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He will walk as soon as he can if they keeping losing now.

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Fulldeck Photos - Cardinals Photos and Wallpapers Website - 8 new wallpapers posted

Sure, I think it would. There will be small market teams teams willing to unload expensive salaries, they just don't have the pieces to get them.

Jocketty needs a successful farm system in a similar manner as Cashman does with the Yankees. Get a bluechip prospect every couple of years (Morris, Ankiel, Drew, Pujols, etc.) keep them as part of the core and use the secondary prospects to acquire established and expensive ready made players like Smith and Polanco for Rolen.

It won't work without a farm system, though, and that's what has hurt the Cards.


I don't know enough about Mozeliak to comment either way, it's a luxury to have an in-house candidate as you know his work ethic, his instincts, his ability to learn, and his ability to work with others moreso than from a second hand source. If he's being considered, it would tell you something about those qualities and hopefully he's not a 100% yes man, if the btm line is clouded by penny saving rather than strictly baseball.

Meph will disagree with me, but I think Logan White of the Dodgers is the best GM available, but as he mentioned Antonetti would be a good choice as well. Just hope he would be aggressive with high ceiling & likely unsignable at slot high school players (especially on the mound).

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Please run for Governor, Mr. Feingold!

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Much respect for the 3rd winningest manager in MLB history. Enjoy your retirement.

I would wager than Scott Rolen has a higher pain tolerance than almost anyone on this board.

Dave McKay is an extremely genuine and cool guy.

Unofficial campaign manager of "Yadier Molina for HoF" since 2011

I'm not prepared to worry about 2011 just yet. I'd be more worried about signing some pitchers for 2008, rather than re-signing Pujols for 2011.

I'm not going to quote the whole thing cause it would be very very long post, but you are projecting your major league team 4 years out. No major league team holds onto their starting lineup or rotation for 4 years. Things change. Players get hurt, traded, or leave. Even the successful Jocketty years saw 4-7 players leave a year. I dont think you can go on a payroll woe-is-me for that long into the future. Economics change, teams change. And some of your numbers are pretty inflated. Rick Ankiel will not be earning close to 8M in arbitration. Miguel Cabrera is probably going to sit somewhere around 9M, Rick Ankiel has been at his position in the majors for a couple months, and he is no Miguel Cabrera.

And I loved the Jocketty/TLR years (in fact I hope the TLR years are extended), but I dont see how Jocketty leaving makes this team any more of a "trade them when they hit arbitration" organization.

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"Hey gunner man, that's quicksand. That's quicksand, that ain't mud."

How do they say it, QFT? I'm more concerned with the identity of the owner than the identity of the GM. It's a lot easier to find a competent GM than a guy with huge truckloads of money that will be invested in baseball players.

It's too bad about Jocketty, but the front office's off-the-record whining about payroll should've sealed his fate. If he's not willing to work with somebody like Luhnow, then that's obviously not going to help either. If he was that unhappy, he should've announced his resignation a couple of weeks ago, as Terry Ryan did.

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We want information. Information.

a lot of doom and gloom creeped into this thread while I drove home from work.

The Cards are an upper tier team in terms of budget. They are. It's tough to argue that.

If we can't afford to pay the doom and gloom salary numbers that are being thrown about, neither will 25 other teams in the majors. The market eventually has to correct itself a bit.

Ownership is not talking about doing what the Royals have done. Not one mention of decreasing budget (and they'd have to decrease the budget a TON to get into that state). All they've stated is that we need to build more from within, presumably to get some cheaper players on the roster that will allow the rest of our budget to cover the big money guys like Pujols. I completely agree with that philosophy.

If it's not one Walt could follow, so be it. I'll reserve my hate/venom/vitriol for the ownership and despair for the future until the team and the people running it actually do something to harm it (like lowering the budget in the face of rising free agent salaries).

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What do you think happens if KC had retained their players when it came time for the to enter free agency and added a few free agents? Be a pretty good team now, i can see stl doing that, theve seen what happened in KC and im sure ownership doesnt want that to happen.

Cards Talk is on the verge of another implosion.

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While I don't think Jocketty was treated fairly, I think this was a good move. He hasn't added a significant player to the roster since 2004 and he doesn't excel in player development. The market doesn't suit his strengths and it has showed in the lack of significant trades and free agent signings made by the team recently. A change could be good. So could a more aggressive approach.

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I saw Nick Stavinoha's last major league homer and Mark Mulder's final major league pitch.