marquis ortiz
13-14, 4.03 9-11, 5.23
i'm not gonna get bogged down in the details. mulder -- didn't watch him. king -- what more needs to be said? flores -- made adam dunn look foolish for the 2d time in 10 days; appears to be our best lh option out of the pen, hands down. tavarez -- can't be trusted. 11 bb, 10 k since the all-star break; hitters batting .333 in the span with an .ops just shy of .900.
onward: apparently suppan has slipped out of the nlds rotation despite being the cards' most consistent second-half pitcher. i gotta say, i don't get it. if mulder is the postseason #2, how can supps -- with nearly identical markers -- be out of the rotation altogether? behold:
| w-l | era | whip | batt avg | slg | obp | w/9 | k/9 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| suppan | 16-10 | 3.57 | 1.38 | .275 | .335 | .428 | 2.9 | 5.3 |
| mulder | 16-8 | 3.64 | 1.38 | .273 | .339 | .410 | 3.1 | 4.9 |
those are identical pitchers; if one's in, why not the other? i would keep suppan in the rotation and put marquis in the bullpen, which clearly needs the help. suppan's not the late-inning asset that marquis is -- lacks the velocity and sink to come right after hitters the way jason can. seems to me the bigger marginal gain comes from assigning marquis to a setup role. . . . . i hope we're still not making decisions to shore up threadbare egos; i.e., to keep jason from pouting all winter.
speaking of pouting: mcgwire's appearance was chickenshit. he refused to ride around the track; then, like a coward, he hid behind his infant child. and cardinal fans, classy group that they are -- much classier than "big" mac -- still offered polite cheers. it was a big mistake to bring him back at all. he tells the press "i've moved on"; well then move, 25. thanks for the memories. don't come back.