Make yourself a Ham On Rye for lunch and remember that love-even of a ballclub-is a dog from hell.

in this regard may lie in having an advantage in possible trade talk. For example, if the Cardinals were trading, say, a certain left-handed hitting 1B to SF for a young arm, then disclosing a season-ending injury to your own #1 pitcher may imply a greater (though true?) need for pitching than the Cardinals would like to expose.

Our rotation, as of today, consists of: Blooper, El Pineiro, Lohse, The Colonel, and Mitchell Boggs (from Memphis). Our infield, as of today, consists of The Great Pujols, AK, Grit Miles, Ryan, Izturis, Glaus, and Yadi. Our outfield consists of Barton, Ankiel, Ludwick, Skippy, and Mather (from Memphis). Our ‘pen consists of Villone, Springer, Franklin, Flores, McClellan (kind of from Memphis), Perez (from Memphis), and Mark Worrell (from Memphis). All in all, I’d say that we have a fifth stop gap starter, a fourth or fifth outfielder, and two arms in the ‘pen—one of whom throws 95 mph with a nasty slider while the other has proved himself capable in his two appearances, even with the stick (whacking a homer in his first big league AB).

I’d say that, as with any season, we’ve had injuries, had to pull players up from AAA to fill holes, and that those players had proved capable of filling those holes. At least to this point. I would further put forth the idea that all of these players were deserving of a shot in the bigs.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have used “cloack & dagger.” Yes, in retrospect, “cloak and scalpel” would have been more appropriate.

nice to have stats back up what we already know.

trying to support an 800 lb gorilla with one finger would be tough

Griffey is another example—it’s painful to watch guys who were once so smooth lumber around as if they were goofs

but one of the reasons injury information is made accessible to the public, is to keep gamblers and bookmakers from having a monopoly on that data (because you KNOW they are going to find a way to get it) and thus using it to their advantage…as you probably know, the NFL seems to bend over backwards to make sure that every bump and bruise is documented.

That said, I try not to live my life obsessed with the condition of Wainwright’s finger or Wellmeyer’s elbow or any of that, but it’s kind of like all the celebrity news that we are inundated with…none of it is really our business, but people tend to think they are entitled to “inside” information when you root for a team or follow a movie star and all that.

See:
Mulder, Mark
Clement, Matthew
Rolen, Scott (although I don’t think the staff is entirely at fault here)

Follow any other team in baseball as closely as you follow the Cardinals. Follow them for 3 straight years, the same way you follow the Cardinals, and i’ll bet you’ll see the exact same things with any of those organizations.

something is certainly amiss with their rating system. Truthfully, anyone with a calculator and plenty of time could even make the Jeff Tabaka decision a good one.

(And you could easily read that statement the wrong way)

I’m 90% sure I know the hand specialist that Paletta referred Wainwright to; he’s in the same building and he’s an excellent surgeon. I do trust his judgement.

talk to LB about doing a Medical post weekly or monthly? Just talking about common injuries, especially those facing our pitchers.

over at another SBN blog, Conquest Chronicles. Paragon SC runs a series called “Injury Clinic”, usually in response to an SC football player getting injured, but its a pretty comprehensive medical explanation of the causes/symptoms/treatments associated with football injuries that you always hear about but us laymen don’t necessarily understand. its a nice addition and i think something like that for baseball would be great to have around here.

i agree with you (and oldbirdwatcher below); I’m sure many others do too. It’s usually those who are upset who want to talk about it most. I understand their point of view, I just don’t share it.

Another issue I have with these complaints is that some people usually demand information right away and complain when it doesn’t come. The reality is this injury occurred over the weekend and many medical/info staff for the Cards only started working on Monday – these people have other lives unlike us. I wish people would wait a week, see what we know, then make their assessment of the organization’s honesty/openness.

I have always wondered how the Cards/ MLB (all professional sports really) deal with this in regard to giving out information about a players injury. Sometimes I am surprised at the kind of information that IS given out since it could have repercussions on a players future earnings. I would think that some players just wouldn’t want all the information put out there.

I don’t think anyone was arguing that the Cardinals organization is deceitful. It’s just the constant lack of pertitent details that is vexing.

For example, the Cards announced that Wainwright suffered a “sprain to the finger.” Oooookay, but what’s the severity of the sprain? Mild? Grade II? Rupture? They also didn’t completely confirm it was a ligament versus a tendon, although “sprain” certainly implies a ligament. If it’s a major tear, they should have been able to see that in the MRI, but they don’t say whether it’s a severe tear.

They then instruct Ada…sorry, ADAM, to defer all questions to the medical staff, which has then been instructed to refuse to answer any questions.

Essentially, they are deliberately concealing information.

Now, they may indeed have a good business reason to do so, but it doesn’t make it any less frustrating for us fans that want to know, realistically, whether or not we can count on Wainwright to come back after a few weeks of rest (mild sprain), or whether we should plan on the likelihood of him getting surgery and being out for the year (severe sprain).