This trade scenario is similiar to a 16 vs a dealer’s 10 in Blackjack. You know what you have to do, you know what you should do, but you don’t want to do it.

love the idea of getting Holliday, but we can not give up Ludwig, not yet anyway. we need an addition to Pujols & Ludwig not a substitution for the second half of that. my .02

If we felt confident that Ludwick would hit .285 30 100 this year, would we trade him? So, we are balancing concern about Holliday going on permanent vacation from Coors, with whether Lud just had a career year, and other prospects won’t have a big impact.

I think Holliday is intriguing almost as much for his marquee status. It just feels better to have an established big bat that relying on the players we have. Think of it, Holiday hit well at Busch, and will play half his games here.

Then again, championships are won with strong starting pitching, a dominant closer, and good defense. Where we are and where we should go in these areas may be most imperative.

Some other stats to compare Ludwick and Holliday.
Vs. Lefties Holliday .293 to Ludwick .266.
Strikeouts Holliday 109K’s in 539 AB to Ludwick 146K’s in 538 AB
Holliday has played 120 games or more every season and Ludwick has done that only the last 2 years.

Last year was a little down power wise for Holliday and a career year for Ludwick. I think the Cards have to go for this trade to create some excitement and may be able to lure some Free Agents to come to the Cards (like Fuentes).

It may cost more money, but it opens up a spot for Rasmus or Mather to play if Schumacher is part of the deal. Boggs is a back end of the rotation pitcher at best.

Not sure who will lead off, maybe TLR will bat Pujols in the 1st spot to more AB’s for him!

You have to keep in mind that the road splts of Rockies players have proven to not be very good predictors of what players do after leaving the Rox. There are lots of reasons behind those Coors home-road splits. If you look at OPS adjusted for league and park, and players before, during, and after being Rockies, you’ll find that the overall production is not so different, even for players who had pretty big Coors splits —

Larry Walker, 2003-04, CO — 121, 166
Larry Walker, 2004-05, STL — 143, 130

Andres Gallaraga, 1996-97, CO — 127, 131
Andres Gallaraga, 1998-00, ATL — 157, 122

Dante Bichette, 1998-99, CO — 108, 102
Dante Bichette, 2000-01, CIN-BOS — 105, 103

How about this one —
Aaron Miles, 2004-05, CO — 72, 65
Aaron Miles, 2006-07, STL — 74, 76

Don’t over-react to the Coors splits. They mean less than we think.

It’s Matt Holiday. Maybe this isn’t an elevation effect (humidor) but more of a home field advantage effect. He’s proven CONSISTENT production over the last 3 or 4 years, Ludwick has had 1 break out year. Ludwick was voted the least likely cardinal to reproduce his 2008 numbers during the 2009 season in an espn poll. You can always be sure that Holiday is going to hit for ~30 bombs and .300 plus average every season, you can’t expect Ludwick to reach 40 homers and hit around .300 again. I’d hire the man with the more impressive resume.

Holliday’s contract will hurt us big time in the long run. I like our long term outfield of Ludwick, Rasmus and Ankiel with Skip coming off the bench and Mather in the wings if someone gets hurt. Tons of salary flexibility and we can evaluate Ankiel at the trade deadline next year to see if we want to resign him.

We need middle infielders! I would prefer to see us spend the money on a SS and possibly look at converting Freese/Wallace to a 2B in the short term until Glaus runs out of gas.

The big-market teams engage in this behavior and often don’t make the playoffs.

We’ve asked Ludwick to play like a Cardinal and he has. Now, the fans who fill the Busch Stadium seats say Ludwick whould Stay like a Cardinal.

Ludwick gave us one heck of a year, allot of guys on the team played hard this year. The NL Central is and will continue to be a strong division. We need to make good moves to keep the team competitive. I say make the trade. Ludwick & Schumacher - Thanks for making this past year exciting!!

This would be a BAD BAD idea for a trade………….maybe for a pitcher, but not for this guy! DONT DO IT

If want to UPGRADE, lets shop an outfielder to get Roberts from Baltimore…

Guys, i hear what you’re all saying but if we give up Ludwig to get this, then how are we ever going to unload Chris Duncan? i would realy love to have both Holiday and Ludwig. would rather see them package Chris and Ankiel together. go on and throw me under the bus if you want but i would just like to see them pull this off without giving up Ludwig.

get whatever players you want TLR will still be here and with that we dont have a chance of winning

Obviously Holliday’s hittings stats are critical, but tell me about what I can’t see in the stats. What kind of a clubhouse influence is he? What kind of a professional is he? How do his teammates view him? The Cards need a sparkplug as much as they need a hitter.

ok, so we missed the playoffs last year because we blew more saves than Jim Edmond’s age. IF we’re going to give up an outfielder or a prime player, that is what we need to get. I really like Motte and Perez, but they don’t have an out pitch and I’m just not fully convinced that they are there yet. Our offense was up and down and we kept talking about someone to protect Pujols all while watching him put up some of the best numbers in history on a bum elbow. I may be completely off the rocker here, but I think our offense was competitive last year. I think our bullpen makes us think we need an offense that can put up 30 runs a game. What’s easier and less costly to fix?

