For only the second time in the last 13 seasons, the Cardinals may not have a starting pitcher win as many as 15 games. As Dave Duncan, their pitching coach since 1996, says, "We've usually had a couple of pitchers with pretty good records."
Since Kent Mercker led a forgettable 1998 staff with 11 wins, only Adam Wainwright has led the staff in wins with fewer than 15 since then. Wainwright had 14 in 2007.
Since 1999, the Cardinals had a total of 22 starting pitchers win as many as 15 games in a season, or two per season.
This season, the Cardinals have balance. They have five pitchers between eight and 11 wins. But, judging by the standings, that really hasn't been good enough.
The elephant in the room, of course, is Wainwright, the 39-game winner over the previous two seasons who hasn't been available this year to a rotation that, as it turned out, sorely needed him.
Duncan, who fashions himself a pretty good prognosticator, found himself well off the mark this year in his estimate of his starters, even allowing for the kick-in-the-gut loss of Wainwright to season-ending elbow surgery in February.
"I thought the performance of our rotation would be better than it's been," Duncan said.
"You don't replace a Wainwright, unless you can get a (Roy) Halladay or (Cliff) Lee or somebody like that. (Wainwright) not only is a top-of-the-rotation guy, he's a top-of-the-league guy. You don't replace him, but when we started the season, I felt like the starting rotation probably would be the strength of our team.
"For a while there, I think we pitched representative of what our capabilities were.
"Jaime (Garcia), (Kyle) Lohse and (Kyle) McClellan all started off red-hot and, almost at the same time, they started having problems and kind of lost the consistency in what they were doing."
While staff ace Chris Carpenter was struggling to gain traction and run support, Garcia, Lohse and McClellan by May 29 were a combined 18-4 and Jake Westbrook was in the midst of a four-game winning streak.
But from May 29 on, Garcia, Lohse and McClellan have gone 9-15 as starters with McClellan gaining a couple of wins in the bullpen. Westbrook is 9-7 overall but his earned-run average just got under 5.00 recently. Carpenter is 8-8 but by all accounts, should have several more wins amongst the 10 no-decisions he has incurred.
In all, Duncan said, "It's just disappointing. I usually have pretty accurate expectations — and I try to be realistic about it. My expectations were a lot greater than what we've really done in the starting staff."
For one thing, the innings pitched by the starters have seemed markedly low. In 44 of their first 124 starts and 29 of 70 since May 29, the Cardinals' starter has failed to negotiate six frames.
"I think I've been really disappointed that we haven't pitched deeper into more games," Duncan said. "We've had a lot of five- and six-inning outings. I thought we would be better than that.''
Can the starters be better? Will they be better?
"I don't know," said Duncan, candidly. The answer was the same for both questions.
The refrain often heard this season is that a Cardinals pitcher will make one or two mistakes and neither he nor the team can overcome those mistakes. That refrain, however, is not one to which Duncan necessarily subscribes.
"Nobody ever makes just one or two (mistakes)," Duncan said. "It's just the one or two they didn't get away with. The more you make, the better chance you're not going to get away with some of them."
The Cardinals' staff ERA is a modest 3.83 heading into today's game at Chicago. That is good for only eighth in the 16-team National League.
"I guess (ERA) is the measurement of how good your staff is," Duncan said. "If I don't think we've been all that good, then I guess that's what it is."
Thirty-eight games, including 22 at home, remain. What can a pitching coach do at this stage?
"Not give up," Duncan said. "Just not give up. It's not over yet. You just keep looking at what you perceive the problems to be — and you address them."
