Trevor Rosenthal might have lost the battle for the final starting rotation spot, but the St. Louis Cardinals gained a great resource for their bullpen in 2013.

Trevor Rosenthal – photo from FoxSportsMidwest

The Cardinals officially said last week that Rosenthal is out of the running for the fifth spot in the rotation and will start the season in the bullpen. And while that might be disappointing for a pitcher who had a goal of winning that battle, the move should work out best for both sides.

Rosenthal can throw more than 100 mph and often looked as unhittable as any pitcher in Major League Baseball last season out of the bullpen, and the Cardinals will give him the chance to do more of the same in 2013.

As a reliever, Rosenthal could rare back and throw the ball as hard as he wanted without having to worry about stamina. That gave his fastball the extra few miles per hour that often make the difference in whether a hitter gets a hit or swings threw a pitch.

And he most likely would’ve lost that quality had he moved to the rotation.

Detroit Tigers pitcher Justin Verlander can still crank it up to 100 mph late in a ballgame, but he is a rare (almost unique) pitcher who can throw as hard as a starter as he could if he were a reliever. Others tend to lose a few miles per hour on their fastball once they’re asked to throw more than one or two innings.

Adam Wainwright began his Cardinals career out of the bullpen as the closer for the 2006 World Series championship team. He threw in the high 90s as a reliever but rarely reaches above 94 or 95 mph as a starter.

Granted, Wainwright is plenty effective as a starter and is on the precipice of receiving a whole lot of money because he can pitch effectively for seven innings or more. That could very well be the path Rosenthal eventually follows, but for now he is best suited for the bullpen.

He started one game at the beginning of spring training, and it didn’t go well. He gave up four runs on five hits in two innings against the Miami Marlins while walking two batters and failing to strike out anybody.

Sure, that was an early spring training game, but the Cardinals would be foolish to take a chance on a young pitcher in their rotation when they have others who they have already groomed to be long-term starters for the organization.

Those two are Joe Kelly and Shelby Miller, and they will battle for the final spot in the rotation.

Kelly did not look good in his last start, giving up two runs and three walks in two innings Thursday against the New York Yankees.

But Miller hasn’t been much better. He gave up two runs and three hits in two innings Friday against the Washington Nationals but walked just one hitter.

Overall, Kelly has more experience as a starter and is more of a sure bet than Miller at this point.

Theoretically, the Cardinals could give Kelly the starting job and send Miller to the Triple-A Memphis Redbirds to start the season. Then Miller could come up into the rotation and Kelly could slide to the bullpen if a reliever gets injured, or if the Cardinals find they need more depth in the bullpen.

That situation will work itself out in time, but at least the Cardinals already know they have a flamethrower who can shut down hitters late in a ballgame, even if he technically lost a job to get to that position.

One of the men most responsible for the St. Louis Cardinals’ 2011 World Series championship is currently locked in a battle with the team to be paid more like the star he is becoming, but this isn’t the type of battle that should raise serious concerns.

David Freese is one of the most talented young position players the Cardinals have, and he has plenty of potential to grow into another St. Louis baseball superstar. So far, the team has gotten an incredible bargain with Freese, who has made just $1.7 million total in his four-year career and is currently the 16th highest-paid player on the team.

It’s time for Freese to start earning more money. In his four years with the club, Freese has hit .296 and his power numbers have increased exponentially each year. He finished with career highs in hits, homeruns, doubles, runs scored and RBIs in 2012. And don’t forget he has a career .345 postseason batting average and was the MVP of the 2011 National League Championship Series and World Series.

He could fairly easily make a case that he deserves more than the $3.75 million he is asking for this offseason. The Cardinals have countered with a $2.4-million offer. The case will go to arbitration sometime between Monday and Feb. 20 if the two sides can’t strike a deal.

Now, while all of this sounds as though Freese and the Cardinals can’t see eye-to-eye on his worth, this is more of just a typical baseball business deal. Nobody will have their feelings hurt too no matter how the case finally plays out. The Cardinals have already finalized similar deals with relievers Jason Motte, Mitchell Boggs, Edward Mujica and Marc Rzepczynski.

