(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Good evening and welcome into another edition of Gateway to baseball heaven on your house, Daniel shop.adc70 with me as always. David Jones, that I pop editor, we've got a number of things to talk about David. But I think the big, the question I've got to start with is whether we start with the draft or if we hold it for later. - Ooh, that's a good one. Are you just going to tease that out there and see what happens or what do you do? - I want to see if you were going to shoot at me first. I mean, I can hold my thoughts for the end if I need to. This is your call. This is your show. I will just do what you say. - Well, I don't want to weather that storm. So we will go ahead and start with the draft. Cardinals taking JJ weather hold for in the first round, seventh pick. A guy that, you mentioned, you talked about the draft last week. I don't know, I mean, he was, he's drafted one one or he mocked at one one for at least for some in some mocks. And I don't know how much thought we thought he really would, we were hoping he would drop to the Cardinals. I don't know how much we expected him to drop to the Cardinals. - Yeah, I, you know, it was one of those things that Bizana was not going to happen. Condon was not going to happen. Like those were, there was a zero percent chance of those things happening. Weather hold was kind of in that, well, if you went back a couple of months ago, weather holds probably in that like, there's a 5% chance of this happening. And then it was suddenly like, hey, there's a 10% chance of this. And that was kind of shocking. As we got closer to today, it kind of was like, okay, maybe a 20% chance that he's there, but maybe there's also a 40% chance he gets taken number one overall. And right before the draft, Vegas was leaning towards weather hold being the number one pick. They had shifted from Bizana yesterday to weather hold today. So I thought, okay, that's probably what's going to happen, which would be worst case scenario because that really starts a domino effect that hurts the Cardinals, but here we are. And the man from Mars is a Cardinal. - Yeah, it was, now I will say one of the reasons I saw, 'cause I don't remember who shared it. But one of the reasons that the Cleveland was thinking about taking him at the first pick was in, at least in some part, because there was some idea that he would take less money. I think Brendan Schaeffer shared somebody, so much shared a tweet that showed that. Obviously, he's got the talent to be a number one pick as well. But, I mean, do you think that was probably part of the 1-1 talk was the fact that they could juggle their budgets a little bit? - I think that was part of it. - You know, Bizana, I think is the number one player overall. And you could maybe make an argument that maybe content should be there too. I could see an argument for either one of those. But it's not like with Weatherholt, you're getting some guy who's like maybe 25th overall. Or, you know, you're getting just like a college senior who has no other choice. Most people had him top four, top five usually at worst. So he's one of those guys that pre-injury, a lot of people thought he was the favorite to go number one overall anyway. So I think that's where Cleveland was probably looking. Yes, it was kind of an underslot deal, looking to save some money. But also knowing, hey, perhaps we can save some money, but also get a guy that when healthy is worthy of the number one overall pick. But, you know, it just didn't play out. And we won't know, we may never know if they were actually considering that, if they actually talk dollars with all the, maybe top four players. But when I heard Bizana going number one, I knew there was a chance. I didn't think there was a good chance, but I knew there was a chance. And sure enough, it played out. Yeah, and I think, you know, it was a little bit surprising to see the Reds take Burns at two. Which kind of put a little things a bit in the mix. Not a whole lot, because we did it all expect him to be probably gone before St. Louis got a chance to draft. Anyway, I think the biggest thing in listening to, you know, a number of different, a few different places, you know, listening to you, we've talked about it. Richard and Truman talked about it on the playing catch pod. But the idea that the A's were gonna go with a guy like Hertz, which, I don't know that would have got, I don't think anybody else in the top, maybe 10 would have taken him. I think that really sealed the deal to some degree of the Cardinals being able to get this big. Absolutely. And that's where, you know, I kind of tweeted about it today in a way too long thread. But by Bizana going first, it allowed this to happen because Oakland really was the turning point. Because Bizana doesn't go first, he might actually fall to fourth to Oakland. And then basically you've just got your board of top players going before the Cardinals pick. But a lot of the talk had been that Oakland was looking at either Montgomery or Kurtz at four. And the feeling was if one of those guys goes, then when the Cardinals finally get on the clock, you're going to have somebody like a Weatherholt or maybe a Smith or it ends up being Kaggleone who would have thought, or he went one before, but those are the three left leading into that. So you knew one of those three were gonna be there. And so you have to feel pretty good about that if you're the Cardinals, whereas, like I said, if Weatherholt goes first, this is a whole different thing. And my feeling is the Cardinals were probably drafting Bryce Rayner or Braden Montgomery at seven because their top six were completely gone at that point. But it fell the Cardinals direction. And I don't think you could ask for anything better, especially for a team that should have been top five according to their losing record last year, but ended up getting bumped to seven. I think it's pretty remarkable that they were able to grab Weatherholt. And I'll say I do think Cincinnati is going to regret the Burns pick over Condon. I think Burns can be a very good pitcher, but I think Condon could end up being an all-star and Burns may end up being in their bullpen. - Yeah, I mean, there's a long way to go on all these guys unless you're the Los Angeles Angels, you're not planning on bringing these guys up anytime soon. But yeah, I think that it's gonna be very interesting. It's gonna be interesting to see if the Reds gambled a little too much with their second pick. I