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The Cards farm system has generally been rated at best middle of the pack, yet it seems year after year we grow key contributers to winning teams. My questions are these:

1. Have the Cardinals outperformed expectations?
2. If they have, what's going on? Just getting short changed from the experts? Something happening with teaching at the lower levels that is unique to this organization? Tony LaRussa/Dave Duncan?

Here is a list of players that have contributed or provided important returns with trades at the MLB level. I put in parens the rating of the team by Baseball America or the individual players ranking within the Cardinal organization. This seems like good production from a farm system, more than what I would have expected given the organizational rankings.

2007 (23)
- Colby Rasmus (1) - Largely the reason we were as high as 23, Rasmus hasn't lived up to his potential yet at the MLB level. St. Louis seemed to recognize something, trading him at the deadline for bullpen help that was instrumental in the 2011 WS.

- Jaimie Garcia (2)
- Chriz Perez (3) - again provided good returns.
- Jon Jay (5)
- Mitchell Boggs (11)
- Shane Robinson (28)
- Skip Schumaker (29)

2008 (13)
- Rasmus (1)
- Perez (2)
- Garcia (5)
- Boggs (9)
- Jay (11)
- Allen Craig (15)
- Kyle McClellan (19)
- Jason Motte (24)
- Mark Hamilton (27)

2009 (8)
- Rasmus (1) and Brett Wallace(2) were big reasons for the higher ranking. We turned Wallace into Matt Holliday.
- Perez (3)
- Motte (8)
- David Freese (9)
- Jay (12)
- Garcia (13)
- Boggs (14)
- Lance Lynn (15)
- Fernando Salas (20)
- Craig (26)
- Robinson (28)

2010 (29)
- Shelby Miller (1) - still waiting but he is the reason we weren't ranked dead last.
- Garcia (2) *
- Lynn (3) *
- Freese (5) *
- Eduardo Sanchez (6) *
- Craig (7) *
- Daniel Descalso (9) *
- Jay (13) *
- Joe Kelly(21)
- Mark Hamilton (26)

Look at that! The 29th ranked farm system had 7 guys that were on the WS roster (denoted by *). That's pretty impressive.

2011 (24)
Miller (1)
Craig (5)
Lynn (6)
Sanchez (7)
Kelly (10)
Matt Carpenter (11)
Descalso (12)
Salas (14)
Adron Chambers (16) * - the 8th guy that was on the WS roster.
Tony Cruz (25)

But if you want to look at it differently, you can't measure the construction of a team by one offseason. For a team like the Cardinals, you measure it over several years of player development. And right now, those dividends are paying off like a mofo.

OK, I unleashed all these questions on Kevin and wow, were jim's and phins' long! Hopefully he responds to half of them. Thanks for all the thoughtful questions!

OK, I unleashed all these questions on Kevin and wow, were jim's and phins' long! Hopefully he responds to half of them. Thanks for all the thoughtful questions!

I want ice in the 2 hole