It's Not in the *CARDS* This Year!!!!! HA HA HA!!!
See, I can be a sports-column titler too!
Anyways, I know I'll probably eat these words later, but one of the most exciting things about the upcoming baseball season for a Reds fan has to be how much the Cardinals are going to blow this year.
The latest reports have Edmonds and Encarnacion starting the season on the DL, which honestly makes me want to skip gaily through a field of flowers and butterflies.
But I first started feeling that me and Cardinals' suckiness might have a romantic spark when I read this article by the Enquirer's Kevin Kelly a couple weeks ago that discusses the Cards' grand plans to turn Braden Looper into a starter. I'm not sure why Kelly was writing about the Cardinals, per se, but I like to think that he was snickering at their hopelessness while doing so.
So here's the situation:
...okay, wait, lemme check....yep, that actually did happen....The World Series Champs have lost 3/5ths of their starting rotation in the offseason (Weaver, Suppan, and Marquis) not to mention they won't have Mark Mulder back until midseason at the earliest...all the while acquiring zero other pitchers of note (the most classic of wash-ups Kip Wells as well as Ryan Franklin) and talking about turning both Looper and fellow reliever Adam Wainwright into starters.
O Glorious day!
Here's what Yadier Molina had to say about the Cards' pretty bad pitching staff:
Yes, Yadier, if by "communication" you actually mean "acquiring reliable starting pitchers.""We've got a pretty good pitching staff," Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina said. "It's just getting them to feel comfortable. You just try to communicate with them, see what they like and what they don't like, what they like to throw in certain counts and what they don't like to throw.
"Communication is going to be an important part of this process."
But the best part is the whole Looper thing (gosh, it's making me tingle!), because it makes me think fondly of how the Reds are no longer sweating-ass making desperate moves to fill in their Bowden-neglected rotation with the likes of formerly good relievers like Danny Graves and John Riedling.
I welcome your terrible ideas with all of my heart, LaRussa. Here are the stats for Graves and Riedling before and after they were made sacrificial lambs for Bowden's inability to develop/acquire/give a shit about starting pitching:
Graves (switched at age 29, never more than 110 innings pitched)
-before: 3.32 ERA, 1.32 WHIP
-after: 5.10 ERA, 1.47 WHIP, out of league
Riedling (switched at 27, never more than 47 innings pitched)
-before: 2.54 ERA, 1.25 WHIP
-after: 4.99 ERA, 1.59 WHIP, out of league
Looper, btw, is older (31) and worse (career 3.57 ERA with a 1.37 WHIP) than Graves and Riedling were at the time and has never pitched more than 86 innings in a season. And, for historical context, Derek Lowe (whose anomalistic success as a reliever-turned-starter in 2002 (at age 29) sparked the trend) had 31 major league starts under his belt before that and had pitched over 109 innings in back-to-back years.
Not that I'm complaining. Please, LaRussa, ignore the evidence and kill your best relievers. Don't mind us! We'll just go ahead and find a way to lose out to the Cubs instead.
So thank the Lord, it seems as though the tables may actually be turning- Say what you will about Krazy Krivsky, but the fact is that for the first time in, Jesus, I dunno, 98 years, the Reds have more than 3-4 pitchers capable of starting with some success in the big leagues...and the Cardinals have only 2 (Carpenter + .5Kip Wells (still exists???)+.5Anthony Reyes)! And that makes me giddy.
Someday maybe I'll write about a team I don't hate.
5 comments:
A possibility not many people have mentioned yet: What happens if Carpenter goes down for the season? Do the Cards even stay below 90 losses? Does McGwuire re-juice up and make a comeback like Stallone in Rocky VI? Will we get to see Rick Ankiel pitch again?
Oh man, if Carpenter went down I might have to marry him (...).
Also, I wanted to point out that I kind of feel like I am cherry-picking with the reliever-turned starter examples. If anyone (I guess I'm talking about you, Midre) can think of any other examples of successful or not so successful relievers-turned starters, I'd appreciate it.
I´m going back to the East Coast here (and to 1969 again), but Nolan Ryan was a reliever turned starter... although I guess he was never really just a reliever. Al Leiter also went from starter to reliever and then back again. Also, the best example I can think of is Pedro Martinez. I think people thought he was too small to handle to work load of a starter. And then he won three Cy Youngs. And then it turned out he was too small after all and he kept getting injured.
Also, maybe you should be worried about the Brewers. I can see them coming out of the Central this year.
Here, look at Goose Gossage's 1976 season and then compare that season to his years before and after. An experiment with Danny Graves-esqe results.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/g/gossari01.shtml
Notice the large drop in K/9 too.
The Brewers and Cubs are atop the Central no doubt. But I think the winner of the Central will only have 85 wins. Both the Reds and Bucs could have a fluky good season and compete. Realistically though, they finish 5 and 6 and the Cards finish 4th.
Sorry to post more random shit on your blog, but I am falling in love with Baseball Reference. Did you know Walter Johnson started 666 games and threw a complete game 531 times with 110 shutouts! Clemens, the active leader in CGs with 118, is the most sure thing hall of fame pitcher in the last 30 years and barely has 1/5 the CGs of Walter Johnson. Talk about era differences. Insane.
p.s. Cy Young has 749 CG. Clemens has started 690 games. Maddux 673.
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