don't know. I mean, if they didn't, that's a dangerous rotation for the Cardinals to have to face for a number of years, right? But if it doesn't pan out, then they might have a really solid back in the bullpen. That's probably worst case scenario for the Reds and that's not bad, right? I mean, 'cause the Reds could use any of that. Most teams could. So I think that's interesting, but the Cardinals get Weatherholt and it really kind of fits the profile of Randy Flores, right, to some degree. You think about Nolan Gorman, who was supposed to go well before the Cardinals could take him and he slipped. Jordan Walker, kind of the same type of thing. And here we have Weatherholt. It does feel like, when other people can do the job for Randy Flores, it really helps a lot, you know what I'm saying? When he doesn't, when there's some stars that are way overrated for the spot that he's picking at, it's really nice. Yeah, and you know, I've heard people say before that when it comes to drafts like this, you don't win your draft in the first round, but you can't lose it in the first round. You typically win your draft in the later rounds, because yes, it's great to get this one player, but it is one player. And you need to hit on other players as well to fill out your organization. So yeah, that really did help the Cardinals there. And, you know, the Reds, he burns may end up being fantastic, he may be, he may be tremendous. I'm a little worried about some of his stuff. And the thing is, yeah, he may end up being a Raldis Chapman or something like that out of the pin, but that's not somebody you pick with the second overall pick. Now I say this and he may go on to win some Cy Youngs, who knows, but the Weatherholt pick for the Cardinals, like this is a guy that I've watched for a while. I watched him in the College World Series against North Carolina, just seeing this hit tool over and over. And it sounds so cliche, but I just watched him and kept thinking, this guy feels like a Cardinal. He just absolutely feels like somebody the Cardinals would draft and develop. It feels like they've done it with the poor man's version of him in the past. I was thinking people always love to talk comps. And I'm not gonna say the Cardinals drafted Brendan Donovan in the first round, but it was kind of like one of those things like on Amazon's like, if you like Brendan Donovan, then you'll love JJ Weatherholt. I feel like maybe that a guy like Donovan, or maybe Tommy Edmund even do a lesser degree, they're kind of like the poor, poor man's version of JJ Weatherholt, but this is a guy. He's a hard-nosed player. He runs the bases really well. Defensively, he is getting better, but man, that hit tool is there. Some people have said he has the best hit tool they've seen in the amateur ranks ever. Others have said the best hit tool since Buster Posey. The guy can hit the ball and typically guys that hit the ball that well and have that hit tool. They're not necessarily bust proof, but they're more bust proof than the guys that have the raw power but can't make contact on off-speed pitches. - I was reading, of course, obviously he's a shortstop, but I was reading arm strength and everything that he might have been a fit at second base with probably any team, but maybe most especially the Cardinals, if that's a future possibility, I mean, 'cause again, you've got Mason win for at least another five years and you expect Weatherholt to be up at some point in time in there. Do you move him to second base to start or do you let him play a couple of years as short before moving him over? - Yeah, that's a great question and I think that's one that they've already tried to address a little bit. My thought was you just move him to second base and part of that is because of Mason win, which it's funny, typically with drafts and stuff like that, Cardinals fans are divided or angry. 95% of fans on comments on Facebook were pretty happy about this and the other ones were saying, we don't need another shortstop, this is a terrible pick, stuff like that. I don't think he sticks at shortstop, I think he becomes a second baseman later on, but it sounds like they are gonna let him play short in the minors. They've already talked about that a little bit and said that's where they're gonna put him, that's where he wants to play and okay. I guess there's not a lot of harm there. The only thing I was thinking about too with this is when a guy has bad hamstrings or a bad hamstring and he had the grade three tear, which we may get into, that's a little frightening. It seems like second base might be a little bit easier on that, especially for the long term, but yeah, I think I would go ahead and put him there. Maybe the Cardinals just wanna see his versatility and what he can do and that's a good chance to see if possibly they could move him to center field at some point. I don't think that's gonna happen. But yeah, second base I think is where he's going to stick and I mean, if this guy, if he stays healthy, if he is the guy that we think he is, you could see him and Mason win having a combo together for many, many years to come. - Yeah, I mean, Nolan Gorman moved to second base in the off season, after playing years at third. And granted, it's taking me a little bit of time. He's become a passable guy. It does feel like if the Cardinals want to maybe build in some good will or whatever the case may be, they can let him play short for you know, if he signs and gets into the leagues this year, which probably happens right, you know, play short this year, maybe play short all of next year. And then as he starts working it up, maybe there's a time where they start shifting him over because and I think at that point in time, you know, a guy is going to say, okay, I understand because this is the quickest path to the major leagues, if I move a position, especially if Mason William has has a solidified it. And I mean, there is still the possibility, right? I mean, I love Mason win. I think he's going to be a good for a long long time, but Mason win has only played not even a full season yet. I mean, there is a possibility that for whatever reason, they need a short stop in a year or two. I would be very surprised, but you know, yes, if you're preparing him as a short stop, then at least if you have a need for one, there you go. Instead of having to necessarily put like a Tommy Edman in there. - Yeah, you know, I think, yeah, it's one of those things that guy like him, Weather Holt, it's not going to be new for him to