Looking Back, Looking Forward

What this team has is frustrating, but eventually pretty good.  The All-Star players talked about the upcoming second half and all of them sounded the right positive notes.  Obviously, you don't expect much of "it's tough" or "only if we can get that Motte guy to stop eating all the post-game food", but it still is good to hear that they are fairly confident in their ability to put something together.

Even though the game isn't in St. Louis this year, there is still a lot of focus on Albert Pujols by the national media.  I found it pretty interesting to hear AP talk about this season as possibly being his most rewarding because it's been his most challenging.  I'm not surprised by that--Pujols has always been a guy that appreciates hard work and overcoming obstacles--but it'd be really surprising if, ten years after he retires, he picked a season like this as his best instead of one of his MVP years.  Then again, if he starts hitting the pitches he's been missing in the second half, this could be another of his MVP years.

Of course, the All-Star festivities are going on and Matt Holliday competed in the Home Run Derby last night.  After hearing all the talk about his batting practice displays, I think my hopes got raised for him making a run, but instead he went out in the first round.  At least he had the longest home run and a majority of his homers came on the "gold ball", so more money went to charity.  Take what you can get, I suppose.

Looks like Chris Carpenter won't pitch in tonight's game, giving up the possibility to help ensure that Adam Wainwright gets to get into it.  A classy move by Carp, who has started one of these games in the past and knows how much fun it can be.  (BTW, has anyone noticed that Wainwright seems to be the go-to guy for a quote?  Seems like any story relating to the Cardinals has a snippet from Waino.  He's outgoing and quotable, so it's not surprising, but it seems to have stood out lately.)  It'd be pretty nice to see him be the winning pitcher, wouldn't it?

There's also a brief discussion (looked like most of the regulars were out of touch) about keeping the Cardinal core and what that portends for the future of the club.  With the beginning emergence of Jon Jay, I would say that it's possible this is the last year in St. Louis for Ryan Ludwick.  He's starting to price himself out of what the Cardinals can afford with AP and Holliday, I think.  Now, if Jay doesn't keep this up, and being that it's a small sample size, that's a strong possibility, there could be some difficult decisions to make.

Speaking of Jay, what is going to happen when Ludwick returns?  BJ Rains thinks that it might be the end of the line for Randy Winn.  It seems very difficult to believe that Jay would go back to Memphis, especially since it may be Thursday or Friday when Ludwick returns.  I guess it's possible that Nick Stavinoha could be sent down, since he's not made the trip to Memphis this year, but the club seems to like him coming off the bench, so odds favor the Winn release.

Looking forward to seeing the Cardinal reps in tonight's game.  Go National League!