Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Better Options Don't Equal Good Options

By: Dustin



An astute commenter read my recent post and pointed out that he took some umbrage with my assessment of the Cardinals' bullpen. He asserted that the bullpen would be OK now that Mitchell Boggs has assumed the closer's role following the inevitable implosion of Mitchell Report darling Ryan Franklin.

Two things came to mind when I read this:


  1. Holy shit, somebody commented on a post! Even though it's one of our very best friends and probably the only fucking person to read this blog, at least I said something interesting enough to actually elicit a response. I find as many opportunities to pat myself on the back as humanly possible.

  2. I don't really think the Cardinals' bullpen will be OK, at least not the back end. As I said in the comments section of that particular entry, citing the low St. Louis bullpen ERA is not necessarily relevant to its ability to close out tight wins. I maintain the Cardinals don't seem to have anybody on their roster with the right stuff to be an effective closer. Boggs is already sporting a brand new chink in his armor after last night's bed-wetting in Houston.



I won't lie to our seven readers; nothing warms the cockles of my heart quite like watching a St. Louis sports team take gut-wrenching losses. I know the Redbirds are tied for first place in the NL Central, but we've already covered just how little I think that means. Personal bias aside, however, I think the above points are made free of slant.

If St. Louis wants its true best option in the stopper role, it had better go ahead and let this Eduardo Sanchez start closing games. In his very limited MLB experience, he has shown better stuff than anyone else on that roster. Yes, he's a rookie, but I don't know how he's going to hurt the team any more than the current choices already have. Besides, look how well your last rookie closer worked out. I seem to remember him closing out the 2006 World Series.

3 comments:

Roberts said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Roberts said...

I still maintain that defense is the Card’s biggest issue. Boggs didn’t get the job done Tuesday. However Freese committed a costly error in the 6th that eventually lead to 2 runs and more importantly an early exit for Garcia. Boggs had some shitty luck that lead to a bases loaded with 1 out jam. Boggs got the ground ball he needed but unfortunately the defensive liability at SS didn’t have the range to get to it. A blown save is a blown save but he is still capable of doing the job.

Last night Berkman(No idea why he was still in the game with Rasmus available) missed what should have been an out in right field. Fortunately Sanchez is good enough that he managed to survive and close it out.

But I suppose my point is that poor defense has contributed to many of the blown saves this year. And it’s also been a big contributor to many of the losses that weren’t due to blown saves. It’s tough for anyone to close out games when the defense can't get the job done. Box scores don’t show it but shitty defense has been this team’s biggest weakness and if it doesn’t improve that’s what will cost them the division.

Unknown said...

worst ss/2b combo in the league

*sexson-til-im-dunn*