play second base or play short stop or play third base. Short stop, he just started playing this past year and really didn't even get to play it that much because of the injury. So you put him at short, and then if you need to move him to second, that's going to be fine. So maybe, yeah, maybe you're preparing to see worst case scenario or see what possibly could happen. You know, some of these guys are such great athletes like Mookie Betts, they're able to move all over the diamond. And so, you know, something could come from that, but yeah, I don't think it's going to set him back at all to put him at short stop and then possibly move him later because he is so accustomed to playing second base. I think that he is a good fit for this organization. He probably, I hate to say he'll be a fast mover because sometimes when you say that people think that that means that he'll be on the Big League club by the end of the year. And that usually doesn't happen unless you're an angel. But he's a guy that could be a fast mover because he has, he's handled a wooden bat. He hit well in the Cape Cod League in 2023. So he could be a guy that may be two to three years in the system and we see him in the majors. The one thing that we're probably waiting on a little bit is for the power to come on. And I think it will come on and be a little bit stronger as long as he stays healthy. But that's the one aspect of his game that I think has been a little bit delayed, but I think should have an uptick as he gets a little more strength training and gets in the cardinal system. - I wonder if you also look at the very big picture. And if you move Weatherholt second base tomorrow, assuming that's when they signed him or whatever the case would be. How much pressure does that put on Nolan Gorman? You know what I'm saying? 'Cause Gorman's had his struggles anyway. And then if you take this top pick and move him to his position, I know granted you're right. It's a year or two, three, whatever, until the Weatherholt gets there. But still you kind of put that in the back of your mind. Like because he has had some struggles, it's being very, very streaky and really having some down periods. You wonder if there's a psychological aspect to that, that the Cardinals are like, look, we're just not gonna mess with that. - It's a possibility. Yeah, Gorman has played better at second base than what I expected. It's interesting that it's, we don't really talk about his defense too much. We talk more about him just not hitting. We do know, I guess he could potentially move back to third base at some point, although I do wonder when guys have not played third base and quite a while in the majors, it's not exactly just the best place just to throw him. But he probably, I mean, he's a true DH, he really is. You know, pressure with some guys, pressure makes them push a little harder and makes them get a little bit better and healthy competition is good. And then there's other guys, when they feel that pressure, they seem to collapse a little bit and they feel like somebody's breathing down their neck and they don't do so well. I don't know which one of those guys at Nolan Gorman is. I hope that though, whatever the Cardinals do with Weatherholt right now is completely independent of what they're thinking on Gorman is. 'Cause Gorman's gonna be with this team for a while, we think, but I see him because he is a DH for the most part. I think that it could be apples and oranges to some extent. - Yeah, I mean, that's fair. I mean, it's very well maybe. I mean, there's definitely ways that they can play all these guys at the major league level. You just, I don't know, I wonder about giving somebody an extra thing, if you don't have to. I mean, again, if you think that it's best to move into second base, you move into second base. But again, we're talking about the fact that he could probably do that at any point in time in his development, then if you think that's an issue, then there's no reason to move him off short. But it may not be an issue. It's just something I was thinking about. I do think it's funny that we talked about in the off season about the Cardinals having too many second baseman and possibly needing to offload some guys. And then we get to this point this season and we don't have enough second baseman 'cause Gorman's the only one that can play it. And now we're talking again about the Cardinals having too many second baseman. - Could be, if the Cardinals didn't have too many of something, well, what were you doing here? You know, they've always got to have too much of something. So they did not have too much success in the first half. So I had to add something though. First half of the season is over now with the Cardinals losing today to the Cubs. And I believe there was 104 home runs hit today. I could be wrong, maybe a little bit off. It was, I don't know, it was an interesting weekend, right? I mean, you start the series with the Cubs by getting shut out by Kyle Hendricks because that's what happens no matter how bad Kyle Hendricks is. I think I think somebody pointed out he'd have it over at AD or if it wasn't for the fact these plays the Cardinals twice. Then they go and sweep the double header, scoring nine runs in the first inning of one game, coming back in the second game. And then they go out today and just, you know, everything Miles Michaels puts up there goes over the wall. I don't know if we got much of a feel. I would have liked to have won a little bit better, you know, taking the series and gone into the break with a little bit of momentum instead of this, you know, kind of a little bit of floundering. - Yeah, there was a point where we felt like the Cardinals starting to pull away a little bit in the wildcard and in the last week that has just collapsed for the most part. Now, today the Diamondbacks lost, the Mets lost and the Padres lost. So there's not breathing room, but the Cardinals are in a wildcard spot. And so compared to where they were earlier in this year at the 15 and 24 mark, yes, I will absolutely take that. I'm glad that they've come that far, but it does feel like it was a missed opportunity. The first game against the Cubs, just something looked off. The announcers on Apple TV criticized the Cardinals multiple times for lack of hustle in a couple of certain situations. And I hate to say it, but I kind of agree with what I saw. But then they come back Saturday and put up the nine spot in the first inning and looked like a completely different team. They have