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St. Louis Cardinals NLDS roster: VEB Community-sourced 25-man vs. St. Louis management 25-man

How does the VEB Community-sourced NLDS roster compare to the one announced by Cardinals management?

By Ben Humphrey
Andy Lyons/Getty Images

While Viva El Birdos editor emeritus Aaron Finkel and I were musing about the possible configuration of the St. Louis Cardinals' NLDS roster on Sunday's VEB Podcast episode, I decided to ask readers to submit their picks. I waited until after the good news about Yadier Molina's injured hand was announced. Then I put up a post with a Google form asking for the VEB Community's picks for the Cards' NLDS 25-man active roster. I thought we'd receive 200 submissions or so—300 at the absolute most. After I sorted through the blank and partial submissions, we have 1,007 NLDS roster submissions from the greater VEB Community.

Starting Rotation Order

I've sorted through the selections and tallied up the number of submissions that included each player. I took the top 21 vote-getters after the four starting pitchers. We'll start with the rotation's order. The VEB Community NLDS rotation is:

  1. John Lackey
  2. Jaime Garcia
  3. Lance Lynn
  4. Michael Wacha

This is not to say that there were not other permutations. For example, a lot of folks picked Wainwright for Game 4 if the Cards were facing elimination. But that is the VEB Community NLDS rotation, which differs a bit from manager Mike Matheny's order of: (1) Lackey, (2) Garcia, (3) Wacha, (4) Lynn. Matheny's rotation makes me even more concerned that Lynn's elbow is still bothering him or Matheny thinks that Wacha's 2013 postseason somehow overshadows his 2015 season.

Here are the individual vote totals, by position, from highest to lowest:

Relief Pitchers

  1. Wainwright, 959
  2. Trevor Rosenthal, 940
  3. Seth Maness, 938
  4. Kevin Siegrist, 851
  5. Tyler Lyons, 795
  6. Jonathan Broxton, 694
  7. Steve Cishek, 645
  8. Randy Choate, 313
  9. Sam Tuivailala, 57
  10. Mitch Harris, 32

Outfielders

  1. Matt Holliday, 994
  2. Stephen Piscotty, 982
  3. Jason Heyward, 960
  4. Randal Grichuk, 946
  5. Tommy Pham, 848
  6. Jon Jay, 314
  7. Peter Bourjos, 248

Infielders

  1. Kolten Wong, 990
  2. Matt Carpenter, 988
  3. Jhonny Peralta, 956
  4. Mark Reynolds, 905
  5. Greg Garcia, 797
  6. Matt Adams, 740
  7. Brandon Moss, 702
  8. Pete Kozma, 194

Catchers

  1. Yadier Molina, 943
  2. Tony Cruz, 982
  3. Ed Easley, 83

Top 21 Non-Starting-Pitcher Vote Getters

  1. Holliday, 994
  2. Wong, 990
  3. Carpenter, 988
  4. Cruz, 982
  5. Piscotty, 982
  6. Heyward, 960
  7. Wainwright, 959
  8. Peralta, 956
  9. Grichuk, 946
  10. Molina, 943
  11. Rosenthal, 940
  12. Maness, 938
  13. Reynolds, 905
  14. Siegrist, 851
  15. Pham, 848
  16. G. Garcia, 797
  17. Lyons, 795
  18. Adams, 740
  19. Moss, 702
  20. Broxton, 694
  21. Cishek, 645

Differences

The VEB Community-sourced NLDS roster is similar to the 25-man the Cardinals announced but with two differences. Like the Cardinals in real life, the VEB Community went with 11 position players and seven relievers. The VEB Community chose the same two catchers as the St. Louis brass (as opposed to the three-catcher arrangement that seemed possible last week).

The lone difference on the position-player side is Adams, who made the VEB roster but not the Cardinals' in real life. Jay made the Cardinals' NLDS roster over Adams. In the bullpen, the Cards opted for Villanueva while VEB chose Chishek over Villanueva.

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