“Holliday at Coors is a slugger, a lineup-changing power threat with a home every 16.1 at-bats and that hearty .645 slugging percentage. Away from Coors he’s, well, not. He averages a home run every 29.6 at-bats, which puts him in a different tax bracket.”

Actually, he would be in the same tax bracket.

http://www.irs.gov/formspubs/article/0,,id=164272,00.html

This trade would be idiotic. LaRusso has said it is a matter of perception. Perception does not win you games. Holliday has not been a stud outside of Coors Field. Keep Ludwig and go after the best SS or 2nd available and keep Ludwig.

Career year vs. Future HOF’er! I wouldn’t think twice about doing this deal. Ludwick will never have the trade value again that he has now. Holliday is a year younger and a certain HOF’er. The money works because Glaus salary comes off the books next year. Ludwick and 2 spare parts for Holliday is a no brainer!!!

Crombizzle drops what is believed to be the first IRS reference at Bird Land. Well done. Thanks for turning my cliche on its head with the facts.

Now I am seeing the reports that it will be Ludwick, Schumaker and Boggs for Holliday. It appears the Cards are trying to clear inventory because of the new stock coming in…(ala..Colby Rasmus, Jon Jay, Daryl Jones). If that deal goes down you can bet they are trying to clear the bottleneck of outfielders while getting TLR “perceptive protection” for Pujols. All I can say is this is a bold move if it goes through. Free Agency has yet to open. I too expect Mo to try and sign Renteria and LHRP. Hopefully Fuentes. And then some how have enough money to upgrade through trade or signing a 2B-MAN. I’m not going to knock Mo or the ownership until I see what the roster shapes up to be going into February. After all, remember Mo’s words about being aggressive and creative. I’d say the rumor mill is underscoring those words right now. It should be an interesting winter folks. One last thought. The poor economy may be influencing ownership to make some moves to keep the fan base interest up because if they don’t make some moves that gives the Cards a fighting chance they just may lose some of those season ticket holders. And this poor economy may not turn around for 2 or 3 years.

I hope this trade works out…..This guy is a great hitter at Busch and being around these guys can only make him better…

I am wondering why the Cards are not addressing the PITCHING. The bats are fine, if the pitching blew HALF of the games they did, we would have been in the playoffs. Trading for Holliday would be a mistake and again, we will blame the players instead of the front office

I agree with those who think this proposed trade does not make sense. Holliday is a very good player, but so is Ludwick. Even straight up, I would not make the deal. The main difference is the money each will make this year, and the security that we will have Ludwick beyond this year. Estimates are that Holliday will make $8M more than Ludwick. I would rather see that money spent on areas the Cardinals could use help - pitching and middle infield.

Sell high!

Okay, here’s the thing.

Holliday is guaranteed production. Maybe I’m wrong, but I believe that. Ludwick just came off of a potential MVP season.

Does anyone believe that THIRTY year old Ryan Ludwick with no track record will ever challenge Albert Pujols for “Best Player on Team,” again?

I don’t. I think he’s going to fall off big time and just be decent. .280 AVG, maybe 18 HR and 60 RBI.

If I can get Matt Holliday for Ryan Ludwick and some okay prospects, I’m all in. I wouldn’t give up Rasmus for him, or even Ankiel (who I think has big power potential; maybe 40+ HR).

BUT, on the condition that it means payroll is raised. If you make the trade, you have to lock him down for at least a few years. And you still need middle infield help, and more importantly a revamped bullpen. And don’t forget, Pujols isn’t signed forever.

But I think the trade would immediately make the Cardinals better.

Schumaker
Ankiel
Pujols
Holliday
Glaus
MIDDLE INFIELD HELP!
Molina
MIDDLE INFIELD HELP!
Pitcher

Except the pitcher bats eighth, because Tony LaRussa says so, and he’s the future first ballot Hall of Famer with Rings in both leagues. Not me.

Maybe you can even get enough middle infield help to hit them leadoff, and you can move Schumaker instead of Duncan’t, and hit the big oaf 7th. Either way, that lineup is dangerous (assuming middle infield help isn’t Cesar Izturis and Adam Kennedy).

If Wainwright and Lohse can put up healthy seasons, and a closer emerges, we’d be set up to have a big year.

I will concede though, acquiring Holliday won’t be enough on it’s own to get us into the playoffs. We need some pitching. And some pitching. But this would certainly be a nice pickup for a team lacking star power beyond Fat Albert.

Sell high.

The best available information we have at the moment is Ludwick, Schumaker and M. Boggs for Holliday. If the Cardinals were the Yankees with a virtually unlimited payroll, executing the trade would make more sense. I don’t believe Ludwick is a one-year wonder. Our outfield (without making a trade) has a good chance of being a 100 HR outfield. I would rather see a trade of Schumaker and B. Ryan for K. Greene or Schumaker and M. Boggs for one of Atlanta’s middle infielders. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with Schumaker, but you have to give up something. Trading for Greene and signing F. Lopez would give us a potential lineup of Rasmus, K. Greene, Pujols, Ludwick, Glaus, Ankiel, Molina, Pitcher, F. Lopez.