the comeback win Saturday night, which was pretty incredible. And then today, just, yeah, the Cubs defense was amazing today. The Cardinals defense didn't get a chance to show if they could play or not 'cause if all didn't stay in the yard, like you said, Michaelis was terrible, really, just to be honest. And so, you know, when we talked last week about what we were hoping their record might be, I think they ended up with one more loss and one fewer win than what we were hoping for or maybe expecting. And so I guess I'm not too disappointed, but it really felt like they had a really good opportunity here that they just kind of let go of. - Yeah, I mean, you know, the Kansas City Series is just weird because of the extra rain and putting a whole series into one day is just different. And they, you know, they had their chances in that game, that first game and let it get away. It's remarkable to think, you know, looking at these, at the standings, you know, they're four and a half games back at the Brewers, right? If they win today or win one of those games against the Royals, they're three and a half out and we're really looking at the division race, right? I mean, we're still looking at it at four and a half, but it could have been significantly better. That run differential doesn't, hasn't shifted, I don't think. I think the last time I looked, it was negative 38. It's again, negative 38, even with a big blowout win. - Yeah, I just, I don't know. It just, it, I rode over at the Substack yesterday and I don't know how much we, you know, we talked about how the schedule is gonna get easier and the Cardinals, yeah, when I rode about it a month ago, I was wondering if the Cardinals were gonna be able to take advantage of it 'cause it looked like they were that kind of team. It looks like they've taken advantage of the softer schedule, but I don't know how much of the fact that the Cardinals have been the best team since, in the National League since Mother's Day is a factor of that, right? That they've played a lot of weaker teams. They've played a couple of good teams in there too. I mean, they took two out of three from the Braves, so you can't, you can't fault that, but there were just a lot of teams that were under 500 and they didn't, you know, they won two out of three or they'd sweep a series here and there. I don't know, how much do you think the impact was of facing weaker pitching, facing what your team and being able to finally capitalize on some of that? - Well, you talked about how things might be different if they just played a little better against the Royals. They're one and six against the Brewers this year. You think just one more win or just two more wins, how much different things are, but you look at that and by that standard, the Brewers are a much better team this year than Cardinals have struggled with that. And so I think everything you said, it's a little bit of everything. I think that they've benefited from weaker competition. I think they've benefited from playing a little bit better. You went into a really deep dive of all the stats in your sub stack and I found it fascinating because there were things I thought in my head about, oh, they've been better in this regard that when I looked at the numbers that you present there, I thought, oh, no, I'm wrong. My perception is off on this. And so maybe they aren't playing better in every regard that I think, but the weaker competition has helped. They've had some luck where they've missed some of the other teams' aces during certain series. Didn't have to see skeins in that pirate series. And so I think that's kind of benefited them too, which isn't always going to happen in some of those. So just, I think it's a little bit of everything. Maybe being a little bit healthier. The defense had gotten a little better after being kind of rocky for a little bit. So I think it's just kind of a little bit here, a little bit there that's caused them to be better. I do think overall, they are a much better team than they were earlier in the season. It's now coming down to sustainability for the second half. And how does that stack up against the rest of the National League that's very eh, as well? - Yeah, I mean, it's possible that this team is like, well, we thought we were going into this season we thought they were an 86 win team. If they may be an 84 win team, right? Or something like that now. And that could be, but if they're at a talent level of an 84 win team, they may be able to win 88 games because of the way the National League is. Now, granted, they dug them so such a big hole that maybe that's a problem. But I don't know if I'm really explaining that well, but what I'm saying is that they're getting a little bit of a boost because of the teams that they're going to have to play. Now, that schedule gets harder when August comes around. I mean, there are some big teams in there, including Milwaukee. And so I guess we'll get a good chance to see, I don't know. I'm kind of holding my breath a little bit, I think, because I really do like what the Cardinals have done. And they have played better for the most part, but yeah, I dug into those numbers a little bit. And I was really surprised. I expected like, you know, the last month of baseball that this offense really clicked and, you know, and it hadn't done any more than the months before that. It's a lot better than it was that, you know, with that first stretch where they were just, you know, they're terrible and not winning anything. But the hitting and pitching has not necessarily just found another level. And that concerns me a little bit because I don't know. I mean, you see games like this with Michael's today, and you know that they're going to be out of this rotation. There's a good chance that you're going to get one or two of those a week. Right out of somebody either Lynn or Gibson or, you know, maybe Pilante depending on that fifth spot or, you know, occasionally even Sonny Gray. I mean, Sonny Gray pitched okay in the first game against Hendrix. He didn't have a chance because he was facing Kyle Hendrix, but he wasn't just, you know, it wasn't just lockdown dominant. As we have seen, we've seen him do, you know, he can, he can drop a zero one night, he can throw up four or five the next, you know. So I don't know, I feel like we've talked about this bit. This team isn't going to have trouble getting on a significant role. Like, like, you know, they've played a good stretch of ball obviously for the last two months, but they've