When the St. Louis Cardinals signed veteran Bud Norris in February, the public response was more than a bit unenthusiastic. Coming just days after it was reported that the Chicago Cubs were signing highly-coveted free agent starting pitcher Yu Darvish to a six-year, $126 million contract, acquiring what looked like a back-of-the-bullpen depth piece was…
Until 2009, there was a formal event called the World Cup of Baseball--it was scheduled in September and thus Major League Baseball players could not participate. Today, we have the World Baseball Classic, a vastly superior tournament to the WCB, but one which still lacks more than a few of the best baseball players in…
The Chicago White Sox are terrible. Like, they're really bad. At present, they are 30-60 and saying that they're trying to be better than that would probably constitute false advertising. They have a bunch of acclaimed prospects, some of whom (second baseman Yoan Moncado and starting pitcher Lucas Giolito) are currently in the Majors, but most…
Yesterday, Deadspin columnist Drew Magary wrote an article about the St. Louis Cardinals. It was called "I Can't Get Enough Of The Shitass Cardinals Feuding With One Of Their Own Players". I have not read it. This isn't a matter of grand principle. I'm not consciously avoiding the article--I was just busy all day and…
In 2016, the St. Louis Cardinals missed the postseason, finishing one game behind the San Francisco Giants for the second Wild Card berth. In the off-season, they signed Dexter Fowler to replace, in a roundabout way with Randal Grichuk as an intermediary, Matt Holliday, and Brett Cecil, effectively replacing the Tommy John surgery-bound Zach Duke.…
This afternoon, in San Francisco, the St. Louis Cardinals squared off against the Giants, a team against whom the local nine has a winning record during the Mike Matheny era but against whom I can only remember Travis Ishikawa and (underratedly) Michael Morse socking dingers, as well as Randy Choate making errant throws to first…
When the St. Louis Cardinals hired Mike Matheny in November 2011 to replace the legendary Tony LaRussa, the widespread perception was that, in contrast to his predecessor, Mike Matheny was young enough that he would be willing to adapt to new-school, analytically-driven managerial styles. Less than a month after his hiring, David Laurila referred to…
Happy Independence Day, fine St. Louis Bullpen readers! It is a federal holiday and most of you probably got the day off work today, and as such, Major League Baseball scheduled a ton of games during the day. It's like a Sunday, so games were played earlier than normal. Excecpt, for some reason, in Arizona,…
One of my favorite twenty-first century St. Louis Cardinals teams was the 2003 team. This may seem a bit odd. There is no objective reason for me to hold a candle for the 2003 Cardinals--they were a pretty good team, finishing 85-77, and they were buoyed by typically excellent seasons from Jim Edmonds, Edgar Renteria,…
Come on, guys, win a game. Just one stupid game. Recapping games is more fun when I'm not just writing "hey, the Cardinals struck out again" over and over. Or maybe it's more fun for you guys when I just lose my mind over mid-season baseball games, I'm not sure, but it's not as fun…
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