Another Chance To Sweep

Pitching duels are a lot of fun.  At least, they are when you come out on the winning side.  I’m not sure  Ian thought  last night’s game was as enjoyable as we did.

Bernie Miklasz Tweeted last night that  Chris Carpenterhonors Bob Gibson by going out there and competing with less than his best stuff.  As we’ve seen this year, Carpenter hasn’t been that dominating figure in 2010, completely closing the opponent down, but he’s still gone out there and competed, working out of jams, giving the opponent little to nothing on the scoreboard.

Carp walked four, showing he didn’t have his best command, but he mitigated that by allowing only three hits and getting a double play.  I don’t know what kind of extra motivation Toronto gives to him, but can we get them over into the NL Central?

I will say I heard Buster Olney on Baseball Tonight saying the gap between Chris Carpenter and Ubaldo Jimenez for the NL Cy Young “just closed.”  However, Carp’s not even the best pitcher on his own team this year.  Is anyone really putting him in the Cy Young race?  A 9-1 record and a 2.63 ERA is nice, but in this year of the pitcher, I’m not sure that’d be enough.  Don’t get me wrong, though–if the media wants to put him in the race, I’m all for it.

I also thought it was a turning point for Matt Holliday.  Sure, Holliday has gone off for the last week, crushing home runs and the like.  Last night, though, he came up with a runner in scoring position in a crucial two-out spot.  Two weeks ago, he’d have struck out on that pitch (which was ball four), but now that he’s clicking he got the key base hit.  I don’t know when or if they’ll move him back to the cleanup slot, but he’s got to be enjoying his ride in front of Albert Pujols right now.

Speaking of, good to see Pujols get some hits last night.  Four hits, including a double.  Too bad he couldn’t have gotten one after Holliday’s hit in the ninth for insurance, but asking for five hits is a bridge too far, I think.

However, I want to get into the aftermath of his eighth-inning double.  Yesterday, we talked about the relative insanity of Brendan Ryan trying to bunt a runner on second over with two outs.  If you thought that was going to be the craziest move of the week, you lose.  Last night both imitated and topped it.In case you didn’t see the game, know that before the game started, the buzz was about the fact that Nick Stavinoha was going to be hitting fourth as the DH.  Now, Stavinoha has done a nice job off the bench.  In fact, if you are going to put Stav in as the DH, compared to the other options that are readily available (i.e., not counting Memphis), Stav’s a perfectly reasonable choice, especially since Ryan Ludwick was battling leg cramps.

But fourth?  Really?  I mean, it looked like Tony La Russa had just made out the lineup as if Ludwick was playing, then was too lazy to rework it when he couldn’t go.  Move David Freese or Colby Rasmus (even with a lefty on the mound) up there.  Stavinoha is a six-seven hitter, at best.

Still, that’s where he sat.  So TLR has determined that Stavinoha is 1) a good enough hitter to be the designated hitter, i.e., hitting is all that he has to do and 2) he’s good enough to hit fourth.  These are keys for my coming rant.

OK, so as I say, Pujols is on second with nobody out to start the eighth inning.  Yes, it’s a 0-0 game, but Stavinoha, your cleanup designated hitter, is coming up next.  So, what does La Russa do?

Orders the sacrifice bunt.

Are you getting this?  You are saying that a player that is good enough to be the designated hitter AND good enough to hit fourth in your lineup  isn’t good enough to swing away in that situation .  Besides the general fact that, unless it’s the pitcher batter, I don’t want to see anyone bunting right there, but never, ever should a cleanup hitter be bunting in the majors.

And for the second straight night, it doesn’t work.  This time, Stavinoha bunts it and Pujols gets caught in a rundown.  So the result was one out, runner at second–exactly the situation it would have been in the worst case scenario of him swinging away.  I hope that two failures will at least make La Russa think twice about pulling that stunt again anytime soon.

So, if I could give a Goat to TLR, I would.  However, I stick to players, which means that  David Freesegets the tag with his 0-4, three strikeout night.  Ricky Romero was a tough guy to figure out, so you can’t blame Freese entirely, but it still was a night to forget.

In other news, it does look like the Cardinals are just  going to have bullpen games the next three times the fifth starter slot comes up between now and the All-Star Break.  Which means that Adam Ottavino and PJ Walters really have no place in this organization.

Seriously, you are going to wear down the bullpen on a regular basis like that?  Perhaps Ottavino and Walters wouldn’t give you more than five innings (though at least it would be possible that they could), but that’s likely one more inning than Blake Hawksworth will give you, plus you’ll take him out of commission for a while, meaning he couldn’t be a reliever.  You’d basically be playing with a short pitching staff.  And with Jeff Suppan, who likely will never go over six innings, going the day before, you are going to need Carpenter and Adam Wainwright to go complete games and Jaime Garcia to keep his command and go seven on a regular basis.

If you don’t like Ottavino and Walters, fine.  I’m not saying they are going to be world-beaters. They are #4, #5 starters, most likely, guys that at least can give you a little upside.  I can understand you not wanting to plug them into the rotation (though I still don’t understand coming out and saying that while they are on the big league roster).  If that’s the case, though, you have to make some sort of deal for a veteran innings-eater arm.

I’m not talking about a Cliff Lee or a Roy Oswalt or a Dan Haren.  Those guys would be great, but they’re going to cost a lot in money and prospects.  (Though if you could get Oswalt and have him rework his contract somewhat, that’d be interesting.)  What about guys like Kevin Millwood (who still may cost a bit in talent, but definitely less than the other guys) and Jake Westbrook?  Heck, if you can find someone that’s under reasonable contract for next year as well, go after them, because there are holes in the 2011 rotation that it doesn’t look like the minor league system can fill.

As Justin and I said last night at the end of the UCB Radio Hour, this team seems a little like it is lacking an identity.  It should be able to get the engine in gear and pull away from the Reds, but it hasn’t been able to do that yet.  Running bullpen games, even if it is against teams like Kansas City and Milwaukee, is a good way to lose ground on a team that just doesn’t seem like it’s going away.

At least for one night, though, we don’t have pitching woes.  Adam Wainwright takes the hill against the Jays, looking again for a sweep.  Seven times this season the Cards have won the first two games of a three-game series, including this one.  Six times, they’ve lost the third one.  Hopefully that changes tonight.  A look at what Wainwright has done against the birds of blue:

Bautista has had a little success, though we’ll see if Wainwright can keep him in the park.

As for Brandon Morrow, only Holliday has seen him and went 0-2.  Morrow’s a righty that has command issues, according to Ian’s analysis last night, so if the Cardinals are patient, they’ll get good pitches and will get into the Jays’ pen faster.  We’ll see if they are able to do that this evening.

Sorry for the cranky tone of the post.  That really wasn’t my intention when I sat down to write!  Hopefully the Cardinals will keep winning and get me in a better mood this weekend!