Like many of you, I've spent much time lately wondering one thing: Is there any way they can sustain this?  So even with only 10% of the season past and much of what we've seen likely aberration, I decided to look at which hitters are outperforming their projections and by just how much.

I came to two conclusions: Almost everybody's beating their projections, but there is some reason to hope it will continue.

PECOTA expected the Cards to win 75 games with an AVG/OBP/SLG line of .257/.328/.405.  To date, their actual line has been .277/.364/.437.  This seems to coincide with most observations - they're doing a good job of getting on base, executing well once they do, but not necessarily mashing the ball.

For a one-stop snapshot of individual performances, I looked at actual vs. PECOTA projected EQA.  The advantage is that PECOTA provides not only a projected number, but intervals above and below that number.

Six Cardinal hitters are currently above their 90% EQA projection: Pujols, Ludwick, Barton, Ankiel, Schumaker and Izturis.  Also hitting above their projections are Duncan, at over 75%, and Molina and Kennedy, at over 60%.

Meanwhile, Glaus and Miles are grossly below their projections - both under 10%.

These numbers support the notion that we're in for a correction, with 7 players dramatically outperforming their projections and only two dramatically underperforming.  Production above 90% or below 10% is likely unsustainable, and the aggregate would be an overall decline.  So that's the quantified bad news.

But one interesting trend is also clear - the relative levels of performance are almost directly correlated to age, with all of our super performers under 30.  This makes me hopeful that, while I don't expect them to stay so far above their projections, there's legitimate reason to think guys like Ludwick, Barton and Ankiel at least can beat expectations.  Put another way, I'm more optimistic with these guys off to a great start than I would be were it Kennedy, Glaus, Juan Gonzalez, etc.

It's probably inevitable that the team falls off this pace, but I'm curious what others have seen that suggests certain guys may be on pace to better our collective expectations.

Mr. Gotay was placed on waivers by the Mets, and given our quagmire in the middle infield, I hope the front office at least puts in a claim on him.

At 25, he's still young-ish, and last season posted career highs in AVG (.295), OBP (.351) and SLG (.421).  All but the slugging were above league average, and the slugging was damn close.

Gotay's not likely to become an All-Star or anything, but I think he looks like a league average player, and seems likely to sustain that for at least a few years.  It's not sexy, but if we can pickup a guy like this, even if it means eating Kennedy's contract, it seems like a good move to me.

It seems a near-consensus that we need to play for '08 and beyond.  Folks (including myself) are clamoring for an Ankiel call-up, and Bernie at the PD wants to call-up Ank, Perez, Hoffpauir, and anyone else he could name off the top of his head.

So I jumped into the Baseball Reference time machine to look for a Cardinals team in similar circumstances and see how they spent the last few months of the season.  I settled on the '88 squad as they were just off a World Series, never spent a day in first place, and were saddled with a few under-performing veterans (Horner, Herr).

Down the stretch, that team gave a look to a number of young players who would go on to make significant contributions to the organization.  Tom Pagnozzi (25), Luis Alicea (22) and Jose Oquendo (24) all got their first chances to start on a regular basis.  Ken Hill (22) also made his first major league start.

They also traded Tommy Herr (32) for Tom Brunansky (27), and released Bob Horner.

The '07 Cardinals probably can't unload their aging veterans as successfully, but I hope the team makes an effort to get a look at as much young talent as possible.  Come roster expansions, we need to answer questions like Ankiel and Ryan.  We need to find out if they're legitimate options for '08 or just contingency plans.  

There are sophisticated models for predicting major league performance, but there's still value in throwing a few in the deep end and seeing who swims.  It's obvious we need to acquire a lot of parts in the off-season, so the best thing we can do from here on out is itemize what we already have.

And sure, '88 was the beginning of one of the more futile periods in Cardinal history, but I stand by the comparison.

BP just posted this team and individual baserunning data, and it suggests another area where the Cardinals are struggling.

St. Louis ranks third-to-last in Equivalent Runs via baserunning, having given up nearly eight runs on the base paths.  Nearly all of that comes in the stolen base dept., where we rank second-to-last in runs squandered.  The only area where we've added EQR via baserunning is advancing on fly balls.

It also turns out baserunning is something else Adam Kennedy is terrible at.  He's cost his team more runs in stolen base attempts than any player in the majors, although Albert is just a hair behind.  And overall, he's the 7th worst baserunner, having cost the team 3.31 Equivalent Runs.  The word "bum" comes to mind...

The one bright spot is Mr. Juan Encarnacion, who despite being called out by many-a-fan for lack of hustle, ranks in the Top 10 (along with Mr. Rolen) in terms of advancing on a fly ball.  Take that, anecdotal evidence.

