Some Things Change, Some Things Stay The Same

Welcome back!  Now that we've gotten all the holidays out of the way, we can get back to the daily grind.  (Wait, is this a good thing?)  If I'm right, I think its 40 days until pitchers and catchers report (La Beisbolista has the countdown up, but I don't think she's had a chance to update yet today.)  Heck, the only reason I look forward to the Super Bowl every year is that 1) football is finally over and 2) it's just a couple of weeks until spring training!

You may notice a few new things around the site.  (If you are reading this at Bleacher Report, click on through to see what I'm talking about.)  The biggest change is that you can now sign up for an account here at C70 At The Bat.

  It allows you to set up a profile, upload a picture that will show beside your comments, track activity, etc.  It's not required, but it's kinda neat so feel free to give it a shot.

The other noticeable change resides at the top of the page.  Some really good bloggers said some really nice things about this place during our blogger awards, so I figured it'd be a good idea to have that in writing.  Click on "commendations" or click here to see.

But the more things change, the more they stay the same.  First, the Cardinals still haven't made any signings or changed up the roster in the last few weeks.  Secondly, there's an outcry that ownership is cheap, something that Bill DeWitt finally had to comment on.

DeWitt, of course, makes salient points.  The Cardinals are only the second team in baseball (after the Giants) to privately finance at least a portion of their ballpark. As I examined last year in my ownership series, it's really difficult to make the argument that the ownership group is cheap. 

You can say they don't spend their money wisely or in the way you'd want it spent, but they do spend money.  Especially when compared to the Brewery days after Gussie Busch passed.  I mean, in 1993 the Cardinals were 24th (out of 28) in payroll.  After those days, how can you think a $100 million payroll is cheap?

It's always easy to spend other people's money.  It's easy to claim that the Cards should boost up their payroll because it won't hurt the bottom line.  Just because the team is worth more doesn't mean that it translates to the checkbook.  Just because people focus on the major league payroll doesn't mean there aren't development expenses in other places. 

For years people said they should have a better farm system.  That takes money, especially when you start setting up places in foreign lands, but we are starting to see the results of that.

Speaking of foreign lands, it seems that the Cardinals are one of the final choices for Kenshin Kawakami.  You can see him in action here (hat tip: The Redbird Blog).  Hard to tell a lot about his fastball, though it doesn't seem to move all that much, but that curveball looks pretty nasty.  I'd still rather a more established guy like Ben Sheets, but in theory this was the kind of thing we paid So Taguchi for, besides his skills--opening up the Japan market to the possibility of playing somewhere besides the East or West Coast.

VEB made the point Saturday that we are definitely seeing John Mozeliak being his own person, not a LaRussa yes man.  I admit, when he was hired I was afraid that it was the organization doing the same old thing, even more so when Scott Rolen was traded. 

But when he didn't panic and make a move for TLR at the deadline, when he didn't go overboard to get Brian Fuentes, when he let Aaron Miles go somewhere else, it shows that his vision of the team isn't necessarily what LaRussa's is, which is good.  They have different jobs, different responsibilities, and should have a different view of the team.

Now that the holidays are over and spring training is just about visible on the horizon, hopefully we'll see a little more activity out of the Cards.