done it in winning two of threes and, which is fine. It's great. I just don't know that this team can run a six game winning streak or anything like that because of you're going to wind up with one of those clunkers here and there. What I would love for you to do in your free time is to run those same numbers on every other team in the national league and have them on my desk by tomorrow. Because, you know, as you're saying that I'm thinking, is it the Cardinals or the exact same team they've always been? Just everybody else has really regressed as the season's gone along. Like, is that a possibility? And maybe it is. I maybe injuries have crept up on other teams. We've seen the Cubs be plagued by injuries that Lana's gotten hit by him. So that could be part of it. And, you know, there's another factor that comes into it too. It's weird to say this because something else you talked about. I'm going, you know, I do read your writing. Hopefully you can tell. I'm sorry. Is the the all-star game being as late as it is. We're not at the halfway point. That's typically what we talk about the all-star break. We're we talk about, oh, we're halfway through the season. No, we're we're well beyond the halfway point. We're so far beyond the halfway point that two weeks from tonight, we will basically be previewing the trade deadline. I mean, that is crazy to think that two weeks and two days from now, we're hitting the trade deadline. And this is coming after teams don't have games for the next four days. So we basically there's about a week and a half of games before teams have to really start making their decisions about being buyers and sellers. So you're looking at some roster reconstruction happening in the next two weeks. And that's going to change things too. And possibly it vaults the Cardinals into favorites still in the wild card or maybe even the central. Or if you see a team like the Padres or Mets or both of them do something crazy and trade the house to get an ace, it might push the Cardinals back a little further. So they have not separated themselves far enough. And they've not played well enough that I'm not scared about those big spenders sitting behind them and what might happen. Yeah, Cardinals will play 96 games right now. That works out to a 59.25% of the season. Basically, we're 60% of the season already. So yeah, once you get done with these next four days, things are going to come hard. And it is, I mean, it is kind of a remarkable to think that we're this close to that trading deadline and everything of that nature. And it makes for an important trade deadline, right? I mean, Allen and I were talking about Max Scherzer on the Meet Me Am usual. And then we found out Max has said at least publicly said that he wasn't going to wave his no trade. So that's probably not an issue. But, you know, to get an impact player like that, which is difficult to do, would have, I could make a big splash in this pool of mediocrity, right? I mean, it could be enough to really propel this team. I mean, you know, it doesn't feel like because of what the rest of the division is. And to be fair, what they've done, you know, taking advantage of what they've done, it would not take much to make this team a little bit more consistent, a little bit more likely to put together winning five of six or, you know, seven of 10 or something like that on a regular basis and cut into the ground that the brewers have, even the Braves have, and really make October a lot more solid. Yeah, that's a great point. It really could. I think it's going to go one way or the other. The Cardinals either are going to jump ahead or they're going to fall behind. And if the Cardinals just make mediocre moves, just they grab that starting pitcher with the 4.5 ERA, because he's an inexeater, a lateral move of some sorts really going to put them behind other teams. And so, yeah, they do have that opportunity. I'm just worried that they're, they don't have the capital to give up and other teams will, but maybe they'll be creative. I'm hoping for less of a hap, lesser deadline and more of a Quintana Montgomery deadline. Sometimes the Cardinals do find the diamonds in the rough that end up being something huge for them. I don't think you can expect too much from Steven Matt's coming back. I think Palante has shown what he is, the good and the bad, but I am, I'm concerned about the rest of the pitching staff because this week, we've seen pretty much every pitcher, every starting pitcher kind of implode at some point and not have a good game. And so, somebody, I say somebody, but multiple people have to get back on track. Hopefully, Sonny Gray and Kyle Gibson get their stuff back. If those guys can start pitching back to what we saw earlier in the season, plus you add somebody else, then yes, this team has the capability to really kind of take off and what they're doing. But yeah, it's going to require a move plus these guys making sure their pitching's back. And hopefully, the time off is actually going to help them do that. Yeah. I think you're talking about being creative. Do you think that if the Cardinals could trade for Kyle Hendricks and then give him some glasses that made it look like he was consistently pitching against the Cardinals, do you think that would work? I mean, because I think that, you know, that might be the solution to all those problems. That's an interesting theory. You know, I'm not sure if that's legal or how that would work. You know, they're not being rule against it. So I don't know that they ruled out VR headsets on. I mean, they're doing pitch comms. So I mean, it's just the next step, right? We know after that he threw that game he did, I fully expected Jake area and Ted Liddley to throw the next two games of the double header. I knew that that had to be coming. I was really shocked. They didn't try to sign them off the street or from the nursing home to do that. But yeah, Kyle, Kyle deserves to be in the Cardinals Hall of Fame for what he has done. He's definitely in the in the line of Aramis Ramirez and Pedro Alvarez and all those other Cardinal Kitzlers that have been around. But Norris until bud showed up in St. Louis. Yeah, it definitely does. Yeah, and I think when we get to this trade deadline, are you are you like me? I can only see them making one move. I don't know what it is. I don't know if it's a starter. I don't know if it's I mean, I think it should be probably a starter. But I don't see them adding a starter. I don't end a piece to the bullpen and the bench