Blogs By FansC70 At The Bat
Sponsor


Cardinals_WideSkyscraper.jpg

Baseball Schedule is your best source for the latest St Louis Cardinals Schedule information as well as keeping up with division rivals including Cubs Schedule, Reds Schedule, Brewers Schedule and Astros Schedule.

Bet on the Cardinals with Sports Interaction's MLB betting lines


Slots Galore Casino Tournaments

Get your tickets from Bubba! Cheap St. Louis Cardinals Tickets and more, including tickets for the next MLB All-Star Game. Bubba's got Boston Red Sox Tickets and New York Yankees Tickets

Authentic, large selection of Cardinals memorabilia, guaranteed and certified.

Subscribe
RSS Feed

Archives

Players

Categories


Alliance tickets has an extensive inventory of St. Louis Cardinals Tickets , Colorado Rockies Tickets, San Francisco Giants Tickets and Seattle MarinersTickets.

With all of the St Louis tickets out there, Cardinals tickets and Rams tickets make for great presents. GoTickets.com can fill all of your sports tickets needs, just check out our testimonials!

Scrooged

Posted on December 13, 2010 at 10:26 AM
Filed Under: St. Louis Cardinals
My thanks to all that read and expressed such kind things about my recent foray into parody writing.  Unfortunately, one of those that did not read this (apparently) was Mr. John Mozeliak, because he completely gutted the piece by trading Brendan Ryan yesterday.

Everyone has immediately jumped all over Tony La Russa for this move, which may be the accurate reaction.  However, I find it pretty interesting that TLR had reached out and invited Ryan to his house in the next day or so to have lunch and talk about things.  I don't think La Russa has done that for the other doghouse veterans that he'd run out of town, such as Scott Rolen or Anthony Reyes.

Then there is this quote from the GM.

"Changing the culture of the clubhouse was important to us.  Given the personalities involved, we felt this an appropriate way to make a change."

If we accept the premise that everything is done through the filter of keeping Albert Pujols happy and when you factor in that at least one teammate has anonymously suggested that Ryan needed to focus on his job a little more, could it be more that AP didn't mesh with Ryan rather than TLR?  Granted, I'd think it'd be hard to get along with one and not the other, but it's a possibility.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting that Pujols called up Mozeliak and said, "He goes or I go" or "Ship him off now" or anything of that nature.  I just wonder if it was pretty obvious in the clubhouse that Pujols (or, to be fair, any of the big guys such as Matt Holliday or, as would be expected from the televised lecture, Chris Carpenter) really didn't get along with that extremely hyper and bouncy personality, especially when the team was struggling.

Whatever the case, the team can say all they want about what they received in return, but the chances of a guy with those kind of numbers ever making the Cardinals is really slim.  You just have to wonder what the Padres were offering last week that made the club turn them down.  Right now, the proverbial bag of baseballs is more valuable than a wild flamethrower that gets rocked in the lowest of minors.  You'd think he'd have been successful there just by reputation, because if he could get anything over the plate, it wouldn't have been hit often.

It seems like the team is set for 2011, save the backup catcher.  Now, I'd argue that with a payroll that is already too high for the team, apparently, using Bryan Anderson as a cheap and effective backup would make logical sense.  However, besides the fact that logic went out the window when they kept Skip Schumaker at second base in all these maneuvers, it appears that at least one starter, according to Matthew Leach on Twitter, doesn't care for throwing to Anderson.

In which case, their pursuit of Bengie Molina wouldn't be a bad thing.  First of all, you never go wrong with doubling your Molina supply.  Secondly, B. Molina's bat off the bench would be a wonderful thing.  I know he's slowed down some, but he's still provide more offense than we are used to in that regard, which might allow TLR to actually rest Yadi on occasion.

We'll have to see how things shake out, whether Yadi can talk his brother into it over the Christmas holidays, but it's at least something to get the taste of the Ryan trade out of our mouths.


Leave a comment




2 Comments

2 Comments | Leave a comment

user-pic
Tom | December 13, 2010 12:39 PM | Reply

A telling sign though was an un-named current Cardinal player said that it "isn't a bad thing Brendan was traded, he needs to take his job a more seriously".

Players were not enamored with him. Plus he is 29 years old and if he hasn't gotten it by now, will he ever?

user-pic
Ruly | December 13, 2010 1:56 PM | Reply

OK, first of all... Benjie Molina has slowed down some? He was already slower than a broken sundial. The only thing slower than that is standing still. :)
Secondly, I'm one of those who firmly believes TLR had a hand in Ryan's departure. History has shown us that if you try to cross swords with Don La Russa, your days with the Cards are numbered. I'm not necessarily saying trading him is a bad thing, but if/when Theriot goes down with an injury, or fails to produce as is hoped, the team may wish they still had Ryan as insurance. Just sayin'....

