Cards Young Bats Not Cutting It

[CardsBest]

Cardinals have had many young bats not perform well. Winn, Walker, Gorman, Noot, Scott, Pages were supposed to be primary starters or did start several games. Saggaese was supposed to be a good prospect received in trade. Church had good season in minors. Still small sample for Church and Saggese. Cards cant live with that many unproven bats in the lineup and expect to ever be a good team.

Winn .681 OPS great D but bat has been below average
Walker .595 OPS high Ks
Pages .654 OPS .228 AVG
Noot .717 OPS .239 AVG
Gorman .719 OPS .217 AVG high Ks
Saggese .626 OPS
Scott .623 OPS .223 AVG hit collector
Church .390 OPS

The Cardinals entered a rebuild with the 23rd rank farm system. Top 10 now only because of Wetherholt Doyle and 14 5 year rule 5 eligible players. What did you evpect? It’s going to get worse before better and a huge FA spree is the only way. These players have no trade value and a roster of 26 home grown player with multiple all stars is impossible

The biggest problem is these guys as well as Carlson, Reyes, O’Niell, etc. all had great value at one time and they got. Nothing to very little to show for them. They failed at evaluating their own players and trading when they had good value.

I don’t think John Mozeliak EVER sold high on any prospect.

Maybe somebody can name one but I can’t think of any.

aroz, gallen and alcantra

They didn't sell high on those three. Alcantara 9th and Galen 20th ranked prospects. Alcantara was Cards 4th rated pitching prospect in 2017 and Galen was 12th rated pitching prospect. They were also traded for Ozuna who couldn’t throw the ball from the outfield due to arm problems. Alcantara was touching 100mph and 22 at time of trade.

Arozarena was Cards 16th ranked prospect in 2019. Cards sold low on those three.

2017 Cards prospect rankings had 4 pitchers ahead of Alcantara who was ranked 9th.
(1) Reyes
(2) Weaver
(5) Flaherty
(6) Hudson
(9) Alcantara
(11) Gomber
(12) Gant
(13) Fernandez
(15) Jones
(17) Woodford
(19) Williams
(20) Gallen

[hugeCardfan]

I won't be surprised if it at least "Atlanta-like", where the Cardinals average somewhere in the 70s in terms of wins for 2024-2027/2028 (four or five seasons), before the farm system can deliver enough talent to shape out the ML roster to the point where it makes sense to start adding significantly from outside the organization.

At best I think the Cardinals are halfway through your "period of darkness", and maybe more like 2/5ths.

Not my period of darkness, Matt, yours. Pitching will determine how long it takes to break free. My eternal optimism disabuses the notion of years of subpar. I think we settle in the 80 wins a year or two before challenging the division and making a mark in the postseason.

Let's just not have them try to prematurely exit their "period of darkness" and end up adding guys just to be in a "period of greyness" where they are winning 83, 84, 85 games a year instead of being patient with the rebuild any trying to get back to 92, 93, 94 wins a year.

I'd rather win 70 games a year for five years to then win 90 games a year for five more years than win 80 games a year for a decade.

We certainly agree there. Posturing should focus on future investment; not shortlived benefit. I hated the Alcantara and Gallen trade. Ozuna wasn't even healthy when we got him and clearly we didn't plan to extend him.

I just happen to think that the pitching, hitting and coaching outlook is better than you do. We dont have any business winning nearly 50% of our games with this rotation, but here we are "killin' it" . What if Mathews and McGreevy find traction and we land a #3 for 1-3 years in FA. What if JJ sticks the landing next year and a couple of our position players show more offensive promise than this year. I fully expect that. Not looking for a division win or postseason glory; just promise.

[cbcardsfan]

Young bats haven’t been cutting it for several years now. That’s why they’re in the pitiful shape they exist in today.

