St. Louis Cardinals: Off Day Doldrums

Perhaps everyone was out celebrating St. Patrick's Day yesterday, because there wasn't a whole lot of Cardinal news made on the off day.

The lead story over at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch is that payroll is retreating for 2009.  There's a good chance this will bring out the management bashers and "cheap ownership" cries, but in an economy where large corporations are needing bailouts on a regular basis and people are losing jobs, a little belt-tightening is not unexpected nor unintelligent.

I think Bill Dewitt did a good job of making their case to the press and getting some of the information out there.  Whether you trust it or not is up to you, but I don't see much reason not to.  It will be interesting to see if they make some July moves, and if attendance early in the year is stronger than they expect.

Also, I think we should be glad the team didn't get Brian Fuentes, as the article notes his signing would have forced Ryan Ludwick or Rick Ankiel to be a "salary dump."  I don't mind trading either of those players, but I don't want to see the Cards do that just to free up money.  I would like to see them bring back some talent, even if it is cheaper.

Derrick Goold has part two of his Q & A with Jeff Luhnow up.  Lots of interesting comments about the minor leaguers.

The official site has a feature on Chris Duncan.  It is impressive that he's come back so quickly from that surgery, especially when the term "career-threatening" was being tossed around.

Yesterday's approval rating subject was pretty polarizing.  Al Hrbrosky wound up with a 53.9 percent rating, but the people at Viva El Birdos rated him around 37 percent while CardsClubhouse rated him at about 75 percent.  Never knew those two audiences were so diverse.

Today, we start the home stretch, only three players left to go.  We take up Yadier Molina today.  I'm pretty sure Sarah will quickly be here with her 100 percent, but what say the rest of you?  I've not heard much against Yadi in the last couple of years.  Can he challenge Pujols for that top spot?

It was supposed to be another split-squad doubleheader against the Orioles today, but the game in their park has been rained out.  The lineup for today's home game, assuming it doesn't change due to that development:

Schumaker, 2B
Molina, C
Pujols, 1B
Ankiel, CF
Craig, DH
K Greene, SS
Jones, LF
Mather, RF
Barden, 3B

Chris Carpenter will be on the mound.  I'm guessing they want to make sure Molina gets some more at-bats after his stint with Puerto Rico.  (Sidebar: Even though I hate to see Jose Oquendo and Yadi go home, that was a heck of a game last night, from all reports.  Which, again, frustrates me that I don't have MLB Network.)

I would guess Craig and Jones might be removed from the lineup for other players, but perhaps those that were supposed to go on the road will just get the day off.

If you are interested, my look back at the offseason and look forward to this season is up over at Baseball Reflections today.