Rotating Redbirds

I said earlier I'd put up a look at the off-season moves of the St. Louis Cardinals, and so here we are. Trouble is, I don't live anywhere close to St. Louis, so my knowledge of the Cards as an organization is nowhere near as complete that of the Red Sox. I probably won't go over every move, but I'll give it my best, so here we go.

Let's begin with a handy look at who's come and who's gone (special thanks to www.cardsclubhouse.com, a great message board and Redbird fan community):

In:
Junior Spivey (2B)
Juan Encarnacion (OF)
Brian Daubach (U)
Sidney Ponson (P)
Deivi Cruz (2B)
Braden Looper (RP)
Ricardo Rincon (RP)
Gary Bennet (C)
Larry Bigbie (OF)

Out:
Einar Diaz, CLE
Reggie Sanders, KC
Mark Grudzielanek, KC
Abraham Nunez, PHI
John Mabry, CHC
Ray King, COL
Larry Walker, Retired
Cal Eldred, Retired

Probably the biggest reason for the Cards' collapse last season at the hand of a team like the Astros was injuries. Scott Rolen was injured the majority of the regular season, and their corner outfielders really showed some wear and tear as the season progressed. Larry Walker and Reggie Sanders are both very good players, but they're both very old. Walker in particular looked like a very old man in the field. Turning 40 this coming season, he's just too old to continue at the level he maintained for the majority of his career. Sanders is also extremely old, and while he tore up the cover of the ball agains the Padres in the NLDS last year, a collision in left field at the beginning of the NLCS left him badly banged and bruised. Of these two OF positions only one of them has been filled, by the acquisition of free agent Juan Encarnacion, formerly of the Dodgers and Marlins. Although his career OPS is only .756, he put together an OK year in FL, batting .287, a .349 OBP along with 16 HR and 76 RBI. While the numbers may not jump off the page, let's not forget that St. Louis is a different kind of baseball town than Miami. It's entirely possible that, even though Encanacion appears to have been picked up for his age and his glove, he could end up with the kind of turnaround that Orlando Cabrera underwent in the middle of the 2004 season when he moved to Boston (see, even here the Sox find a way in). Larry Bigbie appears to be the other OF in line to patrol the ramparts of the new Busch Stadium. Bigbie (he of I-Should-Have-Been-In-Boston-But-Someone-Goofed-And-I-Got-Stuck-In-Colorado fame) is miserable offensively, but his glove is surprisingly good, posting only 3 errors and a .996 FP over 4 years. Let's not forget he could be Larry Walker's son (if Walker had a kid when he was like 14). So the Redbirds have filled the worn OF treads of Walker and Sanders with the young, springy steps of Encarnacion and Bigbie. Onwards...

Mark Grudzielanek, the 2B that came over from the Cubs last year and was one half of the great STL middle infield combo with David Eckstein, left during the one week the KC front office decided to do something other than be terrible. In his stead comes Junior Spivey, the 2B dealt to the Nationals in the middle of 2005, but who in 2006 will be wearing the bat and birds. Spivey is nothing spectacular with the glove, but he's young, and he gets on base (.354 lifetime). He steals a few bases a year, but he won't be tearing the basepaths apart anytime soon.

The biggest acquistions for the Cards this offseason have come in the shape of pitching arms. Ricardo Rincon, the reliever with the Athletics, found his way to the gateway to the West, as did Braden Looper, the former closer with the Mets (who I'm sure would love to forget (only 27 SO in almost 60 IP). The big news was Sidney Ponson, who, if you can pry the bottle out of his sausage fingers, could be a decent starter... but nobody's figured out how to do that long enough for him to be consistently effective. Ponson showed moments of brilliance in Baltimore, but poor physical health and lack of off-field discipline culminating in several minor jail stays prevented him from making the top of the Oriole rotation his. Tony LaRussa doesn't seem like the kind of manager that will deal with any guff, and maybe the fact that most clubs don't want to get anywhere near the guy will inspire him to try and redeem himself (a modern day Bernie Carbo?).

These two actions have nothing to do with one another, but Ray "Burger" King was disposed of, and the Cards picked up one of Red Sox Nation's all-time favorite dance partners, Brian Daubach. He's 34, and borderline major leaguer, but is definitely a certified AAA all-star. I hated to see him go the Mets last year, but now that he's with the Cardinals there's a chance Dauber will here his name shouted once more from a living room in Connecticut.