The Final Stretch

The next time the Cardinals have a day off (barring rain or something else strange), it'll start a stretch of six months without a game.  A series in Cincinnati starts tonight, then to Chicago, then back to St. Louis for Arizona (four games) and the final weekend against the Reds.

There were few that thought the Cardinals would be above .500 at this point in the season, much less that they'd played meaningful baseball in September.  Even now, a blazing run to the finish line could theoretically get them into the playoffs--4.5 out with 14 to play isn't completely impossible--but we know a team that just got swept by Pittsburgh and hasn't put any real extended winning streak together isn't likely to start now.

Most reasonable people, though, would consider 2008 a success.  Sure, there are things that could have been done differently, moves made or not made, but when the national press was expecting you to be the worst in baseball, being in contention late in the year is overachieving.

There's an article on the 2009 bullpen up at the PD today.  First off, I think it's great that the powers that be aren't wanting to go into spring training with a "competition" at closer.  Tony's competitions never seem to work out the way we as fans think they should, as someone that looks like they are winning winds up not.  Besides, this team has proven that they need to have bullpen roles locked down as soon as possible.

I will say that Ryan Franklin might want to rethink some of his wording, though:

"We're probably going to be young," Franklin said of next year's bullpen. "I'll have to do a lot of fathering."

I'm sure he meant in the vein of parenting and mentoring, but when I hear fathering, well, something else comes to mind.....

Today Braden Looper and Bronson Arroyo match up.  Looper has done very well against the Reds this year, only giving up two runs in 15 innings against them, including his complete-game shutout on June 11.  Historically, they've not done much against him, either.

Arroyo has gone three times against the Cards, fashioning a 1-1 record and a 3.93 ERA.  Last time the Redbirds faced him, though, he gave up five runs in 6.1 innings.  St. Louis has tolerable historical numbers against him.  Felipe Lopez has especially done well against his old team.

In other baseball news, the Brewers fired Ned Yost yesterday.  Will that stop their slide?  They are tied with the Phillies for the wild card lead, with the Mets just a half game ahead of the Phillies for the NL East title.  With a winning next couple of weeks, they'll make the playoffs.  Apparently ownership thought they had a better chance of doing that if Yost was gone.  He is reportedly pretty tight, which could bleed over to the players.  Plus the Brewer management probably didn't want a risk of another one of these ruining their season.




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