MLB NEWS

Cardinals Exceeding Expectations

Published by MoonDog on May 7, 2008

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The St. Louis Cardinals continue to exceed expectations improving their record to 22-12 with a 6-5 win against the Colorado Rockies Tuesday night in Denver.

With so many predicting the Cards to finish near the bottom of the National League Central this season, St. Louis has gone about proving everyone wrong.

The most surprising aspect of this Cardinal team is their pitching.

A makeshift starting rotation that was thought to be barely functional has been superb to this point. St. Louis has an ERA of 3.59 entering tonight’s game, good for third best in MLB.

Beyond their good pitching, one might think the Cards success has been the sole result of Albert Pujols. But that hasn’t been the case. Pujols continues to produce, batting .348 with six homers and 24 RBI’s.

Those are good numbers considering he’s getting the Barry Bonds treatment, having been walked 34 times.

With Pujols getting limited run-producing chances, the rest of the Cardinals roster has provided significant contributions. Skip Schumaker has done a fantastic job as the leadoff hitter batting .297 with a .376 OBP.

Outfielder Ryan Ludwick is having a tremendous start to the 2008 season, hitting .349 with four homers and 17 RBI’s in only 83 plate appearances.

Rick Ankiel has made the transition from pitcher to outfielder and has done so in dramatic fashion. Tuesday night in Denver, Ankiel made two of the most spectacular throws of this or any season to gun down base runners. While Ankiel strikes out more than you’d like, he’s still managed to hit six homers and drive in 18 runs.

Troy Glaus, acquired in a preseason trade with the Toronto Blue Jays in exchange for Scott Rolen, hasn’t found his stroke at the plate, hitting only .229 with one homer and 21 RBI’s. However, the primary concern entering the season was Glaus’ ability to field his position and to this point he’s done a very good job at third base. Glaus has committed two errors in 34 games, sporting a .980 fielding percentage and a .874 zone rating.

The Cardinals defense has improved dramatically over last year, having committed 15 errors so far tying them for third-fewest in the majors.

The Cards aren’t scoring a ton of runs, averaging 4.7 per game in 34 games, but their team batting average is .281, good for fifth best in the majors, and their OBP is .373, the best in MLB.

St. Louis should actually have two more victories this season, with Jason Isringhausen having blown three save opportunities thus far. The Cards managed to win one of those three games with an 11^th inning victory last Friday against the Chicago Cubs.

Despite the blown saves, Isringhausen has 11 saves thus far and the Cards bullpen has done a solid job of protecting leads or keeping games close. Kyle McClellan and Ron Villone have been fantastic out of the pen, combining to pitch 31 2-3 innings, allowing 21 hits, striking out 29 and issuing just 11 walks. Villone has an ERA of just 0.63 and McClellan’s is 2.08, giving St. Louis a good left-right combination against opposing hitters.

It’s still early and the starting pitching will have to prove it can hold up through the remainder of the season. With Mark Mulder having major problems in his rehab starts and Cris Carpenter not expected to return until at least after the All-Star break, the Cards will need their starting rotation to perform at this current level.

Keep in mind one other important fact. This is a Tony La Russa managed team, and like all of La Russa’s teams the Cardinals are going to play hard and compete for nine innings. La Russa set the tone in spring training making it clear he expected this team to contend despite the critics’ thoughts to the contrary.

So far the Cardinals are making La Russa look like a prophet.

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Tagged with: Albert Pujols, Colorado Rockies, fielding percentage, Jason Isringhausen, kyle mclellan, National League Central, Rick Ankiel, Ron Villone, Ryan Ludwick, St. Louis Cardinals, Tony La Russa, Troy Glaus

tophatal on Wed, 7th May 2008 12:48

Moon Dog
I for one don’t feel that the Cardinals are under achieving. But I do still feel somewhat suspect of their pitching overall. If it can carry ‘em through to the trade deadline then I do expect ‘em to fortify that part of the roster.

I love the new rematted format of your site ! It’s very impressive and does you and your contributions a great deal of justice ! I’m certainly looking forward to reading more over the coming months.

I don’t know that you’re a horse racing buff. But I’ve two posts up within the RSB site that may peak your interest. One is titled PETA ….People For The Ethical Treatment By Assholes …..
Then there’s also It Was A Tragedy But It Wasn’t The End Of The World. It’s just my take on all of the opining going on after the death of the filly Eight Belless at the Kentucky Derby. To my mind just an unforeseen and tragic loss.
There’s the customary NBA post also that deals with the Spurs’ travails against the Hornets. Again it’s my observations on the series thus far. That’s titled Experience Trumps Youthful Exuberance …….Normally .

tophatal …………

MoonDog on Wed, 7th May 2008 13:33

Thanks Top. I’ve been a Cards fan since my youth. I don’t know what to make of them. I want to see them win and prove everyone wrong. Pitching is the key, as it is for every team. I agree after the break we could potentially see them make a few moves.

I’ve got to get the width reset – the chick pics I posted look terrible.

I love horse racing and I’ll be over to check it out.

Sports Fan on Wed, 7th May 2008 19:19

Edinson Volquez for President!

TideDruid on Thu, 8th May 2008 02:08

I’m not ashamed to admit that it took me a while to realize that was a dos equis ad

I like the new re-design

MoonDog on Thu, 8th May 2008 10:02

Sports Fan – Ole!

Tide – When I was a teenager I worked for a beer distributorship that carried all the imports. I know beer like most people know air.

Jay on Tue, 13th May 2008 14:32

I’m not as surprised by the performance of the Cardinals’ outfielders as I am the starting pitchers. I believe anyone closely following the Cards last year saw the abilities of Ludwick and Schmacher. I didn’t figure that the team would be as bad this year as many “experts” thought, but I believed that they wouldn’t do well early and would start to put things together late in the season.

In case you’re interested, the best site that I’ve found for the discussion of all things Cardinals is http://www.cardsclubhouse.com.

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