Thusly Boned

Yeah, I really came of age as a Cubs fan during the Harry era, but tbh he was hard to listen to most days. By the time I was in my mid-late teens (not long before his passing), I was already pretty over him. He was kind of charming, but also a hot mess, and I think that in that way he mirrored the product on the field. And not in a good way. Recently I've started playing random old games on YouTube while I am working, and it's a mix of potent (almost breathtaking) nostalgia and being shocked at just how rough Harry was most of the time. It's kind of like trying garbage food you liked as a child: the first bite or two really takes you back, but you kinda want to toss the rest. Better in memory than experienced again. Len has been my favorite for sure, and that likely had almost as much to do with the fact that his tenure overlapped the Cubs becoming consistently good as it did with how he called the game and his banter. But he and J.D. were a top shelf duo, for certain. I think Boog is just fine, it'll take some time to really appreciate him. It did with Len as well.

No way he's going for anything less than $200MM plus the posting fee, and most teams aren't going there. In a vacuum, maybe, but you have many teams in dire need of starting pitching, including just about all the major market teams. Barring something truly unforeseen, there's going to be a full scale bidding war, and the Cards (and most mid-market teams) are getting priced out. Probably early. And if reports are to believed, the Cardinals never even intended to shop at the top of the market.

Unless Nootbaar has $100MM or so to kick in, I doubt it matters. I just don't see STL getting in the neighborhood of what it is gonna cost.

Yeah, I listened to the "highlights" of that presser and it only reinforced my thoughts. I know a lot of Cards fans were certainly not reassured.

From an outsider's perspective, it seems like STL was a victim of their own success in recent years. For so long, their way of doing things (spending prudently, trading from their mid-tier of prospects, developing their top prospects) just worked out, and in 2023 the juice ran out, and there were no continencies. It's been coming for a few years, and really manifested last year. Their system hasn't produced any really good SP, and they've been reticent to spend. If they don't suddenly discover the willingness to really spend or to deal from their pool of top prospects, they're looking at another 4th or 5th place finish next year. Mozeliak can't afford to be risk averse at this point, but it sure looks like he will.

The Price pursuit is definitely an outlier, and they still lost. It's not just the $200MM+ it's gonna take, but the posting fee. I just don't see it. Whatever STL offers, someone else will offer more. Not only that, but living in STL, as you say. If Yamamoto comes to the central, I think it's the Cubs, who would almost certainly outbid STL, on top of being a better city, on top of the Cubs having a prominent Japanese player on the roster (for what that's worth, if anything). All that said, I think it's fait accompli that Yamamoto ends up in NY or LA, and lazy and cliché as that prediction is.

I like to think it's not just my bias, but I have Yamamoto to the Cards at near zero chance. Like 0.0001% He's 1 or 1a on the list of available SP, the Cardinals don't give big money to SP (historically) and all of the big spenders are gonna be in. I just can't see it happening; I'd be gobsmacked.

Yeah, it's not looking good for them. I see a lot of their fans saying things like "this is fine if we get Yamamoto/Snell", but that's just pure copium; they're not getting either of those guys. I see Mozeliak going after Gray/Montgomery and calling it a rotation at that point. Snell would be a reach, Yamamoto I don't see as even being a remote possibility for them. Maybe they trade for Cease, but their realistic TOR options are few. They're not swimming in the deep end of the pool.

Nah, I think the 1/2 is a more traditional, lower cost swingman. Signing Lynn and slotting him into the rotation just smells like Mozeliak move, and is totally in line with how he operates. Even if Lynn is the "1/2", I think it's less than they need. They needed two of the better starters on the market, and if this is how they are allocating their funds, I do not see that happening. Despite all their historical success, that is not a franchise that has ever spent real money on FA SP, and they aren't going to have the player capital to win trade wars this offseason. No matter how you spin it, Lance Lynn is a "settle". Aging, slowing fastball, little upside. But he'll eat some innings. My prediction is that the "major" additions to STL's rotation are Lynn and one of Gray/Montgomery, which won't be enough. If they have any sense they'll trade Goldschmidt for SP while he still has value, but I think there's zero chance they do.

