Westbrook to Cards, Ludwick to Pads.

[Little Slide Rooter]

Cardinals Close To Jake Westbrook Trade

By Tim Dierkes [July 31 at 10:19am CST]

The Cardinals are close to acquiring starter Jake Westbrook from the Indians, tweets Paul Hoynes of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Westbrook is scheduled to start against the Blue Jays a few hours from now.

 

[expletive] the Cards. Can we just send the Reds Ted Lilly and wnything else we can give them to blow the Cards out of the water? I just hope that the Indians can bend them over like they did for DeRosa.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Little Slide Rooter

[Magnetic Curses]

Cardinals Close To Jake Westbrook Trade

By Tim Dierkes [July 31 at 10:19am CST]

The Cardinals are close to acquiring starter Jake Westbrook from the Indians, tweets Paul Hoynes of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Westbrook is scheduled to start against the Blue Jays a few hours from now.

 

[expletive] the Cards. Can we just send the Reds Ted Lilly and wnything else we can give them to blow the Cards out of the water? I just hope that the Indians can bend them over like they did for DeRosa.

 

jake westbrook is just a guy.

[Little Slide Rooter]

Padres, Cardinals, Indians Discussing Deal Involving Ludwick, Westbrook

By Tim Dierkes [July 31 at 11:08am CST]

11:08am: Joel Sherman of the New York Post tweets that he thinks the Padres have fallen out of this deal and it's just going to be the Cardinals and Indians dealing.

 

10:58am: Krasovic tweets that a three-team deal is pending the union's OK: the Padres get Ludwick, the Cardinals get Jake Westbrook and a Padres prospect, and the Indians get prospects.

 

10:39am: The Padres are deep in talks with the Cardinals for outfielder Ryan Ludwick, tweets Tom Krasovic of AOL FanHouse. The Cardinals were not known to be willing to discuss Ludwick, but perhaps the strong play of Jon Jay swayed them.

 

Ludwick, 32, has settled at a level between his stellar '08 and disappointing '09 seasons. He's under team control for next year, and we know the Padres prefer to get more than a rental.

 

Could be a 3 way deal with Ryan Ludwick going to the Pads.

 

Westbrook may not be Roy Oswalt, but when put in the 4 slot behind Carpenter, Wainwright, and Garcia, thats a hell of a rotation.

[MWV]

Fits the Cards M.O. Pick up a guy who's putting up pedestrian numbers immediately following major arm surgery.

[bleedingblue]

Done deal according to Heyman.

 

Ludwick to the Padres, Westbrook to the Cardinals, Prospects to the Indians.

 

[NonProfitCow]

That is so [expletive] bad I still can't wrap my head around it.

[Butterscup1679666578]

Yeah this is a strange trade.

[mookie]

As long as Jon Jay keeps hitting, this is a really good trade for the Cardinals.

[Butterscup1679666578]

Doesn't he have an absurdly high BABIP?

[Rob]

That is so [expletive] bad I still can't wrap my head around it.

 

I wouldn't have made the move, but I don't see it as making a huge difference.

[Outshined_One]

Doesn't he have an absurdly high BABIP?

 

Not at all. It's perfectly normal for a rookie to have a .396 batting average.

[NonProfitCow]

Doesn't he have an absurdly high BABIP?

 

Not at all. It's perfectly normal for a rookie to have a .396 batting average.

A .446 BABIP and 16.1 LD% seems perfectly normal to me.

[mookie]

Surely he is hitting above sustainable currently, but how much is the fall off? His minor league track record is pretty solid as far as batting average. As long as he doesn't go 0 for 60, they should be okay.

[KaiserCesar]

His strikeout rate is only around 15% and he is showing decent power that isn't inflated by a high HR/FB, so he'll probably be pretty solid even with regression.

[NonProfitCow]

His strikeout rate is only around 15% and he is showing decent power that isn't inflated by a high HR/FB, so he'll probably be pretty solid even with regression.

now look at his minor league career

[KaiserCesar]

His strikeout rate is only around 15% and he is showing decent power that isn't inflated by a high HR/FB, so he'll probably be pretty solid even with regression.

now look at his minor league career

 

He made good contact in the minors and had a good walk rate, but what really has jumped in the majors is his power which wouldn't be unprecedented at age 25 or so. I'd say a career 800 ops player in the minors without strike zone issues has a good chance of being 'pretty solid' as I described.

[Guest]

Well he's going to be a fair bit worse than Ryan Ludwick going forward. Almost so much that it neutralizes the gains they get by adding Westbrook over Suppan/Hawksworth.

 

Not a great move for the Cards. Nothing that's going to kill them or anything, but they didn't make themselves much better at all.

[Formerly Snayke]

This is Tony La Russa meddling (and a stingy owner) at its finest I hate saying that because it's such a cliche, but it's like TT said -- Jay's loss and Westbrook's gain will cancel each other out. St. Louis is so convinced that they need pitching that they completely overpaid for someone coming off Tommy John surgery. I was never opposed to trading Ludwick, but not for Jake Westbrook. That's just [expletive].

[mul21]

I think one of the bigger upsides of this trade for the Cards is saving their pen a bit. With Garcia's innings being limited and Suppan and Hawksworth just bad, they really needed another guy to eat some innings to allow them to have a chance late in the 2nd half instead of a completely gassed pen. I'm not saying this is a great, or even good, deal for them, but it's got some merit.