Even if the case goes to arbitration and the Cardinals win, Freese will be in line for a big-money contract within the next three years. He won’t be a free agent until 2016. By that point the Cardinals will know whether Freese is going to be a franchise cornerstone at third base or if he will succumb to his substantial injury history that has kept him from playing 100 or more games in all but one season.

However, the Cardinals would still be smart to lock Freese up with a long-term deal as soon as possible because player salaries will only continue to rise throughout Major League Baseball.

The Cardinals made a smart decision early in Albert Pujols’ career to sign him to a 10-year, $110-million contract in 2001, and that deal was considered a bargain by the time it expired at the end of the 2011 season. Pujols’ next contract was worth more than twice that amount when he signed a 10-year, $240-million deal last year with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

Freese and the Cardinals would both be in better positions if they could work out a long-term deal sometime soon, but right now the organization has other pressing matters. Namely, Adam Wainwright’s contract.
Wainwright is scheduled to be a free agent at the end of the season, and his asking price will likely be astronomical if the Cardinals can’t sign him to a contract before he hits the open market.

The Cardinals did sign catcher Yadier Molina to a five-year, $75-million contract last offseason, so they will have a strong core group of position players for the next few years.

And that’s what makes Freese’s contract situation a tad bit irrelevant. The difference of little more than $1 million this year shouldn’t have much of an effect on future negotiations.

Freese will get paid what he is due at some point. How soon the Cardinals will be willing to make that commitment is what will be the most interesting part of this situation.

The St. Louis Cardinals entered play Sunday with a 46-41 record, just one game behind their record at this point last season. To make a late-season run this year similar to 2011, the Cardinals will need to add some experienced arms in the bullpen.

The Cardinals sent Colby Rasmus to the Toronto Blue Jays on July 27 last year as part of a three-team trade that gave the Cardinals three critical pieces of their championship team: starting pitcher Edwin Jackson, and relievers Marc Rzepczynski and Octavio Dotel.

Jackson started some critical games for the Cardinals in the second half of the season, and Rzepcysnki provided needed lefthanded relief to neutralize potent left-handed hitters such as Prince Fielder and Ryan Howard. However, the most important part of that group that is no longer with the team is Dotel.

Dotel, who now pitches for the Detroit Tigers, filled the role Julian Tavarez played for the Cardinals in 2004 National League championship and Braden Looper pitched in relief for the 2006 World Series championship team. Unfortunately, the Cardinals don’t have a pitcher similar to Dotel in their bullpen this year.

The team may have hoped Scott Linebrink would fill that role this year, but he got hurt in Spring Training and the Cardinals released him before he ever threw a pitch in the 2012 regular season. Now they have a group of 20-somethings that are pitching as typical 20-something pitchers without much experience.

Sure, much of that group pitched well during last year’s playoff run, but they also had a veteran leader in Dotel. He not only pitched well with a 3.28 ERA as a Cardinal, but he also provided leadership for the inexperienced bullpen. His absence has left a huge void in this year’s bullpen.

Victor Marte, 31, is the oldest of the group, but he is in his first full season is not ready to lead a group of other pitchers. Jason Motte, 30, has 20 saves this year and finished off the World Series last year, but he still has issues of his own, which include finding a reliable second pitch that he can throw with confidence.

The bullpen’s lack of experience has shown up in the numbers this year, as well. The Cardinals have a 4.49 bullpen ERA, which is 25th in the majors.

Manager Mike Matheny has grasped at straws in Memphis by bringing up Eduardo Sanchez and Sam Freeman, but both have looked overmatched and should stay in Memphis for the rest of the year. If Motte created nail-biting moments last year, just imagine Freeman pitching in an important game late in the year or in the playoffs. Those would be heart-attack inducing innings.

So, as the trading deadline approaches, the Cardinals have been linked to starting pitchers such as Brewers starter Zack Greinke, but they need to look toward pitchers who can throw key innings late in a game rather than the first six or seven innings.

Sure, the starting rotation is fragile with Chris Carpenter and Jaime Garcia on the disabled list, but Lance Lynn and Joe Kelly provide much more stability in their roles than Fernando Salas or Mitchell Boggs do in their bullpen roles.

Plus, a veteran reliever will likely be a cheaper find than a front-line starter who may or may not test the free agent market in the offseason.

