What need should the St. Louis Cardinals address first in the trade market?
The best time to talk trades is when the heat is off. For the St. Louis Cardinals, that time is now. The team has won five straight as the result of greater offensive output, better starting pitching and less pressure on the bullpen.
Still, the second-place club is hardly out of the woods. Assuming a mid-season trade or two are needed to give the Cardinals playoff momentum, if you were general manager John Mozeliak, where would you focus first? Share your logic as to why in the comments area below.
Loading ...Next time, we will consider which Cardinals players might be offered up in trade.
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I’d try to get Edwin Jackson and Octavio Dotel.
Bingo, good thinking Wes.
Wes, I would not like Twitter. But if you offered some of your good thinking via Twitter, I might have to become one of your followers.
The pen is a more immediate need than a starter. Whether a starter will become the bigger need is unknown but seems to me to be likely. Since the question is what to address first, I would address the present need first and then address the likely but uncertain future need. This even though the starter may harder to come by.
The question then is LHRP or RHRP. The second lefty we don’t have, and Scrabble has been wobbly. But its not like we’ve been getting killed by left handed batters late in games. Not any more so than by right swingers, and there are more of them. We could use a lights out righty every bit as much as a lights out lefty. So I think my first move would be to track down the best RP I could find.
So how do I vote? Other?
I was thinking the same as you – pen is obviously in need of some help. But I also agree the starter situation may be a bigger issue in the future, considering the setback with Carp, Garcia still being out, and Lynn entering unchartered territory for him.
Could they solve both problems with a solid SP and moving Lynn to the BP? Use Kelly and/or Dickson until Garcia is healthy?
Who knows what zaney move Mo will make. His track record is good IMO.
I’d give Lynn another start or two before any decision to take him out of the rotation. I’d also like to see Mighty Joe Kelly another time or two before putting a longer range plan in place for him. So far, he’s been as good or better than anything we are likely to find.
I have a funny feeling that Miller could yet factor in. Its two months before post-season rosters are set.
I’m convinced Dickson landed with a thud, I’d guess his only use would be very temporary emergency fill-in.
40 man guys who don’t factor in, like Anderson, Hamilton, Kozma, might get moved to free up some room.
Maybe see if Arthur Rhodes can get into baseball shape in time?
I guess I just assume he retired at the end of 2011. That may be incorrect.
Wednesday lineup:
1. Rafael Furcal (S) SS
2. Jon Jay (L) CF
3. Matt Holliday (R) LF
4. Carlos Beltran (S) RF
5. David Freese (R) 3B
6. Matt Carpenter (L) 1B
7. Tyler Greene (R) 2B
8. Tony Cruz (R) C
9. Joe Kelly (R) P
The bullpen continues to be a major fail.
Some positives: Kelly went 6 innings on the road, good job. HR by Cruz.
Negatives: the pen has too many who are ineffective: Salas, Freeman, Sanchez, Rzep. Most of the workload falls on Marte, Boggs, and Motte, who get over-worked too hard.
Maybe tonights loss will provide Mo reason to bring up Gaub and Dickson.
How about bring up Shelby Miller and use him as a reliever, as happenned with Lynn last season.
Kelly did well. I don’t see any reason to rush him out of the rotation as of now. 2 runs over 6 innings shouldn’t be a loss with this offense.
The bullpen though is leaking badly. Marte and Boggs are about the only two that don’t cause my blood pressure to rise when they enter the game. Motte still makes things too interesting when he comes in.
I kind of wonder if this isn’t as much an issue with the pitchers as it is with the pitching coach. Is he working with them to improve? Seems like we always heard about Duncan doing specific things with pitchers, but I haven’t really heard anything like that with Lilliquist. That may not mean it’s the truth, it may just not be reported like it was before.
The photo of Mo up above seems apt. In this photo, he looks a bit cornered or in a difficult spot. What should be done?
I was going to use the scarf photo from 2011, but decided for the 2012 model instead. I took this one at Winter WarmUp. Albert was gone, but Beltran had recently signed.