[情報] Five questions: St. Louis Cardinals
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/five-questions-st-louis-cardinals4/
Let’s get the no-brainers out of the way first:
Q: Will Khalil Greene bounce back?
A: Yes; he’ll be the down-order extra-base threat the Cards have lacked
since 2005. The franchise record for homers in a season by a shortstop is 16;
Greene will probably set a new standard this year.
Q: Was Ryan Ludwick’s 2008 season a fluke?
A: Yes, but so what. He can regress a long way toward the mean (to, say, an
.850 OPS), and still be a three-win player. As long as he stays healthy, he’
ll be an asset.
Q: Will the closer-by-committee work out?
A: It may not be a committee; Jason Motte appears close to winning the job
outright. But even if he doesn’t, among Motte, Chris Perez (slowed by a sore
shoulder this spring), Josh Kinney, and the always willing (if not able) Ryan
Franklin, the Cards ought to find a way to muddle through. They can’t do
worse than they did in 2008.
Those are gimmes; they don’t count against the five. So let’s get going w/
the Official Quintet of Cardinals Questions for 2009:
Can Chris Carpenter stay healthy?
This is the only meaningful question in this entire article, to be perfectly
honest. It’s the “Does God exist?” of the Cards’ 2009 campaign. If
Carpenter’s arm holds up, his team has an excellent chance at an October
afterlife; if he misses any significant time, then God, heaven and postseason
baseball will likely remain mere rumors to the Cardinals for another year.
Carpenter’s comeback from an Opening Day 2007 elbow injury has been one of
those patience-of-Job things. Since then, Carp has as many trips to the
operating room as games started—three of each. The main concern at this
point is the ulnar nerve, which was transposed last fall in his most recent
surgery. There also are lingering concerns about a nerve in Carpenter’s
shoulder, which (this is so hard to keep track of) is what curtailed his
comeback last August.
His performance this spring has been far more encouraging than the Cardinals
had any reason to hope. Carpenter has hit every benchmark for stamina, thrown
with velocity and command, and gotten stellar results (a 0.00 spring ERA
through 19 innings). He has reminded everybody what the Cardinals were
thinking when they signed him to that $75 million extension two years ago: He
’s the best Cardinals pitcher since Bob Gibson. If he’s able to stay in the
rotation this year, the Cardinals can only like their chances.
How many weeks does it take to learn to play second base?
Seven or fewer, the Cardinals hope. They released Adam Kennedy on Feb. 9,
eight weeks before Opening Day; a few days later, outfielder Skip Schumaker
reported to camp and started taking grounders at the keystone.
Up to that point, the notion of moving Schumaker to second made to sense only
to a tiny, earnest cult of talk radio callers and newspaper chat-room
posters. The guy last played infield eight years ago, at the University of
California-Santa Barbara, and nobody can cite an example of a successful
outfield-to-second base conversion at the big-league level. But why should
that deter the Cardinals? Their starting centerfielder, (Rick Ankiel) was a
pitcher until a few years ago, and their potential closer (Motte) was a
catcher as recently as mid-2006. Of course, those guys learned their new
trades in the minor leagues; Schumaker will have to transmogrify in the
majors. And he’ll have to do it in a matter of weeks, not years. So the
degree of difficulty on this reengineering project is vastly higher than
anything the Cardinals have pulled off to this point.
Things looked bleak early on. Schumaker made four errors in the first 12
games of the exhibition slate and manifestly could not turn the DP. But he’s
been pretty steady the last couple of weeks, mastering the pivot and showing
decent range to his left. Can he go the other way and turn grounders up the
middle into outs? C’mon, it’s only been five weeks; two more to go until
the timer rings. . . . .
Schumaker apparently will open the season as the Cards’ second baseman, but
the enterprise will remain on an experimental footing for at least the first
20 or 30 games of the regular season. If it has to be aborted at some point
(and there’s still a significant chance of that), Brendan Ryan and Joe
Thurston will take over while the Cards seek a trade or add a piece of
driftwood such as Ray Durham or Mark Grudzielanek. But suppose, against all
the odds, it works out? The Cards will have a vacancy at shortstop next year,
and a whole off-season to convert somebody from one of the other eight
positions . . . .
How many runs will the defense give away?
See the previous question. According to John Dewan’s Fielding Bible II, St.
Louis saved more runs with the glove than any team in the majors last year
except Philadelphia. But the Cards will open the year with new starters at
four positions— and unless Colby Rasmus beats out Chris Duncan for the left
fielder’s job, all four newcomers will be weaker defenders than the men they
replaced.
Last year’s DP combo (Kennedy and Cesar Izturis) saved 31 runs over an
average duo, according to Dewan; this year’s pairing of Greene and Schumaker
will be very lucky to break even. Troy Glaus had a great year with the glove
in 2008, but until he returns from shoulder surgery on or about May 1, some
combination of David Freese, Joe Mather, Brian Barden and Joe Thurston will
cover third base. For a team that relies so heavily on groundball pitchers,
the infield displacements could have a decisive (read: disastrous) impact. It
’s not impossible the Cardinals could lose 50 runs over last season on
defense alone.
Who’ll set the table against left-handed pitching?
This, too, is sort of a corollary to question No. 2. A major rationale for
shifting Schumaker to second base is to keep him in the leadoff slot without
denying at-bats in left field to Duncan and/or Rasmus. Schumaker had a .786
OPS while batting first last year, the best Cardinal performance from the
leadoff hole since Bernard Gilkey’s .813 mark in 1995. But against southpaw
pitchers, you don’t want Schumaker in the lineup at all: He hit .168 and
slugged .185 in 120-plus plate appearances against LHP last year
(.340/.393/.468 against RHP).
When they face a right hander, the Cards can bat Schumaker first and either
Duncan or Rasmus second, but against southpaws they don’t have any good
options. Greene (career OBP: .304) is one of the better candidates; the
others include Mather, Ryan and Ankiel (who handles left-handed pitching
pretty well). If the Cards struggle against left handers, they may have to
recall outfielder Brian Barton from Memphis (.374 OBP against lefties in
limited playing time last season) to get on base ahead of El Hombre.
Was Todd Wellemeyer’s 2008 season a fluke?
This is an undersold storyline. The Cardinals act as if Wellemeyer is just an
innings eater behind their front three of Carpenter, Wainwright and Kyle
Lohse, but in reality Lohse is the innings-eater and Welley (a.k.a. The
Colonel) is the frontline type. Set aside his six midseason starts from last
year, when he pitched through an elbow injury; he should have been disabled,
but the St. Louis rotation was already short-handed so Wellemeyer soldiered
through with reduced velocity and poor command. In his 25 healthy starts—his
first 13 of the year, and his last 12 (after the elbow stopped barking)—
Wellmeyer threw 161 innings and went 12-6 with a 2.96 ERA and an opponent
batting average of .228.
Given his elbow troubles and his career-high workload in 2008 (nearly triple
his previous single-season high), The Colonel seems like a good candidate to
regress and/or to spend time on the DL. But if he can repeat last year’s
performance, he gives the Cardinals a third potent weapon at the front of the
rotation. Wellemeyer’s overall 2008 line was nearly a carbon copy of Adam
Wainwright’s in 2007—the same line that made Wainwright the Cards’ Opening
Day starter and de facto ace one year later. Should Wellemeyer build on last
year’s success, rather than fall off from it, he could put the Cardinal
rotation into elite territory.
--
※ 發信站: 批踢踢實業坊(ptt.cc)
◆ From: 140.126.41.250
Cardinals 近期熱門文章
19
30
PTT體育區 即時熱門文章
