The Gas House Gang

The Cardinals firmed up their outfield yesterday when they signed slugger Preston Wilson to a one year, $1 million deal yesterday.  Wilson can play all three outfield spots and he’ll provide some solid depth as the team’s fourth outfielder.  He hit eight homeruns in only 33 games for the Cardinals last year and while he’s prone to strikeout, he has a career .471 slugging percentage and he’s probably good for about 15 homeruns if given 300 at bats.

Matthew Leach takes on the question of whether the Cardinals can and will repeat in 2007.  There’s some good stuff in here from Tony LaRussa as well the official prognosis, and that’s the fact that the question mark is the rotation.

Matthew Leach, the Cardinals beat writer for MLB.com, recently answered readers questions in a mailbag column.  In the piece, he talks about everything from renovations on Busch Stadium to who will close if Adam Wainwright gets pushed into the rotation.   There’s quite a bit of stuff here and it’s all worth reading.

Accorinding to rumors page at ESPN.com, negotiations between the Cardinals and Jeff Weaver are heating up.  Problem is, Weaver is looking for four years guaranteed at about $10 million a year and that’s quite a bit for a guy who had a pretty rough 2006.

I liken it to Derek Lowe’s 2004.  He had a horrible regular season then got it done in the playoffs and that got him a nice deal with the Dodgers.  Looks like Weaver is trying to cash in the same way.  The only other team that the site shows as being interested in Weaver are the New York Mets.

Accorinding to rumors page at ESPN.com, negotiations between the Cardinals and Jeff Weaver are heating up.  Problem is, Weaver is looking for four years guaranteed at about $10 million a year and that’s quite a bit for a guy who had a pretty rough 2006.

I liken it to Derek Lowe’s 2004.  He had a horrible regular season then got it done in the playoffs and that got him a nice deal with the Dodgers.  Looks like Weaver is trying to cash in the same way.  The only other team that the site shows as being interested in Weaver are the New York Mets.

I’ve heard this a bunch.  Claims have been made that the only reason the Cardinals even made the playoffs, and subsequently won the World Series, was because Roger Clemens didn’t pitch the whole season and cost the Astros a shot at the division.  I blow it off as shoulda, woulda, coulda.

Now John Beamer at the Hardball Times has provided a very detailed analysis on how Clemens late entrance into the mix didn’t really cost the Astros much at all.  Good stuff and it’s very vindicating.

At this time last year, everyone was speculating whether Scott Rolen would be back and how he’d perform in 2006.  Now, in a great column about him at MLB.com, he talks about being confident and ready to go.  Great read.

The Cardinals inked left handed relief pitcher Randy Flores to a two year deal for $1.8 million.  Flores was pretty unspectacular in the regular season in 2006, his third with the Cardinals.  He walked 22 batters in 41 2/3 innings as a left handed specialist and his ERA was a pedestrian 5.62.  He did make up for it in the post season though.  He didn’t give up a single run in 5 2/3 innings and he saw action in the three of the Cardinals wins against the Mets.

This is a solid signing as long as Tony LaRussa uses Flores the right way, which is almost exclusively against left handed hitters.  Right handed batters hit .329 against Flores last season vs. the .258 that left handers hit against him.

The Cardinals re-signed Mark Mulder yesterday to a two year, $13 million deal that has a ton incentives.  If Mulder meets all of them, the deal transforms into a three year, $45 million deal.  Mulder is still relatively young (29) but he had rotator cuff surgery that limited him to 13 pretty poor starts in 2006.

There’s no doubt that Mulder at his best is very good.  His walk rate has come up a bit the past couple of seasons and while he is hittable, he was also a workhorse before his current injury.  The downside here is if you look at his numbers, they’ve regressed in just about every season since his 21 win season in 2001.

At least we’re not locked in for a lot of money here.   If he comes back and flops, the $6+ million will hurt but not as bad as if we signed him to what he’s potentially worth.

St. Louis Cardinals All Star and Gold Glove centerfielder, Jim Edmonds, recently had surgery on his foot to correct his hammer toe condition.  Looks like it was pretty minor and Edmonds should be ready for spring training.  This is his second surgical procedure of the offseason because Edmonds had shoulder surgery back in November.

Edmonds had a rough year, but he played it mostly hurt.  Hopefully these two surgeries will relieve him a bit and he can get back to being the stud hitter he was back in 2004.

Steve Carlton definitely had a profound influence on the Cardinals in his first full major league season.  With Bob Gibson missing time and no starter getting handed the ball more then 30 times, Carlton led the team in starts (28) and strikeouts (168) and he was second in innings (193) and wins (14).  Not too bad for a guy who turned 22 when the season started.  And it was definitely a solid start to a Hall of Fame career.

Carlton was especially effective in the second half of the season.  Both of his two shutouts were in early September and his two best months were July and September.  In July, Carlton went 4-1 with a 1.77 ERA and in September, Carlton went 3-1 with a 1.99 ERA and 44 strikeouts in 40 2/3 innings.  Opposing batters hit a paltry .186 against Carlton in that final month of the season.

Carlton was as effective against lefties as he was against righties.  Lefties hit Carlton for .234/.303/.360 while righties hit him for .239/.298/.327.  One reason Carlton was so effective was he gave up only 10 homeruns in 193 innings.

Carlton got one start in the post season.  He took the loss in game five despite giving up only one unearned run in six innings of work.  He gave up only three hits and two walks with five strikeouts.

Here’s a look at Carlton’s 1967 numbers: 

Wins 14
Losses 9
Games 30
Games Started 28
Complete Games 11
Innings Pitched 193
Hits 173
Runs 71
Earned Runs 64
Walks 62
Strikeouts 168
ERA 2.98
Runs Saved Above Average 8
Shutouts 2
H/9 8.07
BR/9 11.05
SO/9 7.83
BB/9 2.89
SO/BB 2.71
Neutral Wins 13
Neutral Losses 10