Looking back, the Cardinals would have been wise to pursue Dotel a little more aggressively. Hopefully they get a second chance at a similar pitcher later this month.

The St. Louis Cardinals might have a new manager, pitching coach and offensive stars, but their results have been the same as the 2011 team during its run to the World Series championship. The games have also been less stressful to watch, thanks in part to new manager Mike Matheny.

The Cardinals started the 2012 season with two of the cleanest wins a baseball team can have, especially to begin a season. They beat the Miami Marlins 4-1 Wednesday before traveling to Milwaukee and beating the Brewers 11-5 Friday.

Sure, they got beat in starting pitcher Adam Wainwright’s return Saturday to the tune of a 6-0 shutout, but Brewers starter Zack Greinke pitched a brilliant game. He was also the third elite pitcher the Cardinals had faced in as many days.

Overall, the Cardinals have shown early signs that they will play a much cleaner game than they did while Tony La Russa was the manager. It’s foolish to say La Russa’s teams didn’t play good baseball. His team’s won a lot of baseball games, but they also maintained an edge to their game that was never completely comfortable to watch. They could certainly come back after falling behind several runs early in a game, but just as well could let a similar lead disappear.

A good bullpen is certainly a major factor in how those situations play out, but La Russa’s heavy use of his bullpen played a role. His theory of using several relievers in one game was meant to keep them available night after night without wearing down one particular pitcher. But, that always left opportunities for one of those pitchers to have an off-night and blow the game.

Although it’s very early, Matheny hasn’t shown any tendencies to take a lot of risks. His decisions have been calculated, and have not tipped the game for or against his team. Those moments where his decision wins or loses a game will surely come, but his approach is a smart one for a new manager with an experienced team.

Matheny’s has also made judicial use of his bullpen. It helps when his starters pitch deep into ballgames, but he has not made pitching changes just for the sake of making pitching changes. Matheny has a good understanding of the rhythm of a baseball game, and has shown a more gentle touch than La Russa.

Matheny is no teddy bear, by any means. He will fight with his team to the death just as La Russa would have, but Matheny will likely trust his gut instinct rather than what the numbers say in the matchup book.

That will be a stark change for Cardinals fans who have grown to fear a righty-lefty matchup simply because the pitcher and hitter don’t have the same dominant hand. The hand a pitcher throws with is sometimes less important than how the pitcher is throwing that day.

Even if a pitcher, particularly a reliever, was cruising along, La Russa would yank him simply to play the matchup game. Matheny appears to be more likely to let a pitcher who is dominating go ahead and work a full inning regardless of who comes up next in the order. This certainly won’t always be the case, but it will be nice to watch a game that doesn’t include at least six pitching changes every night.

Also, the team’s baserunning has been much better. Former first baseman Albert Pujols was often more of a factor in this problem than La Russa. Pujols was a very aggressive baserunner, but he would also run himself into an out because of that aggressiveness.

The 2012 Cardinals might not be the most explosive team in Major League Baseball, but if the first week is any indication, this should be a very fundamentally sound team that could win a lot of baseball games.

Having a manager who fosters that type of a team will certainly help.

The St. Louis Cardinals technically have a full pitching staff that includes five starting pitchers with a combined eight World Series championship rings, but they still might trade one of them for a pitcher who has no rings.

Rumors continue to swirl that the Cardinals will add Roy Oswalt to the rotation before the season begins. Oswalt, 34, has said he wants to remain a starting pitcher and play for either the Cardinals or Texas Rangers. However, he reportedly wants $10 million to do so.

Understandably, talks with both of those teams have gone incredibly slow. Sure, it would be nice to pitch for one of the two teams in last year’s World Series, but neither team really needs a starting pitcher.

The Rangers’ staff is set for the upcoming season with talented young pitchers, and they would be foolish to move one of them to add a veteran with health concerns.

The Cardinals are in a slightly different position, but still don’t have an opening.

Aces Adam Wainwright and Chris Carpenter will be fine, and Jamie Garcia fits the same mold as Rangers pitchers Derek Holland and Matt Harrison. The other two starters, Kyle Lohse and Jake Westbrook are veterans who are both in the final year of their current contracts.

