Join baseball writer Derrick Goold for his live Cardinals chat at 11 a.m. Monday
Bring your Cards questions and comments to Monday’s 11 a.m. live chat.
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I agree with you that outfield production is key to the Cardinals offensive success. To me the biggest key is Tyler O'Neill, and whether this year he is his 2021 version or his 2022 version. If he is the 2021 version of himself, the Cards will have the opportunity to let Walker, Burleson, Yepez and Gorman develop. And I like that scenario. Want a chance in 2023? Get some proven pitching and cheer for Tyler.
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Loved your piece on the current state of the rotation that you put out yesterday. I have a hard time believing the Cardinals will enter a bidding war for Rodon’s services when the team is wanting to extend Mikolas and (potentially, hopefully) Flaherty, but it also doesn’t seem wise to sign/trade for a mid tier starter who is set to compete the likes of Hudson, Matz and Pallante. Seems like if there were ever a top to swallow the prospect load a pitcher could command now could be the time. I suppose I don’t have much of a question just wanting some further insight on who those potential external trade candidates could be? I have a personal affinity for Tyler Glasnow but I can’t imagine the Rays wanting to part ways with him after a few months removed from injury when his value is low. And of course there’s Not Justin Bieber.
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There is Not Justin. He's not a name to ignore in all of this. I get a lot of questions about Glasnow, and I've not made any connection between the Cardinals and Rays in that regard. It's not for lack of asking. Just could be lack of anything to it. The Cardinals are definitely in a 12-month frame here for what they need when it comes to pitching in 2024, and that means that the trade deadline could yield a candidate not readily available at the moment. I think that will be something to watch during the season for an answer beyond the season.
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You answered your own question, and I appreciate that you've read the coverage at the Post-Dispatch about this, and trusted it.The money coming from the Rockies this season to Nolan Arenado is owed to him by them for his 2021 salary. That is money owed Arenado for a past season, not money relief from the current payroll.
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First - thanks so much for your continued coverage and well informed reporting! I was listening to MLB radio Loud Outs on the day that Contreras signed. One of the commentators stated that the loss of Yadi's defense and pitcher management would mean four more losses over the course of a season, even taking into account Contreras higher upside at the plate. I can't find anything in the stats that says this is a correct statement. Are there any stats that actually support that last years catching corps are 4 wins better than what the Cardinals in 2023?
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I'm not sure where the four wins would come from. I cannot speak for the person who said this, nor did I hear this, but did he/she give any indication that they were turning to a statistic for this, or just pulling the number from thin air for the purposes of illustrating the difference? For academic sake, let's see if there is a way to get into this with some quick, accessible statistics.There is data that shows that pitchers for the Cardinals have an ERA a full run less with Molina than other catchers. But that would be hard to transcribe to Contreras, as he's not caught the same pitchers. Not sure we would arrive at the four wins that way.On FanGraphs and Baseball-Reference, we might have our answer, or closer to it.From 2019-2022, Molina has a 3.8 defensive Wins Above Replacement for the Cardinals at catcher, while Willson Contreras has a 3.1 dWAR. That's a gap -- not four, but it's a gap. The def rating at FanGraphs -- part of its calculation for WAR -- shows a more sizeable one. In 2022, Contreras was a minus-3.4 def (that's a runs number) and Molina was a plus-12. That's a difference of 15 runs at a position that gets a bounce from the defensive demands of it and thus starts ahead of other positions in the "def" stat. It's not enough runs to be considered a four-win difference, but it's enough to illustrate a significant one.
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When Waino announced he was coming back, I winced, because to me it meant goodbye to Quintana, and at this stage I would prefer Quintana. Do you agree it was either or? That is 19M we sure could have gotten better returns from? I have been a big Waino fan, but think he has done the team a disservice by returning, and the team could not say no to the legacy.
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I can see the connection for sure. The Cardinals making the move for Wainwright ahead of the market -- well, Quintana would have welcomed that same conversation. It would have been more money, as you know, and another year of commitment, as we now know. There's definitely something to the timing of it. There is also the message it sends: Wainwright is a starter. That is one less spot in the rotation for a pitcher interested in being a starter. That is part of the conversation with Quintana. He should be -- this is me talking -- should be assured a spot in the the Cardinals' rotation. But would they? Would they? They're not selling that to some of the pitchers they've been talking to. They're not guaranteeing it. They're talking swingman roles, and some of the pitchers who would sign with the Cardinals otherwise want to see if there's a starting job out there first.
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Due the exorbitant contract being handed out to top free agent starting pitchers this season and presumably next season, is the trade route going to have to be the way the Cards acquire starting pitching? I know the Cards are normally hesitant of handing out contracts of more than 4-5 years.
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Hi Derrick. I know this is off topic but i miss seeing the cards in spring training, When I lived in east Orlando at one time, I could see the Cards play the Braves at Disney, The Nat's in Viera, The Astros in Kissimmee and Tigers in Lakeland. Do you for see any traveling to the Tampa Bay area this year or in the future?
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They're coming to Sarasota to end the 2023 schedule. Gets Jackson Holliday a chance to play against his dad, Matt, the Cardinals' bench coach. The Cardinals also play at Lakeland and in Tampa this spring -- March 7-8. They plan to include trips like that when possible in spring training.
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There is not. And that's probably why he's so fascinating as a talent. He's got so much athleticism, and so much athleticism in his delivery, and that allows him to unspool with such velocity for his size. I would stop short of comparing him to anyone else because any comparison is going to fail at capturing all of his potential skills. Eager to see what he does against better competition in the coming year and how that sets him up to slingshot into the conversation for some role, some way, some how, some impact in 2024.
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Allow me to help you here and urge you to stop suspecting that. That has not been my experience. I talk to agents and other teams and members of the Cardinals and the Cardinals front office and agents again. The Cardinals, as you probably know, do not comment on free agent pursuits, and that is a team-wide policy. They are pretty famous in the industry for not talking about pursuits, not responding to reports or rumors, and not fueling them. They are a locked box for many reporters. That means I better talk to other people, eh?I tell young reporters when they ask that it is vital to know the motivation of your source, and that helps you know how much they know about the situation. A lifetime ago, I spoke to an agent and he told me he had talked to the team I covered about his free agent, a former All-Star and name player. It's true, he did talk to them. He called them. He asked if they were interested. What he left out of the description he gave me was the response he got. I checked, I asked, I confirmed, and the team I covered did not have interest. I could have tweeted that they a conversation with All-Star X and been right, and got likes and retweets and whatever the equivalent of that was back then, but would it have given the readers the news? No. They talked. But my reporting didn't stop there. The team I covered wasn't interested. They had other targets. I wrote about those.Hope this helps. Your suspicion is off. It's more complex than that.
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