Yeah, there are a lot of options on the market, and to jump on Lance Lynn this early suggests to me that they have no intention to be major players in the SP scene. If you're Mozeliak and your SP solution is Lynn and Jordan Montgomery or something, you have failed. They either need to spend a lot of money or get creative, and this seems to indicate neither. Still early, but again, I would not feel good about this start if I were a Cards fan.

Realistically, the Cards need at least two good-very good SP, and Mozeliak said a while back the Cards need "2 1/2" starting pitchers, and if this is one of those, I am more than fine with that. If I were a Cards fan, I wouldn't feel great about the message this sends; I would read it as them not being willing to play in the expensive end of the pool (which has been their M.O. with regard to SP).

I'm right there with you. I loved what Bellinger gave us last year, but my confidence he can continue that is...shaky. I wouldn't mind having him back, but at the numbers being tossed around, I'd prefer the Cubs steer well clear. I don't know if the Cubs will sign Ohtani, but I am becoming increasingly confident they'll make as strong or stronger a play as any other team, and certainly can buy that the Cubs are prioritizing that pursuit well above Bellinger's.

That seems fair, but the problem is that his actions for the rest of the season seemed like adherence to that statement, well past the point where it made sense to. If he had adjusted when things were on their way down the drain, you could more justifiably frame it as criticism of a statement made out of context, but he didn't. Everything he did after saying that sure make it seem like that is just his ideology.

I don't hate Ross by any stretch, but I saw/heard things from him last year, particularly down the stretch, that I really didn't like. The whole "going with who got us here" thing really smacked of the sort of dogmatic, old school loyalist ideology that I just can't stand. His seeming unwillingness not to use what was given him down the stretch was on clear display. There were a lot of red flags there. The bullpen management stuff was in large part due to not having much to work with, but he still rode guys into the ground rather than take chances just play the hand he was dealt. Counsell has a rep as a "player's manager" but also as being intelligent/analytical. Obviously we don't have the perspective of fans who watched every Brewer game over the last 10 years, but from what I've seen he almost always makes what seem like the best, most "obvious" decisions in the moment. I don't trust Ross to do that, particularly after what I saw last year. I just feel more confident that Counsell will be a more pragmatic and analytical decision maker than Ross on a day to day basis, and really that is best anyone can hope for with a manager, imo. Obviously he's going to do things that piss us off, but that's just a given with any manager. As far as assigning a measurable value to Counsell v. Ross, that's a unscientific endeavor. But I am pretty certain its at least a marginal upgrade, and as so many are fond of pointing out when it comes to players, it's not my money. And if the "message" it sends helps us in the marketplace at all, it will have been worth it based on that alone, imo.

I love this.

I don't care about that, even. Not much to work with right now. For me it's the body of work with the bullpen mostly, lineup construction, and in game tactical decisions. All garbage.

It's a middling team that managed to play itself into contention and was undermined by their manager. It's been said that a manager can't really do a ton to improve a team, but can do a lot to screw it over, and imo we're seeing that. I'm not furious really, as I don't think this squad had/has much postseason run in it, but looking to the future Ross isn't the guy I want to be calling the shots if we get some actually well constructed teams.

No question about that, but Ross has managed to bungle things pretty badly. I think you have to cut him loose so he's not in a position to screw things up when we have legitimately good teams. We can see how his mind works, and it's not great

Chill out Sulley, it's not that bad

Our playoff chances were lost in that stretch against Colorado, Arizona, and Pittsburgh (where almost every pitching matchup heavily favored the Cubs), no doubt. And Ross steadfastly doing his "sticking with the guys that got us here" schtick.

And yet didn't call for the obvious safety squeeze earlier in the game. It's like he's optimized to make bad decisions.

I was fully prepared to see the Cubs lose 2 of 3 this series, or even get swept, but not quite this way. And horsefeathers Ozzie Albies, that guys just never fails against us.

That lineup is a murder machine

Ross is addicted to his guys. It's disgusting. I really don't want to hate Rossy, but we're getting there.

Now that I am looking at the exit velos, it seems like a fair bit of bad luck. Still really annoying, though.