Unfortunately, the transistion is probably going to hurt. The organization has shown a committment to the new strategy by signing guys like Molina, Carpenter, and Wainwright to long term deals. The next real tests for them will be to see how they handle Ankiel (if he performs well) and Pujols.

The Wells signing last year turned out to be really bad. The Pineiro signing looked to be pretty good, but I think the judgement will have to be reserved until this year’s All-Star break. I would say the same thing about Mulder and Clement. I agree, Thompson and Wellemeyer are not long term options, but hopefully they are placeholders for better options.

Elliot, the worst rotation comment wasn’t hyperbole, their runs allowed was third highest in the history of the team (granted, scoring’s up, but still). (My source, because I read that recently:
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/five-questions-st-louis-cardinals3/)

Anyway, I remember the last years of the Maxvill era and it wasn’t fun. But the difference is this group of owners are generating revenue at a record pace. This team won the world series two years ago and what did they do last offseason to shore up a pitching staff? Convert Looper and Wainwright. Sign Wells. Pick up retreads mid-season to try to shore up.

I agree that the team is in transition, and the cupboard’s bare, it’s frustrating that they have the resources to supplement better than players DFA’d by other teams and consistently choose not to do so. This team could have easily signed workhouse rotation guys to short term deals either last year or this year instead of relying on other team’s releases, (Wellemeyer, Pineiro). They always want to find the next diamond in the rough. Duncan’s good, but he can’t make these chunks of coal into diamonds.

The biggest impact on all of their decisions is money. Including player development and free agents.

Look at the Kozma draft pick last year (DG has covered it well). They fail to pick Rick Porcello, because of the money and go after an odd choice in the 1st round because they lacked middle infield depth in the organization.

Baffling.

I like signing Molina and Wainwright, but they did it because they didn’t want to pay more later.

I prefer the youth approach long-term, and I’d actually be OK if they just fessed up and said we’re a team that’s rebuilding, holding out hope for healthy pitchers for next year. Last year’s team had a chance to supplement and did nothing. This team did little.

The constant conflict in this organization in youth versus veterans is perplexing. You can’t have a youth movement without them playing (Ryan, Reyes, Haren, even the beloved Thompson).

Remember Bonilla had to get hurt before Pujols got his chance. Seems like it’s the same thing this year for Barton (Juan Gone).

This years Cardinals slogan: “Cards 08. We have hope” (or “We’re recovering nicely”).

That “worst rotation” statement … look no further than last year. Bernie Miklasz has charted how last year’s rotation — frayed and wheezing as it was — has a a strong claim to that adjective, “worst.”

Brian,

I agree with you on the fact that I wish the team was more honest with the fan base about the transition the team is going through. We recognize a pig, painted up or not. For years, fans cried for fiscal solvency in baseball to try to even the playing field. I think what the Cards are doing is leading to that end, at least for them. Just because they are “generating revenue at a record pace.” does not mean they should spend it with abandon.

Their motivations for signing Wainwright and Molina (and even Pujols back in the day) were of course to avoid paying more later. I have NO issue with that. That is a great business decision. Being able to identify cornerstone players and signing them long term is becoming crucial to modern baseball (as it was before some of the craziness of free agency).

While most teams are paying $10M+ for 4-5 years for Gil Meche, Ted Lilly, etc. I wish I could tell you when Livan Hernandez will finally hit that wall. The big dollar signings of Schmidt and Zito have clearly taken their respective teams out of contention. Even the Santana signing by the Mets will require him to make an exceptional transition to the NL and continue to pitch at a Cy Young level for 3+ years to consider it a great move. The Cards have Carpenter and Wainwright. They are raising some solid potential 3-4-5 starters internally right now (No, I’m not talking about Thompson and Reyes). They have a few years to identify a new “ace” through draft or trade.

Your confliction in the organization comes from the team’s undying support of a manager that clearly favors proven track records over potential. Perhaps he is doing the right thing with guys like Ryan and Reyes, but I am more of a “sink/swim” type of guy (as it sounds are you).