[Braund241]

Cardinals have had many young bats not perform well. Winn, Walker, Gorman, Noot, Scott, Pages were supposed to be primary starters or did start several games. Saggaese was supposed to be a good prospect received in trade. Church had good season in minors. Still small sample for Church and Saggese. Cards cant live with that many unproven bats in the lineup and expect to ever be a good team.

Winn .681 OPS great D but bat has been below average
Walker .595 OPS high Ks
Pages .654 OPS .228 AVG
Noot .717 OPS .239 AVG
Gorman .719 OPS .217 AVG high Ks
Saggese .626 OPS
Scott .623 OPS .223 AVG hit collector
Church .390 OPS

If you are going to point out what you consider failures, you should point out the successes. Relative to expectations, these guys should be considered successes:

Donovan
Burleson
Herrera

In addition,Gorman and Saggese trending up. Regarding Pages, he has outperformed expectations. Regarding Church, coming into this season, most people didn’t even know his name. Barely on the radar. How can he be a failure when no one really had expectations?

But not one close to be a difference maker that is going to lead a team to playoff success. And zero pitching.

[Carp4Cy]

Which, honestly, was expected to be the case.

I think in the case of Walker, Gorman, Winn, and Noot we were expecting to see more progress. But as of now they all don’t inspire much hope

This is a massive problem for a reset that is hoping to rebuild internally. If you cant develop a MVP level talent and/or multiple all stars, and if we aren't willing to spend 200M on other team's developed talent, there is no realistic path to winning ~100 games and seriously competing at the level we want to year after year. Just a bucket of "average" hitters and one or two below average mixed in doesn't get us there. Not even close.

Well hopefully fixes the development system that Mo ruined and they can start producing quality players again. That’s the only way the cardinals will get better again then once it starts producing then they can spend money to fill in the gaps with good veterans

We keep hearing "fix the development". Well Bloom has been here 2 full seasons now and was supposedly focused on fixing the MILB development from the start. That's longer than some of our prospects have even been in the minors. Hope it doesn't take much longer to start seeing proof that its been successful and not just more smoke and mirrors.

lol you think an entire development system could be both fixed and be churning out quality prospects in just two seasons? That’s crazy he had to evaluate and see just exactly where the problems were who was worth keeping who to fire who to bring in then he had to go out and find those people and try to bring them in then they have to work with the players coming in. It took mo years to destroy but you think it could be fixed and be churning out good prospects in just two season

As has been pointed out before, teams like Houston (avg. 64 wins from 2009-2014), Philadelphia (avg. 69 wins from 2013-2017), Atlanta (avg. 72 wins from 2014-2017), etc. can take 4, 5, 6 years to rebuild.

And because of that, MLB changed the rules so that losing 100 games doesn't guarantee you can pick 1st. You also can't pick 10 top year after year. You get blocked in the lottery. These are good rules to prevent extended tanking but fans and owners need to catch up with the effects of the new reality and understand that what worked in 2013 to game the system won't work as well now.

[peterman'srealitytour]

Cardinals have had many young bats not perform well. Winn, Walker, Gorman, Noot, Scott, Pages were supposed to be primary starters or did start several games. Saggaese was supposed to be a good prospect received in trade. Church had good season in minors. Still small sample for Church and Saggese. Cards cant live with that many unproven bats in the lineup and expect to ever be a good team.

Winn .681 OPS great D but bat has been below average
Walker .595 OPS high Ks
Pages .654 OPS .228 AVG
Noot .717 OPS .239 AVG
Gorman .719 OPS .217 AVG high Ks
Saggese .626 OPS
Scott .623 OPS .223 AVG hit collector
Church .390 OPS

If you are going to point out what you consider failures, you should point out the successes. Relative to expectations, these guys should be considered successes:

Donovan
Burleson
Herrera

In addition,Gorman and Saggese trending up. Regarding Pages, he has outperformed expectations. Regarding Church, coming into this season, most people didn’t even know his name. Barely on the radar. How can he be a failure when no one really had expectations?

But not one close to be a difference maker that is going to lead a team to playoff success. And zero pitching.

No argument from me on either point.