DG’s 10@10: Bark like a Bulldog, Break for the Bullpen
TOWER GROVE — A bark will do it. But not any old bark. It’s got to be a good, hearty robust, UGA-worthy bark that gets Adam Wainwright’s attention.
The past couple years, before each spring training the paper dispatches me to write a travel story about St. Louis Cardinals spring training in Jupiter, Fla. And an annual part of the story is getting hints and suggestions on how to land a player’s autograph. Most subscribe to the Three P’s: Patience, Politeness and having your own Pen. Wainwright follows the canine rule. A solid bark will get his attention. It strums his Georgia roots and it plays on his University of Georgia fanaticism.
“There isn’t a better way to get my attention than with a ‘Go Dawgs,’” he said. “and that’s not just ‘Go Dawgs,’ that’s ‘GO DAWGS!!!’” with several exclamation points in there. There are two proper ways to say it. Say, ‘Go Dawgs,’ really loud and mean it. Or, just bark. We’re not talking about a girlie dog bark. No lapdog barks. English bulldog or bigger.”
The Georgia boy comes home this afternoon looking to win a series for the Cardinals.
Wainwright, who won his only previous start for the Cardinals in his native state, has not lost since June 2 of last season. He’s 3-0 with a 1.13 ERA in six games (three starts) against his original team, the Atlanta Braves. And today he leads an ever growing pack Cardinals with Georgia roots. Blaine Boyer recently joined Mitchell Boggs and Wainwright as Go-Dawg devotees. Boyer is an Atlanta native, who like Wainwright, was first drafted by the Braves. Boggs pitched for Georgia. Wainwright — who (shhhh!) committed to Georgia Tech out of high school — just roots, loudly, for Georgia.
It would help the Cardinals if their lead dawg, Wainwright, chewed up some innings today.
The 10@10 for today starts with last night, and the eighth inning that put Wainwright in position to pitch the Cardinals to a series victory instead of trying for a series sweep at Turner Field …
- After second-year reliever — and now setup man — Kyle McClellan pitched two shutout innings against the New York Mets, manager Tony La Russa said the outing underscored the rule of thumb with the young righthander. “The key to that is to rest him,” La Russa said. “Rest him. Not (burden) him with a surplus of innings. Watch it.” And then there was a one-run lead in the eighth inning Tuesday night that needed bridging to closer Ryan Franklin. The plan was to get McClellan, who threw 18 pitches Monday, a night off — but the need was to pin down a victory. You know what happened from there. Three walks. A seeing-eye single (the desired groundball of all things) and a 1-0 lead became a 2-1 loss with 3-2 pitch. McClellan was pitching on back-to-back days for the second time this season, and each time it’s been rocky. He’s allowed three runs in 2 innings pitched in the second day of back-to-back appearances. Going back through his last 10 back-to-back appearances — dating to May 25 of last season — McClellan has pitched 9 2/3 innings in the second day and allowed 13 hits, five walks, struck out six and has an ERA of 5.58. In all other appearances he has a combined ERA of 4.27.
- Two former Cardinals from the opposite ends of the franchise spectrum had quite opposite performances yesterday in the majors. Anthony Reyes, that longtime Cardinals prospect, was thumped for seven runs in his two innings of work for the Cleveland Indians yesterday. Russell Branyan, that short-time Cardinals fill-in, went 5-for-5 for Seattle, setting a career high for hits after going his career without even four hits in a game. To mark former closer Jason Isringhausen’s advancement to Triple-A on his rehab assignment with the Rays, today’s poll focuses on the former Cardinals and the impact they could have on their current clubs:
Loading … - The young high school pitcher mentioned yesterday, Patrick Schuster, did not complete his fifth consecutive no-hitter. In the third inning of the game, a double snapped his hitless run at 28 1/3 innings. Coverage of the game pegged the number of scouts present for the lefty’s run at prep baseball history at a couple dozen. The Cardinals, according to an official, were not one of them. Schuster will get to make his next pitch on a big-league field. The Florida high schooler will make the ceremonial first pitch for Tampa Bay on Sunday.