Neither Lohse nor Westbrook have been outstanding at any point in their careers. Therefore, the Cardinals would not have to gamble as much on bringing in Oswalt.

Even if Oswalt is only a .500 pitcher at this point in his career, that’s not much different than what Lohse and Westbrook have been since they joined the Cardinals in 2008 and 2010, respectively. Lohse is 39-32 with a 4.62 ERA, and Westbrook is 16-13 with a 4.07 ERA. Oswalt’s career ERA is 3.21, and even with his injuries in Philadelphia he had a 16-10 record with a 2.96 ERA.

The biggest obstacle between Oswalt and the Cardinals might be the same obstacle that caused Albert Pujols to leave and sign with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Money.

Oswalt apparently wants a $10-million contract for 2012. But, the Cardinals let starting pitcher Edwin Jackson leave to sign with the Washington Nationals in part because he would’ve cost too much when the team already had five starting pitchers.

Jackson signed a one-year, $10 million contract with the Nationals.

Oswalt is a better pitcher than Jackson, but the Cardinals don’t need either pitcher at the $10 million level, especially when the team is currently projected to enter the season with a franchise-record $113.6 million payroll.

Pitching will be even more important for the Cardinals this season after their offense lost an average of 42 homeruns and 126 RBIs from the lineup when Pujols left. However, Wainwright will fill a void at the top of the rotation, and Lohse and Westbrook have been as serviceable as any back-of-the-rotation starters the Cardinals had during the Tony La Russa era.

Plus, the Cardinals would have to make some kind of roster move for Oswalt to fit. Lohse and Westbrook have full no-trade clauses, and nobody has bitten on the Cardinals’ attempts to trade Kyle McClellan.

Even if the team did trade McClellan, it would have to convince Westbrook to pitch from the bullpen as he did in the 2011 playoffs. Westbrook did well in that position during the playoffs, but it’s unlikely a starting pitcher would want to move to middle relief when he will be up for free agency the following offseason.

If he stays healthy, Oswalt might put up much better numbers than Lohse or Westbrook this season, but the Cardinals don’t need to pay him $10 million to find out.

Now that St. Louis Cardinals fans have opened their 2011 World Series championship Christmas gifts and the calendar has turned to 2012, it’s time to start anticipating the beginning of a new season.

The Cardinals have already made most of their offseason moves by keeping Rafeal Furcal and Skip Schumaker, signing Carlos Beltran and not signing Albert Pujols. With the lineup and rotation pretty much set, now Cardinals fans can start asking the annual questions of how good the team will be during the upcoming season.

The 2012 Cardinals will look a lot better on paper than a lot of defending World Series champion teams. Most of those teams have geared up for a championship run for several years and have an aging nucleus by the time they win the World Series. Even the 2006 Cardinals were in a position where they couldn’t bring back many pieces of that team in 2007.

That’s not the case in 2012. Sure, the team lost the best baseball player and best manager of this generation, but, the rest of the team remains pretty well intact, especially considering Adam Wainwright will be back to lead the rotation after missing the entire 2011 season because of injury.

Not many defending championship teams are able to add a Cy Young Award winner to their staff the following year without having to dish out a major contract or trade away the entire minor league system.

Those types of moves often impair a franchise for several years after it goes for broke to win a championship. Even the New York Yankees struggled to maintain a minor league system that continually fed the big club with solid, young talent after their dynasty of the late 1990s.

So, the Cardinals look to be in a position where they will once again strongly contend for a playoff spot in 2012. The major question marks will be and whether or not the team will be able to score enough runs.

The offense carried the 2011 Cardinals for much of the season, but more responsibility immediately dropped on the pitching staff once Pujols left for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. The pitchers are going to have to be excellent this year for the Cardinals to win a lot of games.

Had Pujols and manager Tony La Russa stayed, the Cardinals would’ve likely been huge favorites in the National League Central Division and maybe the entire National League, but the few changes they made are significant and leave the door open for doubt to creep inside.

The Cardinals spent most of the money they didn’t pay Pujols on Furcal, Schumaker and Beltran. Unfortunately, those three players combined might not generate the same offensive production Pujols did by himself. That means the Cardinals’ starting pitching will have to be dominant at times, the defense will have to be vastly improved and the team will have to be more creative in baserunning situations.

