Season 86-76 B-
The Cardinals were a solid favorite to win the NL Central, with the Brewers and Cubs as the main competition, and they started out like they meant it. Their 15-8 April was followed by back-to-back months of .500, though, and they finished the first half just 47-41, in second place but just 1 game behind the surprising Reds. I think everyone assumed it was the Cards that would get hot and take it, but it went the other way: while SL did catch up in mid-July, and flirt with first place through mid-August, ultimately it was the Reds that turned it on, and the Cardinals that fell 5 games short. Head-to-head they were 12-6 against the Reds, but they had losing records against all the other divisional rivals except the lowly Pirates.
Hitters 77.5-84.5 C-
The Cardinals, despite the presence of the best hitter on the planet, were an ordinary offensive team. Beyond Pujols and Holliday, only Colby Rasmus contributed above-average offense, while several Cardinals (Brendan Ryan, Yadier Molina and Skip Schumaker) were pretty awful.
Starters 97.25-64.75 A
Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright were a 1-2 punch essentially the equal of anyone’s, and Jaime Garcia was very good, as well. But the only other starter who deserved a winning record was late-season acquisition Jake Westbrook, in a dozen starts. The other has-beens and fill-ins couldn’t keep it up, so the rotation couldn’t drag the team to the playoffs by itself.
Bullpen 126/455 B+
The bullpen was good, too. Ryan “bane of Mark’s existence” Franklin was amazing once again as a failed starter reborn as a good closer, and he was well-supported by McClellan, Boggs and Motte – these four were the four with the most relief innings, and all were rated A or above. For once, the algorithm doesn’t quite work – the rotation was supposed to win 97 games with average offense and an average bullpen – it had a slightly below average offense, and a well-above-average bullpen, but the team won only 86 games. Most of that, it turns out, was luck: the Cardinals Pythagorean record is 91-71, which is not nearly so far from where this report card places them. Those 5 games, of course, are the difference between the playoffs and being an also-ran.
Charts
| Runs | Times |
| <3 | 52 |
| 3 | 13 |
| 4 | 21 |
| 5 | 15 |
| 6 | 17 |
| >6 | 44 |
_____________________________________________
| Batter | PA | OPS | wOBA | Grade |
| Albert Pujols | 700 | 1010 | .420 | A+ |
| Matt Holliday | 675 | 922 | .396 | A |
| Ryan Ludwick | 553 | 743 | .324 | C |
| Colby Rasmus | 534 | 859 | .366 | B |
| Skip Schumaker | 529 | 666 | .299 | D |
| Yadier Molina | 521 | 671 | .299 | D |
| Brendan Ryan | 486 | 573 | .256 | F |
| Felipe Lopez | 441 | 656 | .297 | D |
| Jon Jay | 323 | 781 | .341 | C+ |
| David Freese | 270 | 765 | .341 | C+ |
| Rick Ankiel | 240 | 710 | .314 | C- |
| Randy Winn | 233 | 663 | .300 | D |
| Aaron Miles | 151 | 628 | .275 | F |
| Nick Stavinoha | 126 | 625 | .278 | D- |
| Allen Craig | 124 | 710 | .304 | D+ |
| Tyler Greene | 122 | 655 | .292 | D |
| Adam Wainwright | 96 | 457 | .212 | F |
| Chris Carpenter | 84 | 288 | .132 | F |
_______________________________________________________________
| Starter | Games | Innings | ERA | W/L | Deserved |
| Chris Carpenter | 35 | 234.2 | 3.22 | 16 – 9 | 24.5 – 10.5 |
| Adam Wainwright | 33 | 230.1 | 2.42 | 20 – 11 | 25.5 – 7.5 |
| Jaime Garcia | 28 | 163.1 | 2.70 | 13 – 8 | 17.5 – 10.5 |
| Kyle Lohse | 18 | 92.0 | 6.55 | 4 – 8 | 5.75 – 12.25 |
| Jeff Suppan | 13 | 67.2 | 3.72 | 3 – 6 | 6 – 7 |
| Jake Westbrook | 12 | 75.0 | 3.48 | 4 – 4 | 7.25 – 4.75 |
| Brad Penny | 9 | 55.2 | 3.23 | 3 – 4 | 5.5 – 3.5 |
| Blake Hawksworth | 8 | 41.2 | 5.83 | 3 – 4 | 2.25 – 5.75 |
| Adam Ottavino | 3 | 14.1 | 7.53 | 0 – 2 | 1 – 2 |
| P.J. Walters | 3 | 16.0 | 3.94 | 2 – 0 | 2 – 1 |
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| Reliever | G | IP | ERA | Val | Gr | Effective | Ineffective | yikes | YIKES! |
| Kyle McClellan | 68 | 75.1 | 2.27 | 30 | A+ | 50 | 16 | 2 | 0 |
| Mitchell Boggs | 61 | 67.1 | 3.61 | 21 | A | 45 | 11 | 2 | 3 |
| Ryan Franklin | 59 | 64.2 | 3.46 | 25 | A+ | 46 | 6 | 6 | 1 |
| Jason Motte | 56 | 52.1 | 2.24 | 26 | A+ | 43 | 9 | 4 | 0 |
| Blake Hawksworth | 37 | 48.2 | 4.25 | 3 | C- | 22 | 11 | 4 | 0 |
| Dennys Reyes | 59 | 38.0 | 3.55 | 14 | B | 39 | 15 | 5 | 0 |
| Trever Miller | 57 | 36.0 | 4.00 | 11 | B- | 35 | 21 | 0 | 1 |
| Fernando Salas | 27 | 30.2 | 3.52 | 2 | D+ | 16 | 9 | 1 | 1 |
| Mike MacDougal | 17 | 18.2 | 7.23 | -2 | F | 10 | 3 | 3 | 1 |
| P.J. Walters | 4 | 14.0 | 8.36 | -1 | F | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Adam Ottavino | 2 | 8.0 | 10.13 | -2 | F | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Jeff Suppan | 2 | 2.2 | 6.75 | -2 | F | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Aaron Miles | 2 | 2.0 | 0.00 | 2 | A+ | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Joe Mather | 1 | 2.0 | 9.00 | -2 | F | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Evan MacLane | 2 | 1.0 | 9.00 | 0 | D- | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Felipe Lopez | 1 | 1.0 | 0.00 | 1 | A+ | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
2 Responses to “St. Louis Cardinals”
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Talk about a utility play, Felipe Lopez has played every position except for catcher and has started games in all of those positions except for pitching.
Indeed, he is almost the ultimate utility player; unfortunately, like many utility players he can’t really hit (wOBA of .297 is NOT my idea of a hitter!). What you REALLY want is Bill Hall or Ben Zobrist from a couple of years back: a guy who can play most anywhere and hit like a son-of-a-gun! But it is too tempting to settle him into a position, so there really has never been a true utility player who played all over and hit a ton.
Correction: unbeknownst to most baseball fans, even serious ones, there WAS a player in an earlier era who could play any infield position (though he almost never played first, it was too big a waste of his talent) and the outfield, and play them defensively as well as anyone in the game. At the same time he was a top-notch hitter. He moved from short to second to third to the outfield, not game by game so much as season to season, and he was outstanding wherever he played. His name: Honus Wagner!