How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Discuss all things Cardinals Baseball
Post Reply
User avatar
ZigZagCardsFan
Perennial All-Star
Posts: 5531
Joined: July 29 06, 6:26 pm

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by ZigZagCardsFan »

I'd absolutely love to add Van Slyke but I have to imagine the Dodgers wouldn't be too keen on helping out a team that's had their number in the postseason.

Van Slyke would be perfect as a RH compliment to Taveras/Adams though.

Shame we got rid of Joe Kelly. Could've had a stare-down swap that would've been a fair deal to both teams IMO.

User avatar
ZigZagCardsFan
Perennial All-Star
Posts: 5531
Joined: July 29 06, 6:26 pm

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by ZigZagCardsFan »

heyzeus wrote:I'd like a Van Slyke deal plenty, but I dont' see why the Dodgers would give him up. I'm sure they're still trying to move Ethier, even eating a lot of the money, first.
They could move both and be fine. Joc Pederson is ready to contribute at the ML level.

AWvsCBsteeeerike3
"I could totally eat a pig butt, if smoked correctly!"
Posts: 27273
Joined: August 5 08, 11:24 am
Location: Thinking of the Children

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

Holliday isn't moving to 1st.

dmarx114
Hall Of Famer
Posts: 24006
Joined: December 20 07, 2:45 pm

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by dmarx114 »

pioneer98 wrote:
dmarx114 wrote:
Hoot45 wrote:
pioneer98 wrote:If Holliday could learn first base, it would make a lot of sense. It would give a platoon to Adams and open up more playing time for all the outfielders on the roster.
This is something I'd really like to see happen. When you look at the upgrade all of the different options offer this one actually might have one of the greatest returns. You get your 1B platoon, you relieve the outfield jam, and you still have room to add depth on the bench. I'm not sure the Cardinals will do it this year but I sure wish they would.
I can't picture Holliday at 1st base at all. He's clumsy. Can you imagine him charging a bunt and making a throw to 3rd? I sure can't.

I still think Adams should play every day. He needs to improve against lefties, no doubt about it. But that will be the theme for next season.....Adams, Taveras, Wong, and Grichuk improving.

That's how you answer the question in the title of this thread. We have the core guys. They need to get better.
"Hope is not a strategy". I agree that a lot of these players have more potential than they showed last year, but our plan is to hope that materializes? To me that is a very risky strategy because the Cardinals are not starting from a position of strength. They were 24th in runs last year. If they were already, say, 15th in runs with potential for improvement, I'd feel better about their position. But they are a pretty mediocre offense with potential to maybe around average if they improve. I doubt they will jump from 24th to top 5. So the quesiton is: will the improvement in these players be enough?

Another way of looking at this: last year they overperformed their pythag by 7 wins. Next year it's entirely possible they underperform their pythag. If that happens, it's possible they finish around .500, give or take. In other words, they may need a big improvement somewhere just to get back to where they were this year in terms of W/L.
I don't hope the kids get better. I expect them to. We saw a snap shot of this in the post season. They all got better. This has been part of the long term strategy. We stuck with these top prospects, instead of trading them, with the expectation that they will continue to improve. I don't think Mo should change course now.

boops
Everyday Player
Posts: 468
Joined: September 29 13, 12:54 am

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by boops »

Will the Taveras-Grichuk "competition" be like the Martinez-Kelly "competition" in the sense that isn't really a competition at all and the manager appears to just sort of pick the guy that he likes more?

User avatar
ZigZagCardsFan
Perennial All-Star
Posts: 5531
Joined: July 29 06, 6:26 pm

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by ZigZagCardsFan »

boops wrote:Will the Taveras-Grichuk "competition" be like the Martinez-Kelly "competition" in the sense that isn't really a competition at all and the manager appears to just sort of pick the guy that he likes more?
The difference is that both Taveras and Grichuk can share time in the starting lineup while you can't platoon starters.

Vidor
You've just been hit by...VidorSmarm™
Posts: 22965
Joined: June 10 10, 7:50 pm

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by Vidor »

pioneer98 wrote: "Hope is not a strategy".
Yeah, this is not a short-term thing. We've lacked home run pop for a while now. We didn't hit a lot of homers in 2013 either, but we made up for it with spectacular hitting with RISP. This year, one of our best sources of HR power was gone (Beltran), and the RISP hitting fell off, and we scrounged for runs.

User avatar
Jmodene
Still waiting for someone to use a Weird Al song
Posts: 15535
Joined: April 18 06, 5:54 pm
Location: Las Vegas, NV

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by Jmodene »

Vidor wrote:
pioneer98 wrote: "Hope is not a strategy".
Yeah, this is not a short-term thing. We've lacked home run pop for a while now. We didn't hit a lot of homers in 2013 either, but we made up for it with spectacular hitting with RISP. This year, one of our best sources of HR power was gone (Beltran), and the RISP hitting fell off, and we scrounged for runs.
I feel compelled to point out that Beltran wasn't a particularly good source of power for the Yankees in 2014 (.233/.301/.402, 15 HR, 47 RBI). It wasn't losing Beltran that hurt... it was not replacing that production. But the fact is we got almost as much production (.237-9-59) out of our right fielders this year as the Yankees got out of Beltran.

User avatar
33anda3rd
Replies Authoritatively
Posts: 8418
Joined: April 7 13, 9:45 am
Location: Chicago, IL

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by 33anda3rd »

ZigZagCardsFan wrote:
boops wrote:Will the Taveras-Grichuk "competition" be like the Martinez-Kelly "competition" in the sense that isn't really a competition at all and the manager appears to just sort of pick the guy that he likes more?
The difference is that both Taveras and Grichuk can share time in the starting lineup while you can't platoon starters.
The difference is Taveras has a HOF ceiling and Grichhck is just a dude. That's the difference. If OT plays himself off the position, or completely bust, fine, whatever, but until then he has such a high ceiling that it's not worth putting him in comparison to a guy who projects to be just a guy.

Vidor
You've just been hit by...VidorSmarm™
Posts: 22965
Joined: June 10 10, 7:50 pm

Re: How do the Cardinals improve their offense in 2015?

Post by Vidor »

Jmodene wrote:It wasn't losing Beltran that hurt... it was not replacing that production.
Distinction without a difference. We lost Beltran's production, which is a fact, and which hurt. The fact that Beltran the individual aged about a decade between 2013 and 2014 doesn't change the fact that his production disappeared from the lineup.

Post Reply