In this interview with Matthew Leach, the Doctor explains how it took so long to determine that Carp needed Tommy John surgery.  An excerpt:

"This is unfortunately a classic example of slow, gradual failure of the ligament," Paletta said. "Not all ligaments suddenly tear and rupture. And sometimes the way the ligament fails is over the course of many months or many seasons, and it doesn't become as obviously apparent except through things like spurs and arthritis."

Much of the trade discussion here (and elsewhere) has focused on which big leaguers the team should trade for younger, cheaper talent.  And clearly that's the direction the team must go.  But I wanted to broach the discussion of which, if any, minor leaguers should also be "on the block."  

On the surface, trading prospects for prospects is at-best a wash.  But it seems like if we want to land a top level minor leaguer, ready for '08, we may need to sweeten the deal with more than the big contracts of our aging major leaguers.

That only makes sense if we've got prospects to spare.  Despite the fact that our farm system is still thin (especially at the top), I see at least one area where it might make sense to deal.

Our system is flush with power hitters who may have a hard time finding a home in St. Louis.  With Albert at first and another first basemen in left field, I find it hard to believe yet another converted 1st basemen like Joe Mather could find a spot in our outfield.  Mark Hamilton, recently promoted to AA, is yet another 1st basemen who's likely big-league arrival date will be during the Albert Pujols era.

Rick Ankiel IS an outfielder and can even play center, but his age and the presence of Colby Rasmus make him worth considering in a deal as well.

Gordo suggests in today's column that Bryan Anderson should also be available, given Yadier Molina's talent.  I personally disagree.  For a team with such below average bats in both middle infield spots, I don't know that we can afford the luxury of a defensive specialist behind the plate.

I admit a flaw in this entire line of reasoning is that only a few of these minor leaguers will even develop into useful major leaguers.  So it can be a specious argument to speculate that these guys will ever block each other.

But I also think it's clear that we won't get much  more than salary relief if we can move an Encarnacion, Eckstein, even an Isringhausen.  (Not that that's without value.)  I wouldn't mind seeing one of these prospects move along with a big leaguer, if it could net us a major league ready prospect at second or short.  Thoughts?

I was a bit disgusted last night to see a lineup card with Kennedy and Schumaker at the top.  Despite a two game stretch some are calling a "hot streak," Kennedy's OBP is below .300, while Schumaker's only climbed above .300 a little over a week ago.  Collectively, they went 2-for-9 with no walks.

To further punctuate the situation, Kennedy made the last out of the game.  So Tony essentially had the chance to give an extra at-bat to any player on the team, and he chose Adam Kennedy.  It was the 13th time he's been in the leadoff spot this season, and Matthew Leach tells us his OBP in that slot is all of .309 (now lower).

I imagine most here have read Bill James, Baseball Prospectus or others who found optimal batting order construction puts the highest OBP at the top.  It's also just common sense that you hit Albert third so he can drive in runs, which he can't do if the first two hitters are back in the dugout.

Tony has used 8 players in the leadoff spot and 8 in the two-spot thus far (some of those overlap).  Eckstein's led-off 39 times and currently ranks 6th in OBP.  Taguchi's led-off 21 times and ranks 5th in OBP.  Miles and Kennedy have each hit first 13 times, and rank 11th and 15th, respectively.

Duncan hit second 44 times and ranks 2nd on the team in OBP, with Spezio in the slot 15 times and ranking 3rd.  Taguchi hit there 11 times.

From the standpoint of maximizing OBP, we're doing much better in the 2nd spot than the 1st.  But with Duncan moved to the cleanup spot, who's going to get on base for he and Pujols?

Eckstein and Taguchi seem like the best leadoff options, statistically.  Miles and Kennedy are terrible choices, even if they do hit left handed.

Spezio's got the best OBP outside Pujols and Duncan, so he's a great choice to bat second when he's in the lineup.  But of course, he's injured.  Schumaker and Ryan rank 4th and 8th in OBP, but the sample size and their track records make me think those numbers will come down.

The next best option to bat second right now is clearly Scott Rolen.  His .338 OBP (7th on team) is respectable.  Given his power outage, he makes less sense in the middle of the order, particularly if Duncan's already in the cleanup spot.  Others on this site have noted Rolen seemingly turning into Placido Polanco.  Doesn't it make more sense to use him that way instead of crossing our fingers and hoping he'll hit 30 HRs?

Personally, I like Duncan and his on-base skills in the 2 spot.  But if you're going to move him to try to capitalize on his slugging, it's even more crucial to get on-base skills at the top.

In the 90 games this season, Tony's used 82 different batting orders with his position players.  So why not get Rolen into that 2 spot rather than tinkering with the replacement player of the week?