The 2011 Cardinals were built from the batter’s box, but the 2012 Cardinals will likely have to win with pitching and defense.

It’s opening day for the Milwaukee Brewers. Sort of.

The ace of their staff will take the mound, ready to lead them to a Central Division title, a pennant and a World Series championship.

Better late than never. They’ve waited five weeks of the season for newly-acquired ace Zack Greinke to recover from a rib injury suffered playing pick-up basketball over the off season. Welcome to Zack’s World, Brewer’s fans.

Greinke will take the mound against the Atlanta Braves tonight for the first time in a uniform other than the Royal blue.

While the Brewers have stumbled out of the gate, going 13-15. Greinke has missed 28 games. That’s nearly one-fifth of the season. Is he worth the $13.5 million they owe him for this season? Was he worth the price of four potential big leaguers to acquire?

The only way the Brewers’ Greinke experiment will prove worthwhile is if they challenge for a championship. He’s not exactly off on the right foot.

What can Milwaukee fans expect in Greinke’s first outing? Well, his past couple of weeks have been basically like spring training. He was on a pitch count and was trying to knock off the rust as if this were March.

He’s due to throw 90 pitches today. Last Friday he threw 75 pitches over 5 innings for Nashville, the Brewers’ AAA club. He struck out seven, but took the loss by yielding seven hits and two earned runs to Albuquerque.

More interestingly to Royals fans, the past met the future when Greinke faced the hot prospects of the Omaha Storm Chasers. Omaha chased Greinke from that tune-up in just the third inning. He gave up back-to-back triples to Lorenzo Cain and David Lough.

Ironically, the game featured many of those Omaha players Greinke just couldn’t wait around for. He asked to be traded in typically undiplomatic fashion, saying he didn’t want to wait around for prospects to develop. Neither Eric Hosmer nor Mike Moustakas dented Greinke, but they will likely get another crack at him someday.

The Royals’ pain of being spurned by Greinke has been diminished significantly by their better-than-expected start. And they can relish the fact that while Greinke has been on the shelf, the four prospects they acquired in the deal have been gaining valuable experience.

And most of all, KC fans can shake their heads in wonder at the latest twist in the saga that is life with Greinke. Do you think Dayton Moore was the least bit surprised that Greinke was injured in an ill-advised non-baseball activity? My guess is he breathed a sigh of relief, glad he struck while the iron was hot.

The Greinke experiment may still work out. Milwaukee has other solid starters. They currently rank third in the National League in average and slugging, and second in home runs. But they will have to conquer the rugged NL Central. My guess is Milwaukee fans planned to be several games over .500 at this point, not looking up at three other teams in the division standings.

The Greinke soap opera is always worth watching. But it won’t break my heart to see that it’s been moved to a different channel this season. Hope Brewers fans can stomach the drama. I, for one, am glad to be done with it.

He’s not gone, folks. He’s here for the entire 2011 season, at which point more negotiating will take place. Even if he does end up elsewhere next season, repeat after me, “It’s. Not. The. End. Of. The. World.” Personally, I like the Cardinals chances of getting an extension done once the season is over. But should that not happen, we will survive. Why? Glad you asked.

Albert’s been on the roster for 10 years, 2001-2010. During that time, we’ve won exactly one World Series championship, 2006. Ten minus one is nine. Nine’s the new six. Confused yet? Here’s what I’m getting at: Nine is a serious number!

Fortunately, “nine” has no impact on trying to rhyme with “thumbah”.

We’ve had the best player in baseball for a decade, and 9 of those 10 years, a team not named the “St. Louis Cardinals” won the World Series. Giants-2010, Yankees-2009, Phillies-2008, Red Sox-2007, Cardinals-2006, White Sox-2005, Red Sox-2004, Marlins-2003, Angels-2002, D-Backs-2001. We had Albert in each of those years and only won the World Series once?! Inconthievable!
Nine also happens to be the number of World Series championships the Cardinals have won WITHOUT Albert Pujols. 1926, ‘31, ‘34, 42, ‘44, ‘46, ‘64, ‘67, ‘82–nine different occasions when the Cards won it all, without Albert on the roster. Granted, those eras were more focused on pitching, speed…etc, and this era is more based on power-hitting RBI hitmen like Pujols, but as I just said, 9 other teams got the hardware in the past 10 years.

