Archive for the “July 31st trade deadline” Category

It’s hard for me to wrap my head around this, so I will try and be objective as I can. My initial reaction is Mozeliak got totally fleeced on this deal, to put it nicely, but let’s take a look.

First the prospect: Nick Greenwood is 22 years old, left-handed and has a 6 K/9 in the Midwest League. He was a 14th round pick in last year’s draft. He did not make Baseball America’s Top 30 Padres list last season, for what it’s worth, and it’s unlikely he rates very highly in our system either by seasons end. He has fringe stuff, save for a decent change-up, but he has good command. He’s a C grade pitcher, arms of his ilk are a dime a dozen.

So forget the player coming over providing much of anything. What this really signals is a huge vote of confidence for a couple of former Future Redbirds:  Jon Jay, and I’d throw Allen Craig in there as well. Mozeliak has to feel that Jay and Craig can match Ryan Ludwick’s production for the rest of the season. Jay has been a man on fire so far and LaRussa no longer has to take away at-bats from Colby Rasmus (good news!) or Ludwick.

Now obviously, the Cardinals know Jay cannot sustain hitting like a mad man for the rest of the season. He has a crazy .446 BABIP this season, so he’s due for some regression. What does it take to replace Ludwick? ZiPS projects Luddy to post a .363 wOBA the rest of the season. Assuming a couple runs of defense and 250 plate appearances, that’s about a win of production (1.3 WAR, to be exact) of production to fill. Can a Jon Jay/Allen Craig platoon match that? I don’t have the projections in front of me, but I doubt it. Considering Craig hits lefties, and Jay continues some semblance of good-hitting, a .340-.345 wOBA seems completely reasonable. That’s about a 5 run gap left to fill.

Well, Westbrook fills that gap. Westbrook projects around a 4.45 FIP for the rest of the season. Over 50 innings that equals 6 runs.  Suppan is a replacement level pitcher, so Westbrook is 6 runs better than Suppan. The Cardinals barely improved, if at all, but here’s where salary comes to play.

Westbrook’s salary will be covered by Cleveland. Ludwick is due around $2 mil the rest of the season, if not a little more, and he’s going into his last year of arbitration next year. He would probably make $8 or so mil in arbitration. If the team deemed that pricetag too high, he’d be non-tendered (I think, correct me if I’m wrong) and  the Cardinals get no compensation. So this is some sort of compensation now.

The Cardinals, at least on paper, didn’t get a lot worse I guess…and they get some salary relief next year from Ludwick to help try and re-up the Mang.  I think they’re maybe better in the long run, and about the same in the short run, just so long as Westbrook doesn’t crap the bed and Jay/Craig play as about expected.  Is that hoping for too much?

I’m afraid this is some sort of misguided endorsement of Jon Jay (from the front office that brought you: Kyle Lohse was flukily good for one year, so let’s re-sign him!) and Dave Duncan (Westbrook + Duncan = teh awesome FTW!). To me it makes more sense to hold on to Ludwick, get San Diego out of this deal and work directly with the Indians, and then shop Ludwick in the winter time if you find his price-tag too constrictive.

Maybe there’s something that will still happen today with the middle infield before 3pm that helps me understand this more, because I get the deal…except I really don’t get it.

I’m not sure if I’ll be around when the news or non-news hits at the trade deadline, so here’s a place to discuss all things trade deadline concerning the Cardinals. I’m not expecting much.

UDPATE 3:00 PM *crickets chirping* Looks like the farm system stays intact, but I’m sure it takes a little time to get the news out.

God bless Liam for creating the Bernie Button, it’s a handy tool to get right to Bernie Miklasz’s internet posts without having to see the psychotic flamewars and endless trade “Duncan, Boggs and Ryan for Matt Holliday” threads that make up the P-D forums. For what it’s worth, the other day Bernie called Chris Perez “Reyes II” and said they are trying to turn him into a sinker/slider pitcher. Ugh.

First of all, he is a slider pitcher. Or at least he is when he’s right. Secondly, I had no idea he was being told to throw the sinker but…um…why? I have no qualms about having him try to throw lower in the zone, but when you throw 95 you can get away with throwing a pitch up on occasion. I tried to find data on Perez’s splits in different parts of the zone and found no success, (not sure what it would’ve been worth, anyhow) but I do remember that at times his FB would get a little too true at times, so he can’t just fling the ball up in the zone all the time, but I don’t seem to recall him doing that.

I’m continually baffled that minor league pitching coordinator Brent Strom preaches that pitchers should “be themselves”, while Duncan has to fix everyone by making them a sinker-ball pitcher. The whole org doesn’t seem to be on the same page, to put it lightly. But I’m not here really to discuss that; I would like to just ask you all: Should the Cardinals trade Perez? Because if he’s not their cup of tea I’d hate to see him be monkeyed with and correspondingly lose his value as a ballplayer.

Even without being monkeyed with, I for one am not thoroughly sold he’s the closer of the team’s future; it seems we have seen a lot of these college closers with shaky control problems settle in as middle inning guys-David Aardsma, Joey Devine, Royce Ring, Ryan Wagner, Craig Hansen, heck, even Braden Looper to an extent. The jury is still out Devine and Hansen, but their outlook isn’t as bright as it was when they were drafted. Chad Cordero and Huston Street have proved to be the exception and not the rule, so I found this past draft to be pretty screwy with the landrush on relief pitchers.

I think Perez is a heck of a bullpen arm, don’t misunderstand me. He’s easily a top 3-5 prospect and has more upside than any pitcher in the system. I’d like to see the Cards exercise some patience and help him develop. But if Duncan is the one developing him and feels he just has to reinvent him, then I’d rather see him traded while his value is high. My heart can’t take another Anthony Reyes saga.

lboros already tackled this subject at VEB, but here is my case for why the Cardinals should be sellers-

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