Big Day In Cardinal Nation

Today's the day that Cardinal fans have been anticipating since the end of the season.  We knew that Colby Rasmus wasn't going to get the Rookie of the Year award.  We knew that Tony LaRussa might make a good showing, but he wasn't going to win the Manager of the Year award.  We know that Albert Pujols is taking home MV3 (to pull out an old term and totally misuse it) next week.

But Cy Young.  There's intrigue.

Even though the odds are in favor of a Cardinal winning the award, it's still strongly possible that both will be shut out.  Tim Lincecum had an outstanding year for the Giants, taking home the Baseball Bloggers Alliance version of the Cy.  While it'd be disappointing to St. Louis faithful if the Giant hurler took home the prize again, I don't think anyone could get real up in arms about the unjust robbery of our hometown heroes.

If Lincecum doesn't win, though, who will?  Bernie Mikalsz picked Chris Carpenter with his ballot, and I will say his argument is a very strong one.  As I'm working on my Cardinal Blogger Awards post for tomorrow, I'm really going back and forth on the Pitcher of the Year selection.  Both Carpenter and Adam Wainwright have amazing cases and it's one of the things that made this year so exciting and fun, watching them go out there every time and put up a great game.

Matthew Leach said in his UCB Radio Hour appearance that he thought Wainwright would get the nod from the writers, especially since he led the league in wins and had the peripheral numbers to go along with it. I'd kinda like to see Waino get the award, because he was the bedrock of the rotation all year long. You knew he was going to go out there, give you a good game, and was going to go as deep into the game as possible.  Perhaps in anticipation of AW getting the Cy, Derrick Goold has a great story on him and where he grew up.

Even though it wasn't my hosting week, I spent some time (quite a bit of time, really!) talking to Nick and Josh from Pitchers Hit Eighth last night on the weekly show.  Before I jumped on board, though, they talked about the news that the Cardinals had added eight players to the 40-man roster, protecting them from the upcoming Rule V draft.

You can find the list of those players here if you've not already read about it elsewhere.  There weren't too many surprises, though I do think the fact that they kept Mark Hamilton was a little surprising, just because of his limited use for the Cardinals.  That said, he might be a good trade chip, someone people are asking about, and so you don't necessarily want to just give that kind of player away.  Other than that, it was pretty standard and it'll be interesting to see how many of these players make it to St. Louis sometime in 2010.



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Also on the Network: √ 2009: The Curse Of Shea Stadium [Loge 13] √ Braden Looper: Now More than Ever! [El Lefty Malo] √ The Ballad of Ricky-Bobby: March Madness [Tremendous Upside Potential] √ Playing Pepper 2010: Oakland Athletics [C70 At The Bat] √ Book Review: Joe Cronin, A Life In Baseball [C70 At The Bat] √ Happy Birthday, Loge 13 [Loge 13] √ Things to Read: 3/11 [Tremendous Upside Potential] √ The Farm Team to Watch [El Lefty Malo]

Part of the show was to discuss what next year's Redbird roster might look like.  While you can listen to most of my thoughts there and we didn't get into the bench, I wanted to put down what it might look like if the Cardinals did go out and use the Matt Holliday money for pitching and other hitters.  As I mentioned, I was intrigued by the thought of Chone Figgins and I'd love to see Rich Harden (though, of course, there's injuries to worry about there).  If you got those two, you might see:

Schumaker
Figgins
Pujols
Ludwick
Rasmus
Molina
Craig
Pitcher
Ryan

I could see Tony LaRussa reverting back to having the pitcher in the eighth slot (which would meet with Nick and Josh's approval) to try to increase offensive production.  There's not a lot of power in this lineup, though you have to think that Rasmus could take another step toward being a full-time productive player after a year of experience.

Carpenter
Wainwright
Harden
Lohse
Garcia

The rotation would be pretty interesting as well.  Harden is one of those wild-cards.  When he's healthy, he's just about unhittable, so that'd be a dominating top three, and if Kyle Lohse was able to rebound from his jinxed year, it could easily be the best rotation in the majors.  That said, you figure Carp and Waino will tail off some from this year and who knows just how many innings you can get out of Harden.

Hawksworth
Franklin
Miller
Reyes
Motte
McClellan
Boggs

Blake Hawksworth probably takes over Brad Thompson's old role of occasional starter, though he looks like he'll be a better all-around pitcher than Thompson has been the last couple of years.  It's still a fairly young bullpen, but it's tested.  The key will be Ryan Franklin.  If he stumbles, there's no definite replacement.  I'd guess Jason Motte would get the first crack.

On paper, this roster would be intriguing.  It would definitely win from the mound and not necessarily from outslugging everyone, though if you can consistently put players on in front of Albert Pujols, you can put up some crooked numbers.  I don't know that I'd be completely comfortable with this, but I think I could live with it.

CBAs tomorrow.  Oh, and if you are a Twitterer, you might want to check out Fake Mike Shannon!