bat. I just I don't see all of that. Is that is that fair or do you think they've got enough in them to make it maybe even a couple moves? I think we'll see multiple moves. I don't know if they'll be of significance. And now sometimes moves that seem like throwaway moves like trading Sosa for Romero end up actually being pretty big moves for the team. And so there may be something along those lines. We may see the Cardinals, you know, a one for one to get a relief pitcher of some sort. You know, kind of a they call those, you know, hockey trades and hockey where it's a player that's up at the big time for another player that's up at the big time. Maybe there's something like that. So I think that we will see more than one. And some of this could be also if the Cardinals need to kind of flush the roster a little bit. If things are getting a little too crowded, if, you know, maybe Dylan Carlson's the one to go. But maybe it's more like a Tyler O'Neill O'Neill deal where it's kind of you may be trading him for a reliever to give him a better better scenery, but it's not necessarily for that starting pitcher you want. I expect to see a couple. But I don't I don't know what those will look like. I think maybe you'll see one semi major move, but everything after that will be kind of a so so maybe a guy that can help the bullpen, maybe not type thing. Yeah. And that's probably fair. I just I just looking at the pieces that the Cardinals have and you're right, they're gonna have to do something with this roster. You know, the on Herrera was activated and sent back to Memphis, in part, because apparently the one runner that you saw him throw out was probably not enough to get him back to to St. Louis. It really does feel like it's a situation where he needs to work on on the run game. And I don't think the Cardinals are going to, you know, even though he's proven he can hit the major league level, I don't think that they would trade him off. But I also think that, you know, not kind of dimensionless, but I've mentioned it before, it feels to me like Pedro Pajes is a much better backup than Herrera's because I feel like Herrera needs to be a guy that's playing regularly. If he can figure out how to deal with the run game, I guess, but and I don't know how that works in St. Louis, but we've talked about that ever since I signed Contreras, right? I mean, you know, Contreras and Andrew Kissner made sense because Andrew Kissner feels like a backup, a backup catcher. Contreras and Evant Herrera just doesn't make sense to me, even as much as you're deaching Contreras. But, you know, there it is. We'll see if that matters. I guess it's a trade demo. I am not convinced Herrera is safe. Now, if you trade him and Contreras gets hurt again, you're kind of in a mess because his bat sure did help out a lot. But I don't think he is safe, especially with what Pajes has done with guys like Jimmy Crooks at AA right now, that knowing that you could possibly have another backup type on his way at some point. I think that we could see Herrera gone. I think we could see Dylan Carlson gone. And as Ken Rosenthal talked about last week, teams are really hungry for big league talent, and that's where you may see a return. So if the Cardinals can get a really good starting pitcher that would involve Dylan Carlson and Evant Herrera, maybe it's a different outfielder of some sort, not Jordan Walker. I'm not trying to tease that. But just someone else, I think it's within the realm of possibility. Victor Scott II does not look like he's ready to come up anytime soon, maybe not even next year. But he is still knocking on the door. He's going to figure out Triple A. And so this team is pretty overloaded, not only without Fielders, but also with DH types. And so yeah, I think we might see the Cardinals deal from their surplus of big league talent, which is going to hurt because we've gotten to watch these guys know these guys and that could be a little uncomfortable. Yeah, I think it's gonna be, I guess it, you know, if they do make a move with Herrera, I guess maybe that tells you a little bit of what they think about Jimmy Crooks or somebody like that, that that's a guy that maybe could fill in soon. You know, again, this year, it's probably a problem. But, you know, then again, you know, you've seen Paul Hayes do pretty well, right as the starter. I mean, you don't want her contrast to get hurt again. And you hope that that's the case itself. But, you know, he held his own when when he needed to, not, not ideal, you know, but he seemed to be getting better the longer he played out there. So, you know, maybe you could get by with a pie is in a rough photo for two weeks if you had to. I don't know, I think that is going to be very interesting because I does feel like, of course, you know, we talked in the off season about the trades that we're going to make that were going to hurt. And then that didn't really happen. So, I don't know, but it does feel like they're good. I mean, when you're playing, you know, when you're playing baseball and you only get so many players, you've got to do something. And we've seen, you know, new bars back. We've seen what they don't wear. And now, Tommy Emman is actually playing rehab games. I still don't know that he's back until probably getting close to that trade deadline, right? It may be where the Cardinals make a trade. So, in part, because they need to get Tommy Emman on the roster. But they're going to, they're probably going to have to do something because they're not as of right now. And baseball is obviously fluid. As of right now, there's not a real clear way to get Tommy Emman on this roster unless you're going to tell Brendan Crawford, he can go home now. And they might, but I still feel like that feels a little bit like something they don't really want to do. Yeah, it might be the right choice. But, you know, we hear a lot of talk about leadership with this team. But yeah, Tommy Edman, you know, he went two for five today. So, that makes me think he'd probably played all night innings, or at least came very close. Springfield put up 16 runs today. So, I think that's all he was supposed to play. He was going to do five than seven than nine. So, it might have been a seven today with with that many runs. Yeah. And you know, now that I'm looking, there were some guys that got six at bats today. He all, he only got five, but yeah, two for five, three RBIs had a run. He's sitting 286. Now, extra base hits have not come yet. He's hitting a lot of singles, but