1. Never trade a previous years all-star. 2. you send a message to the others in the farm system that it is possible to come up the ranks and make the bigs with out fear of being the player to be named later. 3. Ludwick looks and acts like a team player and willing to bat in T-Balls silly day to day line up changes. 4. Ludwick comes at a nice price and so far seems reliable. 5. lastly the team was very close to winning a playoff spot and hitting and fielding was not the problem,… bullpen blown saves! Give them half the blown saves and we were looking pretty good. The excuse of not being able to tack on runs was the ol’ look at this hand while the other hand is doing something bad. Blown saves was the issue, fix that and the Cardinals are serious contenders again.

james K

Ludwig and anyone for Holliday? Why? There aren’t enough plusses in that scenario to make anyone happy. Don’t do it. Save the trading capital for something you need desperately — pitching and closing. Even the infield as it was isn’t bad. Sign Lopez. Use Anderson as trade bait, not a proven almost MVP numbers player who wants to be in ST. Louis.

why dont the cardinals trade away prospects like Rasmus to get the big players? a lot of other teams do it but we dont. look at the rays trading away delmon young to get garza and bartlett from the twins, i mean they are not the biggest named players but they helped lead the rays to the world series. give the rockies rasmus skip and boggs, and have an outfield of holliday ankiel and ludwick with mather and duncan as backups.

the cards also need to start spending some more money! we cannot let the cubs keep winning the central…its not supposed to be like that!

TRADE AINT HAPPENING!!!!

I think having to play a lot of games in San Diego, LA, and San Fransisco (all pitchers parks) are enough to deflate Hollidays road numbers. Even if you lose Holliday after a year, you get compensation picks which will make up for the loss of Boggs and Schumacher who are two very replaceable players. People who know baseball don’t compare the average/homeruns/rbi’s they compare the slash stats known as average/slug/obp. They also know that its okay to have a lot of strike outs in your lineup (at least in your RBI positions). This is the reason the American League has dominated the National. The National continues to use up outs sacrificing and using singles hitters while the American is using high OBP/Slug/Average…aka power hitters who work the count, draw walks, don’t give easy outs, avoid double plays, ect. If you look at the recent World Series Champs/good teams they all have great power lineups (Boston, Chicago, Boston, Philly). The only exception is the Cards in 2006. A lot of times strike outs by RBI men avoid inning ending double plays. As long as your RBI guys have high OBP’s and slugging percentages your strike out rate doesn’t matter since you get out 7 out of 10 times in baseball anyway (you have to get out someway and in RBI situations a strike out is usually better than a ground out which could cause a DB). Wake up people. Holliday is a better player than Ludwick. Ludwick is also injury proned. Think about this:

1. Rasmus (good slash stats/defensive upgrade/adds the ability to steal)
2. Ankiel (.500 slug/great defensive player)
3. Pujols (best player in the league)
4. Holliday (great slash stats/power upgrade/defensive upgrade)
5. Glaus (decent slash stats/decent defense)
6. 2B (on the team for defense)
7. SS (on the team for defense)
8. Molina/Pitcher (on the team for defense)
9. Pitcher/Molina

That first 5 of the line up is pretty good. That lineup would improve the slash stats/power numbers significantly, add the ability to run, and improve the defense (assuming Rasmus is the player he is projected to be). At this point the smartest thing the Cards could do is add Holliday, resign Izturis/a 2B who are good defensively, and shore up the pitching. I don’t know why people think its more important to sign a SS/2B, since no SS/2B will improve your club offensively (or defensively for that matter). We don’t need more hitters we need more power bats and those positions don’t offer many. If you can get Holliday with an extension…..then you no doubt HAVE to make this trade. Everyone keeps saying sign Renteria, but people don’t realize Izturiz is better defensively and he has almost as good offensive numbers. Izturis has a higher OBP. Renteria adds no power and is declining as a player. It would be nice to keep Ludwick along with Holliday but I don’t think the Rockies would want anyone else on the team (except Pujols and Rasmus). We still have Duncan on the bench who is another power bat. People are acting like adding Holliday is going to take away your ability to add a left handed specialist and closer (which by the way we have two very good young prospects at closer). I would pull the trigger on this deal in a second…especially if you can sign Holliday to an extension before. In my opinion, you can add both of the Braves middle infielders and it wouldn’t improve your team as much as having Holliday protecting Pujols. The only negative I can see in this trade is that you deminish the value of Chris Duncan. Chris Duncan would be reduced to strictly a left handed bat to come on and pinch hit for the SS/2B/Pitcher positions who would then leave the game after the pinch hit because he isn’t a defensive upgrade. But if Ankiel gets hurt he could come in at the number two spot and and you wouldn’t lose the power. The other knock is you could potentially loser Holliday after one year, but if you do you get compensation for him via draft picks which improves your team in the long run. I say pull the trigger. I figured the Rockies would want more then Ludwick, Schumacher, Boggs (like that plus Rasmus).