- While today’s Braves starter is no slouch — Javier Vazquez has nine consecutive seasons of at least 30 starts and 198 innings (eight with 200+ innings) — the Cardinals do duck Atlanta’s ace. And, that brings our ongoing count of Missed Aces to … five. By the the end of April, the Cardinals have missed the following standout/ace pitchers in single series against their teams: Johan Santana, Brandon Webb, Dan Haren, Carlos Zambrano and now sinkerballer Derek Lowe.
- Check out Parker Michels-Boyce’s video mini-doc from the annual St. Louis Browns luncheon, including comments from St. Louis native and Browns’ star Roy Sievers.
- Kansas City Star baseball writer Sam Mellinger put it well this morning: “Welcome to Zack Greinke Day.” The Royals righthander enters tonight’s start against Toronto without allowing a run in six consecutive starts — tying the record held by Orel Hershiser and Don Drysdale. That includes 29 scoreless innings this season, and tonight he attempts to be baseball’s first five-win pitcher. He’s already done something few Royals have pulled off: Appeared on the cover of Sports Illlustrated. KC Star columnist and uber-blogger Joe Posnanski has an excellent profile of Greinke hitting newsstands now, but you can follow that link to read it in preparation for a game in KC that matters. Mellinger’s blog also has a host of other links for more on Greinke. … And then there’s Jason Whitlock. The KC Star columnist advocates the Royals signing … wait for it … Barry Bonds.
- FARM REPORT: Cardinals general manager John Mozeliak attended last night’s game at Low-A Quad Cities and saw the Cardinals affiliate edge Wisconsin for a 4-2 victory. Brett Lilley walked three times to raise his on-base percentage to .621. Casey Mulligan struck out two and got his fifth save of the season. The righthander, a 22nd round pick in 2006, is doing the Jason Motte thing. He’s a catcher converting to pitcher. He made the move halfway through last season. … Blake Hawksworth continues to make his best starts away from home. Hawksworth held Round Rock to two hits and one run through eight innings Tuesday. The righthander struck out three and walked one. … Jess Todd closed the 3-1 victory for his fourth save of the season. He struck out two. … Tyler Greene, discussed yesterday in the 10@10, went 2-for-4 with a walk, a stolen base, a run scored and an RBI. … Springfield was held to three hits in a 3-1 loss. Daryl Jones had one of the hits — a double — but otherwise he and Brett Wallace combined to go 1-for-8 (but without a strikeout). … At High-A Palm Beach, Shane Peterson doubled and Curt Smith drove him home with a single in the 11th inning for a 4-3 victory. Blake King got the win despite walking three in his two innings. He did not allow a run, but he struck out two.
- Cubs outfielder Alfonso Soriano hit a three-run homer in Chicago’s rout of Arizona on Tuesday. Over the weekend, we saw manager Lou Piniella experiment with moving Soriano out of the leadoff spot. For years, it’s been thought that Soriano’s power and free-swinging ways was a bad fit for the leadoff spot, and that a team would be better served with him, his power and his Ks in the middle of the lineup. Piniella’s latest attempt lasted two days. On Sunday, Soriano was back leading off — and back leading the Cubs to a win. Baseball Info Solution’s John Dewan crunched the numbers on why Soriano batting leadoff works: Wins. Since Soriano arrived with the Cubs, they are 192-150 overall. Without Soriano in the lineup, they are 41-42 (.494). With him in the lineup, but not hitting leadoff, they are 4-9 (.308), with a small sample size. And with him hitting leadoff? The Cubs are 147-99 (.598).
- It’s almost too early to bring this up, but man it caught Bernie Miklasz (@miklasz) and my (@dgoold) attention last night during our Twitter exchanges. Over at Fangraphs.com, they track the zone ratings of infielders and the runs “defended” or runs kept off the board with defense. All that information — and remember defensive stats are very much a work in progress — is distilled into a UZR or UZR/150. Basically, those are runs allowed above average and runs allowed above average over 150 games at the position. (Check the glossary definition here.) Albert Pujols, for example, has a 7.3 UZR/150 so far this season, and that follows a +8.5 UZR/150 in 2008 and a +16.0 UZR/150 in 2009. Last season, Cesar Izturis had a +11.3 at shortstop last season. At the same time, Khalil Greene had a minus-11.0 for San Diego last season. Bogged down by errors no doubt, Greene, who dove to reach that seeing-eye single that cost the game last night, has a minus-36.7 UZR/150 so far this season. Doesn’t seem right. It’s early. But it’s worth noting.
