From a Winning Streak to a Losing Streak...

Just a thought I had. Isn't Game 4 of a series against a divisional opponent who has beaten you the first three games a rather odd day to put five starters on the bench including your 4, 5, and 6 hitters? Just wondering........

A Couple of Interesting Things to Talk About Today

Number one, if the Cards have a narrow lead going into the ninth tonight, who pitches?? My vote is for Mike Crudale as he is the only one in the pen who's psyche hasn't been beaten to a pulp by the events of this season so far.

Rick Ankiel is going to return to starting after another plague of wildness has hit him at AA. Both Ray Mileur, proprietor of the Birdhouse, and myself voiced the need for this change and I am glad to see it. Maybe if they would just send him out there every fifth day and treat him like any other player he'd lose some of these nasty head problems he seems to have.

The trade rumors with the Mets will not go away. After Walt killed the notion of a Armando Benitez/Roberto Alomar--J.D. Drew/Fernando Vina swap, the Alomar/Vina portion of the trade isn't going away. Alomar has disappointed since coming to NY and he is no longer the defensive player that Vina is. But if he could somehow return to his .400 OBA form I'd make the trade in a New York minute. Seems very unlikely though as the Mets wouldn't be able to dump any cash on us.

If the Cards lose tonight it will already be their third losing streak of at least three games this year.

Blake Hawksworth pitched five scoreless innings last night in leading Peoria to a win. He struck out six and walked one.

THE HEARTACHE CONTINUES

Okay, winning seven games in a row is great, and yes it's great that we are getting great pitching from our starters, and that we have a good offense and good defense. Yep, we should probably have the best record in baseball, this side of Yankee Stadium but are instead 17-14 because THE CARDINALS NEED SOMEBODY TO PITCH IN THE NINTH INNING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That makes nine one-run losses tonight as Barry Larkin ,who could hit Cardinal pitching with two broken legs and a blindfold, sends one over the fence for another one-run loss in the final at-bat. How many is that? I believe seven of the nine have been in the ninth inning. That's the third time it has happened on a homer, the second time that the Cards were ahead when the ball cleared the wall. I try to keep thinking in the new-wave baseball frame of mind, that relievers are interchangeable and anyone should pitch the ninth inning, but this is getting beyond ridiculous. Tonight it was Kiko Calero, the one pitcher who had not blown a lead yet this year, who was the culprit. I mean how many times can this conceivably happen?? I don't know but it certainly seems like as good as time as any to push the panic button when it comes to the bullpen. The rest of the team is great! To look at it very optimistically (or pessimistically maybe), if the Cardinals had performed the way we would expect in the late innings, they could easily be 23-8 or thereabouts right now and looking to run away and hide in the NL Central. As it is they aren't going to be pulling away from anything anytime soon, except maybe the record for one-run losses before the All-Star break. *depressed*

How about I Finish That Damn Low-Minor Report If Anyone Cares!

I'm doing this before I write anything else, just so I get to it.

High-A Palm Beach is 11-21, a large dose of cruel reality for last year's Chiefs. The offense continues to put up Pittsburgh Pirate-like numbers. Shaun Boyd went 5 for 8 in a Sunday doubleheader, but how excited can you get about a guy who makes an error every other day and has a .331 OBA in A-ball? The team has a grand total of two players with more than one homer and NO ONE WITH EVEN 10 RBI's!!!! I know the Rog is a pitcher's haven but come on!!! One of Peoria's big hitters last year that moved to Palm Beach this season is Gabe Johnson, and he has been out since the first few games of the season with injury. The pitching has been off and on. Tyler Johnson pitched decent on Sunday and Blake Williams allowed 2 earned over six inning last night, striking out 4. He is getting stronger with each outing it appears. Justin Pope has had a couple of ugly outings that have made his ERA not so good.

Low-A Peoria has had a major cool-off after that hot start. Once 10-1, they are now 16-14. The bats and pitching have coooled. John Santor and Travis Hanson are still killing the ball, but Terry Evans and Matt Lemanczyk have dropped their production way off, among others. Hanson has 29 RBI and an OPS of right around 1.000, while Santor's is still above .900. Pitching-wise, Tyler Adamczyk and Miguel Martinez have had bumpy starts the last couple times out and the bullpen has struggled. Blake Hawksworth has not pitched for awhile and I don't know what's up with that, nothing major I hope.

STREAKING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a wonderful weekend! The Cards won on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to sweep the until-then hot Montreal Expos. The offense continue to be just fabulous, as the Cards jumped all over Expos pitching early on Friday and Sunday. Tomo Ohka didn't even make it out of the first on Friday and Simo came through with a great performance, giving just one run in eight innings. The Redbirds recalled Mike Crudale and Kevin Ohme before the game, sending down human out machine Kerry Robinson and DL'ing Russ Springer with home run--er--a sore elbow. Crudale pitched a scoreless ninth and it was nice to see him back in the pen with the big club. He has a chance to be a big help. As it turned out, the bullpen would only pitch one more inning the rest of the weekend. Garrett Stephenson matched his last outing and Simontacchi's outing on Friday with one run over eight innings. Kiko Calero pitched the ninth inning of the 3-1 win for his first career major league save and looks to be the team's substitute closer in the absence of Jason Isringhausen, whom reports had returning to the active roster anywhere from within two weeks to after Memorial Day. On Sunday it was all Matty Mo as he went the full nine, giving two runs and giving the reeling bullpen a break, in a 6-2 Cardinal victory highlighted by a Scott Rolen homer.

As of right now, the Cards have 13 quality starts out of their last fifteen and have the three leading hitters in the league with Edmonds at .402, Pujols at .387 and Renteria over .360. The won-loss record is starting to catch up to what it should be with the Cards now sitting at 17-12 and percentage points ahead of the Cubs for first place in the NL Central.

Chuck Finley reportedly wants to come back and play for the Cards, which he can now do because it's after May 1. The big problem is that the Cards have no cash and would have to move a contract in order to do it. The idea of trading a starter for a reliever and inserting Finley is an idea and I would love to get Chuck back in the rotation. Having that lefty starter would be nice, but it is looking doubtful at this point unless Finley signs for way less than he reportedly wants to. The other consideration in all of this is that Chris Carpenter is apparently way ahead of schedule down in Florida and could be back in June sometime. Oh and did I mention that the Cards current rotation has 13 quality starts in their last 15 games? We'll see what happens.

Dan Haren pitched eight more scoreless innings on Saturday. He now has an ERA under 1.00 with a 5-0 record and one has to wonder how much longer the Cards will keep him in Tennessee. There's no need to rush him but he is so dominating batters that the Cards might as well challenge him. Rhett Parrott pitched for the Smokies on Sunday and had a quality start, giving three runs in 6.1 innings. His K/BB (8-0 on Sunday) ratio continues to be superb, while his ERA is just pretty good, so I think we will continue to see more improvement from his numbers. I'll get to A-ball later.