he is playing. And of course, Jimmy Crookes had a home run today just to throw that out there a little bit. But he is on his way up. But yeah, Edman, you know, in my head, I think, oh, he should be back right after the all-star break. But this is his spring training, essentially. He has not played at all. He has not been able to swing a bat at all. So, it's going to take a lot longer than just a few games or even a week of games to get going. It may take him at least two full weeks, if not longer, just to kind of feel right, feel, get the feel, throw in the ball and things like that. But yeah, the Cardinals, unless something else happens, and you pointed that in your article too, that usually baseball finds a way, they will have to start making some decisions. And we're going to see some guys, they're going to have to get removed either really either sent home or some of them can be sent to Memphis. But yeah, they're going to have to start really kind of doing some things. And if Jordan Walker starts hitting the ball too, there's always that possibility that he gets called up at some point, or he's needed. So, yeah, we've talked about how it's not necessarily a bad problem to have, but it's still a problem that has to be figured out. And last year, they got into that problem by not being able to figure it out and having everybody out of position. So, this year, I think they're going to be much more intentional with how to handle it. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that does lend a little bit of intrigue to the trade deadline to see if they do move major league pieces. Because they're minor league depth is not to the point, I don't think that they want to, you know, to deal if they don't have to. I mean, you know, they'll move somebody, right? But these pitchers that they brought in last year, they're still waiting for them to kind of develop into something, right? We've seen some of them, and I think that they're going to be able to be a major league player, I think, to some degree. So, yeah, I don't know what they trade from when it comes to the minor league, so it may have to be the major league to draw a stir. And yeah, that will be an interesting thing to think about over the next couple of weeks. All-Star game this week, I know you are continuing to root for Ryan Helsley to not pitch in the game. Does that make an impact in the game? No. Well, yes, a little bit. I was happy to see him yesterday, knowing he wouldn't be able to pitch today and get a little more time off. You know, as long as he's not overused, which typically they don't do that in all-Star games anyway. But I just worry about a guy like him being so amped up and going out there and overthrowing and hitting 103 or something like that, and then his arm can't move the next day. Just that's the stuff I kind of worry about. I worry about the pitchers more in the all-Star game than I do the batters who are doing home run derby and messing up their swing. Just because I know that some of these guys, you're amped up, you want to prove to the rest of baseball that you deserve to be there, that you're one of the best, that you could strike out the best. And I just worry about guys overthrowing. But hopefully everything comes out fine. Yes, it would be cool to see him in a game, but at the same time, if he doesn't get in, I will be okay with that. Well, and you think about it, and without looking, but I'm just, I'm guessing here, you know, he didn't pitch Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, because he pitched, didn't pitch Friday, pitched in the second game Saturday, didn't pitch tonight. So he's pitched like once this week. He almost needs to pitch just to get some work in. So we'll see. I agree with you. You're right. There is the natural human tendency to try to want to do a little bit too much. The fact that the, I really do think the players, I mean, everybody looks at the All-Star game as this glorified exhibition now. I think that helps temper it, right? I mean, because they're not trying to go out there and necessarily, you know, lock down a huge save, because if they don't, oh well, I, I wonder if that at least impacts the mindset of it when you know it's just, hey, we're going out to have fun. And I know you want to prove it to everybody and all that, but, and he's, has he been before? I can't remember. I believe so. I think so, which also helps, right? I mean, once you've done it before, you at least know what's going on. Yeah, it is a little shame that they don't have some type of skills competition for other guys, kind of like the other sports do. I don't know what it would be. And NFL can get away with it because it's into the season, but it would be fun to kind of have something else. You don't want to do anything where a guy is going to get hurt, but let these guys show their personality. Like Ryan Helsley is an athlete. Like he, he truly is an athlete. It would be cool to see him involved in something. And again, I don't know what that is. But yeah, I think it would be fun to have something else for fans to enjoy other than just seeing the guys hit the home runs, which sometimes it's fun, but sometimes that kid becomes very tired and it feels like the same thing every year. Yeah, but you're right. I mean, anything with pitchers, you run the risk of so much, you run so much risk of injury, right? I mean, you can't have a fastest pitch competition because then somebody's blowing their arm out. You know, you can't have, I mean, you can have control, you know, you know, see if you can hit the corners of this, you know, display or whatever the case may be. But you know, even then, you know, people are, you know, you run the risk of somebody, you know, trying to throw a slider and, you know, blowing out an elbow or something of that nature. I mean, there's risk in the game, right? I mean, that is part of it. But when you're playing the actual game, at least there's, you know, that's what you're there for. I mean, you had this deals competition into it. It opens a whole can of worms that for baseball just doesn't work as well. I mean, it's not like the NBA where you can do the three-point shooting in the slam dunk and the, I don't know what else they do. Maybe rap battle in the middle of the game. I don't know. I can tell you've watched lately. