Give Mozeliak some credit!

until they spend time in the majors. That’s such a tired and illogical argument. It speaks nothing about whether Mather would actually produce if he got time in the majors.

Also, Duncan has a “customary half season slump”? If you “slump” for half a season could we just say they’re a crappy player? And do we want someone, who as you said, does that on a yearly basis?

that we don’t want to sell low.

Virtually everyone was certain that TLR had totally destroyed Scott Rolen’s trade value. While he had to go, it looked like the Cardinals were going to have no other option but to move Rolen when his value was low. Looking at Troy Glaus’ performance thus far, it looks like we did pretty good selling low.

i love what Mo has done so far. i was uneasy goin into the season, granted most of the players were from previous years. i would rather have him make one trade before the break for a bullpen pitcher. hopefully by then we will have wagonmaker, carp, and lohse in good form. i will take that against the cubs or anybody in the NL in any series. I like walt did for us, but i dont like dumping players for a year and half rental. we’re in it, we need a little bit to close deals to catch the cubbie bears, and im likin MO more and more every day.

... we owe the young man a new start.

as for other young under-performing players (Duncan, Ludwick the past 2 weeks, Ankiel the 2 weeks before that, Skipper the 2 weeks before that, Barton the two weeks before that, Rasmus the two weeks before that)... give ‘em away for a bag ‘o beans. we need some more 38 year old LH relief pitchers, and pronto! screw this “long-term” “responsible” “organization-building” hogwash. i want CC Sabathia and AJ Burnett and Erik Bedard this instant. after all, DeWitt is a millionaire and Rasmus hasn’t proven anything yet. there is NO EXCUSE for not having Bedard and Sabathia on this team already. DeWitt is just a selfish sack o’ you-know-what, and he’s trying to pull one over on us. please Oliver Stone reveal the truth about how Bill DeWitt are conspiring to destroy our fine democracy by promoting Chris Duncan and stifling Anthony Reyes! the world needs to know!

[/sarcasm]

En gassho

With gratitude and humility!

Go Cards

credit. Now it was still a bad idea to hand Pineiro $13 million.

I would give Mo credit so far for being better than average and working with the hand he was dealt. Getting rid of Rolen and his salary and his attitude and getting something in return alone would deserve credit. I was also impressed early when he essentially forced Tony’s hand on having Reyes on the roster. I thought that was a pretty significant statement that he was in controll of the future of the team and that we were going to look at some young guys. That said, the Clement signing seems to be a bust, although not a terribly expensive one. Loshe was a no-brainer panic move and we were lucky he was still available. I think they were probably hoping for more than league average out of Pinero because they could have gotten that out of Thompson or one of the AAA guys for less money. And Izturis certianly was a panic move and not the answer at short. I seem to remember him saying that not only did we need an impact arm and bat, but that we were absolutely going to go out and get them. I should probably give him some credit for not freaking out when that didn’t materialize and making more panic moves just to appear to be doing something. I don’t know how much I’d credit him on Ludwick- It just seems that they correctly figured that with 6 guys competing for two spots, someone would get hot. The same philosophy has more or less worked with the pitchers, but will that hold up over time?

I’ll be interested to see what happens at (and after) the deadline. I think we could probably add a left handed releif option for one of those “prospects” that we seem to value more than other teams. I would say we pretty much know what we’re getting from Duncan at this point, which is inconsistency and a few homers. If they’re going to add a hitter, it’s going to have to be an outfielder- there just aren’t any teams giving away power hitting second basemen/shortstops. And even if they don’t, Duncan is standing in the way of PT for Mather, Barton, Stavinoah, and eventually Rasmus, and we need to see what those guys can do. They aren’t trading Ludwick in the middle of a career year when he’s hitting in the heart of the order. I have to admit I have a huge man-crush on Holliday and would give up anything with the exception of Rasmus to have him hitting in front of or behind Pujols. I doubt that will happen but if he winds up moving somewhere for less than top prospects, Mo will have a lot of ‘splaining to do as far as I’m concerned. With the pitchers we have coming back, I don’t think that’s as pressing of a need. But the bottom line as far as I’m concerned is money. It’s hard to get too excited about 16 year old ballplayers, but I think it’s a great sign that we just opened up the purse strings to sign some Latin American prospects. I’m just still not convinced that the club will add payroll even if they feel the move will help the club long term, and if they won’t then Mo will have to get real creative to impress.

much trade value and never will. People were scared that he would turn into a pumpkin, and replacement level for guys like him is pretty high. I wish people would stop talking about trading him too, but not because I think he’s going to go on a second half tear.

The problem with Duncan is a) he’s a lummox in the OF (the guy tries hard and i appreciate it, but let’s call a spade a spade – does anyone remember a guy named Ryan Klesko?) b) this Pujols guy is locked in at his only real position. He’s not a better option than Ankiel, Ludwick, Schumaker (or Brian Barton imo) and Rasmus is here next year. He’s a waste of resources as a LH pinch hitter. If he could only play 2B or transform into Brandon Phillips, he would be exactly what we need. A straight up trade for Fuentes would be as much as we could expect for Dunc. The biggest problem with this roster is the way it’s constructed. We have below average offensive players at 2 spots (SS and 2B) and no potent bat to protect Pujols on the corners. Molina is not a good offensive player, but his step up to an average offensive player make him an overall plus. Schumaker is an ok OF in a strong lineup (Cubs, Red Sox), but we don’t have a strong lineup. Glaus, Ludwick and Ankiel are all solid complimentary bats, but we need 1 potent bat in the 4 hole to protect Pujols. Carlos Lee would have 200 RBI’s in that spot but he would take a spot from Skip or Ludwick so he doesn’t fit – especially next year when Rasmus arrives. The only places to improve the offense are in the middle infield and I don’t think Hanley Ramirez is available. Ideally, AROD would have really hated NY like the media reported and when he opted out someone would have told him that in STL he would have been treated like a deity and we could have ownership would have ponied up to portect the best hitter of our lifetime. Here’s to what could have been.