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Perhaps Cardinals Should Fire Entire Bullpen
By MoonDog | July 14, 2008
Heading into the All-Star break on a high note following the Cardinals 11-6 victory over the Pirates Sunday, St. Louis fans can take little consolation knowing the Cardinals should have swept the series.
With the Cards’ leading 10-6 going into the bottom of the ninth Saturday night, three Cardinals relievers - Jason Isringhausen, Kyle McClellan and Chris Perez - worked 1 1/3 innings, giving up six runs and six hits that ultimately led to a Pirates come from behind 12-11 victory in 10 innings.
It was the 22nd blown save by the Cardinals bullpen this season, the most in MLB. The start of Saturday night’s collapse began when Isringhausen took the mound in the ninth. Already with six blown saves this season, Isringhausen gave up a three-run homer to Nate McClouth to cut the Cards’ lead to 10-9.
With one out, Kyle McClellan replaced Isringhausen after he’d gone 2-0 against Luis Rivas. McClellan couldn’t get Rivas out, allowing the walk that Isringhausen started. McClellan ended up allowing two hits and the tying run to come across to send the game into extra innings.
Obviously, a few blown saves are going to happen; the MLB average heading into the break is 12. For a team that has performed very well despite low expectations coming into the season, 22 blown saves has cost the Cardinals dearly.
If you reasonably assume the Cardinals held on in half of those games, they would have a record of 64-32 with a 6 1/2 game lead in the NL Central.
The saddest part of this situation for the Cardinals is the apparent lack of an answer from a personnel standpoint. Aside from the consistently strong performance from Russ Springer, every Cardinals relief pitcher has failed in dramatic fashion at a critical juncture.
While many are quick to point out the brilliance of Cardinals pitching coach Dave Duncan’s ability to turn around the fortunes of many starting pitchers, seldom do you hear it mentioned that he did the same for a relief pitcher. So where does Duncan fit into this mess that is the Cards’ bullpen?
At some point manager Tony La Russa or a team leader like Albert Pujols needs to step up an utter the word “accountability.” This situation has gone well beyond mechanics or the mental aspects of pitching.
While La Russa is prone to rely heavily on his bullpen throughout the course of the season, the starting pitching has been more than respectable. Thus, the bullpen hasn’t been overworked and more often than not they’ve had adequate leads heading into the late innings.
In the modern era of baseball we’ve seen the advent of the specialty relief pitcher. The long reliever, the short reliever, the setup man and the closer. With so many talking about defined roles, it really doesn’t matter what your specialty is. A pitcher’s role is very simple - when you’re given the ball, you’ve got to get people out.
The Cardinals bullpen should be embarrassed of their first half performance. Collectively, this group needs to establish a sense of pride and hold themselves accountable to their teammates.
Unless the Cards’ get better production from their bullpen, they’ll be watching the playoffs on TV this fall wondering what might have been.
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Tags: Kyle McClellan, MLB, MoonDogSports.com, tony la russa, Dave Duncan, Relief Pitcher, accountability, nl central, Cardinals Bullpen, Jason Isringhausen, 22 Blown Saves, st louis cardinals, Blown Saves, Major League Baseball, St. Louis Cardinals News, Russ Springer
Topics: Major League Baseball, St. Louis Cardinals News |
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