- Suggested Reading: A New Yorker less than thrilled by the “imperfect” ballparks that opened in his hometown this season finds some solace in the walkways and crannies of Busch Stadium, writes New York Times columnist George Vecsey.
When covering high school football in the bayou, my buddy and I would often challenge each other to get a word into that night’s coverage. “Cadaver” was one. “Trout” was another. Gradually the degree-of-difficulty got higher and higher (”leghorn” or “suppurate”, for example). But Vecsey nailed one with the name-drop of Xian’s statue warriors.
See what words you can get my colleague to use today, because it’s JSL!!!#@$%!! day.
Ration your exclamation points accordingly.
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Derrick Goold said he was going to Mizzou for capital-J journalism, but after growing up in the Time Zone Baseball Forgot he was really drawn to MU sitting between two major-league cities. Goold joined the Post-Dispatch in 2001 after working for The Times-Picayune and Rocky Mountain News, covering sports from LSU to NHL and every level of baseball in between. 
Quick. Before screaming, refresh the screen. Looks like an early (rough draft) version of the 10@10 went up. Just replaced it with polished version. Apologies.
DG, since we know McClellan is a little less than horrible pitching back-to-back days, why not put Franklin in for a 4 out save? Also, whats the scouting report on Mulligan? Fastball MPH etc… Have you seen him pitch? Thanks in advance.
http://buschshouseofcards.blogspot.com
I would argue that Carlos Zambrano is not a “missed ace” because Rich Harden is the Cubs’ ace. But we missed him in one of the series, too, so it comes out to five anyway.
Khalil Greene has been advertised as an excellent defender. However, the +/- ratings system would disagree. His +/- numbers from ‘06 to ‘08:
2006: +13
2007: +7
2008: -4
He has seen a pretty drastic decline the last few years. These numbers contradict what most reports say about Greene’s defense.
On a separate note. DG, any idea whose record Patrick Schuster would have broken yesterday, had he tossed a fifth consecutive no-no?
With thirteen pitchers, eight in the pen, I would hardly say that it’s imperative that Wainwright go deep in the game. Instead, La Russa should try to use the whole array of pitchers he has rather than using McClellan on back to back days. I usually agree with tony but here he blew the game. What’s the use of keeping so many relief pitchers if you only trust two of them in a close game.
Would be interesting to see that UZR stuff for Skip and Brendan Ryan.
Gee Tony wish my boss would come around and tell me to rest after a full 60 minutes of work. 18 PITCHES!!?? Are you kidding me? Wouldn’t want to overwork a bullpen who doesnt really work. They play a game. Maybe you should work them more and not less and get them integrated into the grind of everyday play. I would love to be in the position to play everyday!
uuummm why was Dan Haren not included on the list of former Cards?
I really don’t want to say this, but I think that the bullpen is destined to implode once again this season. McClellan will probably be overworked by August. Hopefully Motte/Perez can fill in more than they have been so McClellan is healthy and effective all season long. The Cardinals need one more starter, even if Carpenter comes back healthy in June/July. Let’s see Mo get it done at the trade deadline. Maybe not even Peavy, I was thinking someone who is more affordable yet decent enough to help out the staff. Someone like Kevin Millwood, maybe? Mark Buehrle? Thoughts?
I agree with Matt (above), why is it imperative that Wainwright go deep in the game. We’ve gotten quality starts (7 and 6) from our starters the last two nights. Goold writes like we were in our ‘pen by the 3rd inning both nights.
If you have bullpen issues with starts putting in quality starts on back to back nights, you have managerial issues with how to handle the bullpen.