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's the case. And you're right, football, I mean, football, nobody watches anyway. But, you know, you can do a little bit of that. Although didn't they, didn't they have somebody get hurt out there? And that's one of the trainees to flag football. I can't remember. Yeah, they've done some of that. And so yeah, which, you know, baseball, you could do fun things like what if you had carnival games and you had like Ryan Hellsley trying to like, you know, knock the clown over or something or you put somebody in a dunking booth and pitchers were trying to hit the target. You could do something fun like something goofy that would be enjoyable where they're not having to throw 100 miles an hour and hurt themselves. True. Yeah. Get one of those rigged fair games out there and see if they could actually, you know, get it, you know, give them the little thing to throw over the bowling pin that doesn't actually fit. And then I think more importantly, make them walk around with a big huge stuffed bear when they win it. So perfect. Yeah, that'll work. All right. We'll be back next week. Cardinals won't have done much. I mean, they'll have that series with the Braves coming out of the of the break. But hopefully everybody's getting a lot of rest. Hopefully, you know, whatever tweaking needs to get done, especially a guys like Goldschmidt. And we saw a little bit we saw a little bit more life are out of no one on our own last week or two, but both those guys could probably use the time off and they were probably no one will probably spend all four days staring at video and hitting in the cage. So how crazy is it that 47 minutes into the podcast, I think is the first mention of Nolan Aronato or Paul Goldschmidt? Yeah. I mean, that's the way of this season, right? It is. It is remarkable. They have to some degree. To some degree, the best case scenario for those guys is that they're an after thought because when people are thinking about them, it's usually because they've failed in a big situation again. And that's it's hard. And I don't know again, nobody knows the answer to this. I know that, you know, I hope that a little bit of a break and you know, some sort of recharge will have them coming out of the last 40% of the season stronger, but you know, I don't know that I would kill them on it. Yeah, you hope the rest helps them, but you almost wonder like in Nolan Aronato's case, if it's going to hurt him, like if he just found his swing and it's going to throw him off. Yeah, we've talked about it many times. Paul Goldschmidt, you feel like you're seeing him break out and then he goes right back into a slump. This week, we've seen we saw him miss two pitches, 88 over the middle. It crucial times in games that it looked like he was behind on 88. Yeah, hopefully there are better days ahead for both of them, a little more power for Nolan, a little more contact or hard hit rate for Paul. I don't know. This team may be relying on the young guys for the rest of this season and then going forward. I saw some stat and I don't exactly remember what it was, but it was basically like Paul Goldschmidt with maybe with runners on or runners in scoring position or whatever, and he had a WRC plus of like 18 or something. I mean, he's really terrible and maybe I'm excited a little bit, but it was not good. And then, you know, any other situation, it was a close to normal Paul Goldschmidt and that I think that's part of the problem too, right? I mean, especially since Goldschmidt is usually up with people on and that's when you wanted to see something else. I don't, you know, it is very strange if that's true and I'd have to really pull the numbers to double check, but I have no reason to doubt it. To see somebody have, especially a guy like Paul Goldschmidt, have so much trouble when there's runners in scoring position versus a regular bat. Yeah, we're just not used to seeing that with him anytime in his career. And it's gotten predictable. I've texted a friend before when he came up in a tight spot and I'm like, man, I hate to say it this, but I wish anybody else would put him was in this spot right now because he's either going to strike out or ground out to the pitcher, like, or ground out to shortstop. Just you just knew it was coming in. Somebody on Twitter called him in Nolan Aronado, like Egotistical Maniacs or something. I think they actually use words that were worse than that. Shut up. No, seriously, no one hates this more than Paul Goldschmidt does. The guy is the ultimate team guy. And from what you hear from the locker room, his demeanor has not changed. He is still leading. He is still helping younger guys. He's doing what he's supposed to do. And so I hate it for him because I love him as a player. I think he's a great person. It's just unfortunate. It's happening. I get frustrated when the results aren't there, but I never get frustrated thinking the guy's not trying because I think that's a total lie. Paul Goldschmidt with nobody on has a 726 OPS this year. With men on, he has a 595 OPS with runners in score position. It's 496. So yeah, I mean, there's, I mean, that's the thing. I mean, if Paul Goldschmidt is slashing 263, I mean, 299, 427, it's not great. But if he's doing that on a regular basis, we're not talking about the fact that he just stepped off a cliff. But it's the fact that he just basically, you know, almost incapable of doing anything with runners and scoring or running on much less than scoring position that is extremely frustrating. Yeah. You know, I don't even know how to account for that. I've heard some bad or say they struggle with guys on because they're, they get distracted. They're out of the corner of the ride. I see a guy or they say they don't want a player stealing because but I don't know how you account for that just for a guy like Paul Goldschmidt who's been in the league so long unless it's just bad luck, bad coincidence. I don't know. But it's not good. Yeah, it's not. So on that optimistic note, we'll call it a day. We will, like we said, we'll be back with you next Sunday after the brave series. And maybe we'll have some interesting rumors to talk about. You kind of feel like it's a chance for this weekend with people getting together in one spot down in Texas for the All-Star game. You know, maybe Ken Rosenthal or some others come up with some interesting possibilities. We'll have to wait and see. But until then, for David, I'm Daniel. Good night. Widespread stance, arms out over the plate. Bickford from the stretch, the 1-1 pitch, a swing and there goes left field way back. That's home run number 700. Paul's hits a three run homer and he hit 699 and 700 at Dodger Stadium on September 23rd, 2022.