Ready for another nine? How about these nine teams: A’s, Giants, Red Sox, Pirates, Padres, Bluejays, Diamondbacks, Mets, & Royals. That’s a list of where Cardinal favorites went after playing with the redbirds. “Who?” you ask? How about Willie McGee, Matt Morris, Ryan Ludwick, David Eckstein, and Joe McEwing. (In fairness, Super Joe did have 6 plate appearances, wearing the collar with two Ks for Houston to end his MLB career.)

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing that would make me happier than for Pujols to be a Cardinal for life. It goes without saying that I don’t want that if it’s going to handcuff the team & not allow ownership to put a competitive team around him. I would love to go to games for the next 10 years and watch him make history wearing the birds on the bat. I’m just trying to make a point about this whole circus. It’s not like we’ve won 10 straight titles because of him, or only won titles when he was on the roster. His presence certainly helps, but when the Phillies won the 2008 World Series, they did so by defeating the sub-$44M payroll Rays (who won 97 games that year, btw). It’s baseball…not golf or tennis, where one man IS the team…not basketball where one guy can carry the team (even Jordan needed Pippen).

It takes nine. Nine guys, working in concert together, under the direction of good manager, a good front office, and a good ownership group, to have success. One man does not a team make. Nine, however, will do the trick. Coincidentally enough, nine may also be the number of years required to make Albert put pen to the paper next offseason.

This article marks Dathan Brooks debut here on I-70 Baseball.
You can read more of Dathan’s work over at his blog, “Good Morning, Good Afternoon, Good Night“

The 1985 Cardinals squad was the best Cardinal team Whitey Herzog ever managed. They fell just short, and Herzog would never get within 12 outs of another World Series championship again. Whether Don Denkinger’s call, the subsequent Cardinal meltdown both in that ninth inning and Game 7, the lack of offensive production finally catching up to them (they hit .185/.248/.269 in the series), or some combination of events led to their defeat will continue to be debated.

Although Herzog once described the locker room after that Game 6 as the most despondent one he had ever sat in, the Cardinals would eventually recover from this loss. It would not be in 1986; they finished 3 games under .500. Not that it would have mattered, because in 1986 the New York Mets won 108 games, tying the 1975 Cincinnati Reds for the third most wins in a season in NL history.

It would be 1987. That Cardinal team sprinted out of the gate, opening a 9-game lead over Montreal at the All-Star Break. They would stumble down the stretch, entering a key September series with New York clinging to a 1.5 game lead. But they took two of three, won the division, then held off the San Francisco Giants in the NLCS (thanks to back-to-back shutouts in Games 6 and 7) to reach the World Series.

Sadly that series ended like the one two years before, although the Cardinals took a different route to get there. In the first Series where the home team won every game, the Cardinals returned to Minneapolis with a 3-2 lead but lost Games 6 and 7. Even more excruciating, the Cardinals held early leads in both those games (5-2 after 4.5 innings in Game 6, and 2-1 at the same point in Game 7) but could not hold off the Twins. It would be their last World Series appearance for 17 years.

Mark McGwire

The 1987 team was also Herzog’s last foray into the post-season as a manager. The 1989 edition scrapped and clawed, but were unable to catch the Cubs. From there the club entered a mini-Dark Age of mediocre teams and bad personnel decisions. But like the Phoenix, the Cardinals would rise from the ashes of those early 90′s teams. Hiring Walt Jocketty before the 1995 season signaled the end of bad personnel decisions. Hiring Tony LaRussa before the 1996 season foretold the end of mediocre play on the field. The Cardinals surprisingly won their division in 1996, and although they sank back into mediocrity from 1997-1999, the acquisition of Mark McGwire helped keep fans interested. Once the new millennium started, the Cardinals embarked on a period of sustained superior performance unprecedented in Cardinal history.

Those of us who lived through that 1985 World Series will never forget it, but it did not haunt the Cardinals like, for instance, trading away Babe Ruth seemed to haunt the Boston Red Sox. The Cardinals recovered, and ultimately returned to their rightful place among the National League’s elite teams.