Rejoice! Cardinals Headed for Hard Times!

Continuing my NL Central preview, here is my view on the Cardinals. They have made little secret that they are rebuilding. Jim Edmonds is gone, David Eckstein is gone, Scott Rolen, and once again they have not been active in the free agent market. A few years ago, the Cardinals regularly brought in top talent through trades, and then signed them to long term deals (Rolen and Edmonds are the best cases of this). Ever snice their surprise championship in 2006, the Cardinals have been conservative with their money, preferring to live off of that glow, instead of pushing to repeat. Now they have probably the weakest lineup ni the division, even with having Albert Pujols at first base. With the starters scheduled to be Ryan Ludwick, Rick Ankiel, and Chris Duncan, the Cardinals outfield will have some power but have troubnle gettnig on base. The infield also is full of guys who can't hit; Adam Kennedy, and Cesar Izturis are the up the middle glove men. Troy Glaus is present at third. If he stays helathy, he will help. The Cardinals could really hit if everything is perfect, but that is not what a team should count on, and it's not what fans want to see either.

Juan Gonzalez (yes, HIM!) is in the Cardinals' camp, with a chance to make a comeback at age 38. It is exciting to think about his bat in its prime, but 38 is very old for a player with a bad back like Gonzalez has. His work ethic has been challenged in the past as well.

The Cardinals are set in only a couple of places on the pitching roster. Adam Wainwright is the best starting pitcher left, not counting Chris Carpenter, who is a great pitcher but is coming off of an injury. I think that as great of a manager as Tony LaRussa is, he needs someone to build his pitching staffs for him. When left on his own, he focuses on gettnig the most out of his pitchers and then turning it over to his bullpen. Everywhere that he has managed, he has come to a point of havnig too many six inning pitchers. Now he has created this problem in St. Louis too; the rest of the rotation is a real collection of oddballs and prayers. I'm talking about Matt Clement, Braden Looper, Mark Mulder, and Joel Piniero. None of these guys have been both healthy and productive in any recent year.

You can count on LaRussa to get the most out of his bullpen, and to fnid random guys and brign them to ERAs under 3.50. He does this year in and year out, in a great tradition going back to Dennis Eckersley, Rick Honeycutt, and Gene Nelson. Established closer Jason Isringhausen is back. I am confident that Tony can build a good bullpen with the players in camp.

But its not enough; the Cardinals now lack young, hungry position players, and good, young 200-inning type starting pitchers. Were Wainwright to hurt his arm, and Carpenter not to come back healthy, it could be a disaster in their rotation. As it is, I think the Cardinals will be around .500. Without LaRussa, it would be far less. But also without LaRussa, there would be more of an emphasis on rebuilding. This is why LaRussa eventually had to leave Oakland; he refused to rebuild and to play losing games today in return for bigger winnings tomorrow.