Join baseball writer Derrick Goold for his live Cardinals chat from the Winter Meetings
Bring your Cards questions and comments to Monday’s 11 a.m. live chat.
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They absolutely do want to sign/add a catcher of note. They want to add a catcher who has a name the casual fan will at least recognize. That is something they intend to do, and if they do not -- then the winter has been .... oof. A bigger whiff that just sitting out the shortstop market. -
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I’d like the to see the cards move some young talent. Not Walker. It gets old watching prospects either stay down to long or hit .300 and then come up to only hit .240. We need proven production if we want to go beyond the first round of the playoffs. There’s no reason we don’t get Murphy and keep Walker
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Hey Derrick, appreciate the chat and your thoughtful, detailed answers. I've seen lots of people comment here over time about whether Jack Flaherty wants to stay in StL, or if he wants to leave for LA or wherever. The bigger question I think is will the team want him back? It seems from the outside that they don't like players who are non-conformist and rock the boat (unless it's Yadi or someone who's a team legend). Any sense of this from your perspective/opinion?
Also, for what it's worth I had a dream a while back of Danny Jansen taking his first at-bat for the Cardinals. May be nothing but putting it in here in case it's a premonition! -
The Cardinals would be thrilled to have a healthy Jack Flaherty leading their rotation -- and that goes for beyond the 2023 season. They would welcome that. Heck, if they had their choice of things to happen, they would have Alex Reyes and Jack Flaherty coming off healthy 2022 and soaring into their 2023 seasons with the potential to be free agents, and the Cardinals would try to keep both of them, or know, they may only keep one. They be thrilled if that was their version of Burnes and Woodruff.Injuries happen, Injuries slow production. Injuries limit pitchers.And the Cardinals are now hopeful that Flaherty came come off a normal winter, have a strong spring training, and be the pitcher they long ago expected him to be when they had him ranked just ahead of Sandy Alcantara in their internal prospect rankings. And if he becomes that pitcher, they'll make a bid to keep him around. They like pitchers who rock the box score. Production rules.
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Great question. That is the riddle that Dusty Blake is out to solve. Some of it has to do with the pitches that are "great stuff." Hicks' sinker is elite velocity, but there isn't a lot of evidence that the pitch is a swing-and-miss pitch, and that goes for any pitcher throwing that kind of heat. Take a look some time at the Baseball Savant numbers or rankings of the fastest pitches and the results of them. They're balls. They're balls in play. They're fouled off. They're not all that often swings and misses. Heck, think back to that Herrera/Hicks at-bat and the contact he made even on the fastest strike thrown that season. The slider is where the swings and misses come, and for several of the relievers the Cardinals have that has to be tightened -- that pitch that plays off the sinker or cutter and gets the swings and misses, that's where the improvement needs to happen for the bullpen to have a better k/rate. Also contributing: A few of leading K-rate pitchers had low K-rates this past season, thinking specifically of Genesis Cabrera.
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Derrick - should we be concerned about Wainwright pitching in the WBC? I think it is awesome for him, but selfishly as a fan... didn't he have dead arm last year? And now hes going to add competitive innings to his arm before the season starts? Makes me nervous a long phantom IL stint is coming mid season so he can just get some rest...
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Nah. And he later made news when he said it wasn't dead arm that was causing him problems. That what he initially diagnoses as dead arm was the fault of his mechanics and footfall, and that in studying video and working in front of a mirror he discovered the issue, corrected it, and does not think that dead arm was the root cause.He'll get a chance to show that in the WBC, and for the first time in his career he'll get to represent his country in a tournament. That means a lot to him. He's talked a lot about wanting a chance to do that. Here it is.
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De Witt's have a ton of money already. They will make a huge windfall when the team is eventually sold. The Cardinals are "more" than their property. They are a civic institution. The DeWitt's owe it to the region to spend all profits from now on on the team.. Enough is enough and greed is greed. Pony up!
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Quick note: They will make a lot of money if they sell the team, but to make that money they do have to ... sell the team. The Cardinals are a civic institution. Owning the team should be entering into an agreement with the fan base to upkeep and match the history of the organization. All that is fair. A public trust.
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That's for chatting, Mr. Goold.
So, the last two teams to employ Christian Vazquez were the Astros and Red Sox. Vazquez is now available to the highest bidder...and the Red Sox are currently trying to make a trade for Sean Murphy, while the Astros are aggressively courting fellow free agent Willson Contreras. Doesn't that tell us all we need know about the abilities/inabilities of Christian Vazquez, the fact that neither of his former teams are trying to bring back the 32-year-old?
I never expect the Cards to wade into the deepest end of the payroll pool, never expect them to sign a $300M player. But when the two best available backstops make basically no money (Murphy, Kirk), then I *do* expect Mo to go all-out to acquire one of them and not settle for 2nd-tier. This is a rare opportunity that should not be squandered. -
I think you have made a compelling and noteworthy case, yes. I will throw this additional twist into it: There is only one Sean Murphy and only one Willson Contreras, and if neither of those teams end up with their targets, will they pivot back to Vazquez? For Houston, it's clear that they have their defense-first catcher already and don't want the overlap, and also there isn't much reason for Vazquez to go there when he wants to be a starter. Boston is a more compelling question, and it would not shock me at all if during this catcher carousel it's the Red Sox that end with Contreras.I do appreciate how you've outlined it and there is something to be learned from how teams react/act to their own players being available. It's something to factor in.
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Trea Turner. 11 years, $300 million. Justin Verlander. 2 years. $86 million. No thank you! I can imagine the Cardinals making these one or both of these two purchases and then having the fans going absolutely nuts when the bill comes due in terms of increased ticket, food, and beverage prices. Give me the DeWitt business model every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Absolutely love baseball. My life, however, does not revolve around how many division championships, pennants and world championships the local nine win.
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If the Cardinals truly want to redefine the meaning of starting catcher and games started/innings caught, then I’d advocate keeping their prospects and signing Vasquez. I wouldn’t give up a haul for Murphy for him to start 110 games. I’d rather have Hence, Graceffo, Winn and Burleson (he’s a flat-out hitter).
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You're right. They don't. They made some big bonus moves 10, 11, 12 years ago, and they didn't get much return (at all) for those moves, and then they considered the top end talents they did return on and really focused on quality of those signings. I'm thinking of the mid-range bonuses that, say, they signed Oscar Taveras for and some of the other recent international prospects. They felt they did better increasing the number of players they signed and counted on one or two emerging as prospects vs. putting all of this bonus space on one player and needing that one player to work out. The Cardinals did spend beyond their bonus limits several consecutive years, spent time in the penalty box with limited spending, and now are on the other side of that looking at what approach to use because an infusion of international prospects would be helpful. It's part of where the system ran thin over the past few years.