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Cardinals news and notes: Changeups, depth charts, and the Hall of Fame

I'm old, and I'd feel a lot better if the Cardinals acquired someone who was even older. That and other things you missed yesterday at VEB.

By Alex Crisafulli
Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

Barring an unforeseen transaction, this season will be different than all the others I've spent as a Cardinals fan.  With the departure of John Lackey and Randy Choate I am now older than every single player that's likely to be on the 25-man roster.  I suppose this awful moment was inevitable starting on August 23, 1999, when Rick Ankiel made his debut vs. the Expos and was the first Cardinal in my lifetime to be younger than me (I have about six months on Rick).  And now we're here.  When I was growing up anyone who played for the Cardinals was like some immortal being.  Now if one of these guys lived in my neighborhood I'd probably anonymously complain about him on the local listserv because while I was on a walk to the farmer's market with my family I saw him roll through a stop sign.  Bloody hell.

Here's what happened at VEB on Thursday:

Repertoires in review

  • Joe Schwarz turned his focus to his favorite pitch: the changeup.  As always, stick around for the fancy GIFs and poll at the end of the piece.  And let's check in with the comments section, where the dearly departed Nick Lampe noted "civil and intelligent conversations take place on a regular basis."

Oh.

Moss vs. Mayo

  • In a quest to figure out who should be the Cardinals' regular first baseman, I decided to compare Matt Adams's home runs in the '14 postseason off of Clayton Kershaw and Madison Bumgarner to a double rainbow for some reason.  I prefer Brandon Moss to be the everyday first baseman but in all honesty I really don't think there's a correct answer right now.

Tsunamy Thursday

Corey Littrell

  • Here's the Red Baron's piece on left-handed pitcher Corey Littrell from his list of top prospects in the Cardinals' system.  I have little firsthand knowledge of the farm system so I enjoy these pieces immensely.  And any Mulder/Garcia/Pineiro comp for a guy who was the forgotten piece of the John Lackey trade is fine with me.

Hall of Fame

  • If, like me, you're still A) mourning the fact that Jim Edmonds wrongly fell off the ballot after his first year eligible for the Hall of Fame; and B) a bit in the dark on how the veteran's committee actually works, read Craig Edwards's piece on the options left for former Cardinals like Edmonds and Mark McGwire who can no longer be elected into the Hall by the BBWAA.

A Tweet I liked

I hear some variation of the Stan Musial / Ken Griffey, Jr., connection about once a year (they were both born on November 21, in Donora, Pennsylvania; Stan played baseball with Griffey's grandfather in high school), and right around the time the fun fact goes outta sight outta mind, someone is kind enough to remind me again.  Pretty cool.

Have a great weekend, everyone.

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