For those who haven't checked out Fire Joe Morgan, it's generally an amusing rebuke of numskull baseball writers - particularly those who fly in the face of data and logic.  I thought others might enjoy the description of Sir Albert from this post.

"Albert Pujols is either the best hitter in baseball or he's damn close. He has 266 career HR and he's played in a total of like 65 baseball games. He has a .418 career OBP. And a walk, mind you, ties the game. He is 12 feet tall, and each of his lats weighs 80 pounds. His bat is 60 inches long and is made of Bigfoot's spine. He is a monstrous monster who eats sliders. Not balls that were used to throw sliders, mind you -- he has figured out a way to eat the concept of sliders. The dude hits with a closed stance only because Marty Barrett bet him he couldn't hit with a closed stance like Barrett did and still win the MVP and Pujols did it just to stave off the boredom that had come from solving baseball. He once hit a home run on a hit-by-pitch. He has more hits left-handed than anyone in baseball history has right-handed -- and he is right handed. He completed an MD-PhD at Hopkins in one hour and gave a graduation address (in Greek), and he had to miss a game against the Pirates in 2003, and he still went 2-4 with a double. The home run he hit off Lidge in the NLCS....just now landed, in Banff.  He is awesome."

There's reason to be pessimistic right now - we're 8.5 games out in the division, but there's also reason for some optimism - namely, Carpenter's expected return after the break.  So I thought I'd hash out some crude numbers to see what impact Carpenter might have on that kind of deficit.

The bad news is that, since 1901, only 10 teams have overcome a gap of more than 8 games at the break.  The challenge is more substantial when there is more than one team to pass, as there is for the Cards.

I decided to look at Carp's 2nd half of '06, as most peripherals suggest that was when the team started playing at the level it is now.  Carpenter went 8-4 during that stretch, with the team going 9-6 in games he started.  Carp's Win Probability Added was also positive in 9 of his 15 starts, suggesting that 9-6 team record had more to do with Carp than with luck.

Two big assumptions for the sake of comparison: assume Carp starts 15 games after the ASB and those starts would have gone to Wellemeyer.  

The team results in Wellemeyer's starts have been largely influenced by luck (or great hitting), with the team going 6-1.  But Wellemeyer's only added positive Win Probability in three of those starts.  Extrapolated to 15 starts, we might expect that to look like a team record of 6-9.

That suggests getting Carpenter back into the rotation for the second half should add in the neighborhood of 3-4 wins for the team.

I freely admit these are crude calculations, small sample sizes, etc.  But I think they give a snapshot of what a 2nd half might look like with a healthy (knock on wood) Carpenter in and an ineffective Wellemeyer out.

Carpenter may certainly get us back in the race, but it's highly unlikely he alone can get us into first place.  We probably need at least one more dramatic improvement if we're to become the 11th team in modern history to close an 8+ game gap.

We all know the problem with bringing Rick Ankiel up.  With no options left, to be sent down he'd have to clear waivers, which he wouldn't do.  It made sense for him to remain in Memphis on April 1, May 1 and maybe even June 1.  But as July 1 approaches, with Jim Edmonds admitting his sciatica might sideline him for the year (or more?), the time for Ankiel is now.

According to Baseball Prospectus' translations, Ankiel's current minor league numbers would translate to an MLB line of: .245/.278/.514.  The on-base percentage would be among the worst of the Cards position players, while the slugging would be behind only Duncan and Pujols.  His numbers also translate to 19 homers and 48 RBI.  That would lead the team in HR and tie Pujols for the RBI lead.

Translations aren't a guarantee of major league production, but these aren't "fringy' numbers we're talking about here.  It's also worth noting that Ankiel's splits are actually better against left-handed pitching, meaning he shouldn't be another guy who sits against every soft-tossing southpaw.  Yes, this is a guy who strikes out a lot.  But this is a guy with the potential for Duncan-like power AND who can play centerfield.

With Edmonds in the outfield mix, you could argue that there wouldn't be enough at-bats for Ankiel.  It made sense to bring up Schumaker as a stop-gap solution.  But the more it looks like Edmonds return is in doubt, the more it makes sense to get Ankiel out of Memphis.  So Taguchi's having a nice season, but Ankiel's offensive potential probably rates him slightly ahead, and Rick's offense/defense combination is clearly better than Ludwick or Schumaker.

Ankiel may not be ready to start every day, but there's got to be an endgame to that "we want to get him regular at-bats" line.  This isn't a 22-year-old kid, it's a 27-year-old who's spent significant time in the majors (albeit as a pitcher).

If the Cards are still making a run at the division, it makes sense to get your best players on the field.  If they've decided the division has slipped too far out of reach, it probably makes even more sense to get Ankiel on a major league field and see what he's got.