Leave a comment




Cardinals_MediumRectangle.jpg

UCB_11_trans_dark_sm.png

Search



BallHyped Best Sports Blogs Book
This blog was featured in the Best Sports Blogs of 2010 Book!
• Pick up the limited print edition
• Free Best Sports Blogs ebook 


United Cardinal Bloggers

FRIENDS OF THE UCB


Download the iPhone or Android UCB app by clicking on the nice orange picture.
Open in Mobile App 

And check out the UCB Network over at LockerDome!
lockerdome-share_63x63.png
  



Other Cardinal Blogs

Recommended Cardinal Forum

Other Cardinal Sites

General Baseball Blogs/Sites



Heroes
Matt Holliday (5)
Matt Carpenter (4)
Rafael Furcal (4)
Carlos Beltran (3)
Jaime Garcia (3)
Jon Jay (3)
Kyle Lohse (3)
Lance Lynn (3)
Yadier Molina (3)
David Freese (2)
Adam Wainwright (2)
Lance Berkman (1)
Allen Craig (1)
Shane Robinson (1)
Fernando Salas (1)
Jake Westbrook (1)

2011 Top Hero: Lance Berkman (24)
2010 Top Heroes: Matt Holliday and Albert Pujols (24)
2009 Top Hero: Albert Pujols (28)
2008 Top Hero: Albert Pujols (25)

Goats
Matt Holliday (4)
Carlos Beltran (3)
David Freese (3)
Jaime Garcia (3)
Jason Motte (3)
Marc Rzepczynski (3)
Adam Wainwright (3)
Rafael Furcal (2)
Tyler Greene (2)
J.C. Romero (2)
Fernando Salas (2)
Mitchell Boggs (1)
Matt Carpenter (1)
Tony Cruz (1)
Daniel Descalso (1)
Jon Jay (1)
Erik Komatsu (1)
Kyle Lohse (1)
Victor Marte (1)
Eduardo Sanchez (1)
Jake Westbrook (1)

2011 Top Goat: Ryan Theriot (12)
2010 Top Goat: Brendan Ryan (14)
2009 Top Goats: Rick Ankiel and Todd Wellemeyer (13)
2008 Top Goat: Troy Glaus (13)

2012 Happy Flights
Happy Flights: 7
Happy Flight Opportunities: 12
Happy Flight %: 58%

Through 5/20

    Cardinal Nation Approval Ratings (March 2012)
    Adam Wainwright 91.9% (down 2.8%)
    Chris Carpenter 90.1% (up 3.2%)
    Lance Berkman 88.6%
    Tony La Russa 88.2% (up 17.4%)
    Yadier Molina 87.4% (up 3.7%)
    Matt Holliday 87.3% (down 3.8%)
    David Freese 85.5%
    John Mozeliak 85.4% (up 13.3%)
    Mike Shannon 85.3% (up 0.4%)
    Jose Oquendo 84.7%
    Derrick Goold 82.8% (down 5.0%)
    Mark McGwire 82.6% (up 20.1%)
    John Rooney 81.5% (down 2.8%)
    Mike Matheny 81.1%
    Bill DeWitt 79.8% (up 8.8%)
    United Cardinal Bloggers 78.9%
    Skip Schumaker 73.3% (up 9.2%)
    Jim Hayes 71.9% (down 4.2%)
    Jon Jay 71.1%
    B.J. Rains 69.5% (down 0.9%)
    Kyle Lohse 68.9% (up 13.8%)
    Dan McLaughlin 68.0%
    Joe Strauss 67.7% (up 10.2%)
    Ricky Horton 67.5% (down 1.6%)
    Al Hrabosky 66.4% (up 3.2%)
    Albert Pujols 54.9% (down 45.5%)
    Colby Rasmus 46.5% (down 35.3%)

    2011
    Dave Duncan 87.9% (up 0.9%)
    Matthew Leach 85.5%
    Pop Warner 76.7%
    Ryan Franklin 72.8% (up 3.1%)
    John Vuch 68.9%
    Jeff Luhnow 66.4%
    Dan Lozano 58.7%

    2009
    Rick Ankiel 83.9%
    Chris Duncan 69.1%


    Looking for St. Louis Cardinals Tickets?  TicketCity is your source for New York Yankees Tickets and World Series Tickets.

    Looking for Cardinals tickets? Stop by OnlineSeats. We’ve got Blues seats and even Rams games. Go to the coasts as well and catch a Celtics game or get Dodgers tickets.

    Referrals