Why the St. Louis Cardinals Were Big Winners at the Trade Deadline

To listen to both the mainstream media and the blogosphere, the Cardinals and John Mozeliak were big failures at the trade deadline. They pulled out all the stops to “win now” and they didn’t get enough in return to do it. 

They were desperate to win in Pujols' final year. They didn’t get enough return for Colby Rasmus. One writer even said this was “the early favorite for trade of the decade.” They failed to land the big time closer they should have gotten and so on and so forth.

Most of this rhetoric commits two errors. First, it far overvalues what the Cardinals gave up and second, it far undervalues what the Cardinals got in return. Let’s set aside the names for a minute and consider just one question. 

Essentially there are four major factors that determine a baseball team’s success—rotation, bullpen, defense and lineup. As far as I can tell, only one club, the St. Louis Cardinals, helped all four.  More importantly, the more they needed help in an area, the more they received.

If you want to skip the lengthy article and just go to the conclusion just read the last seven or eight sentences for a condensed version of the story. Just go back and see why those are my conclusions before arguing with me about them please.  

Bullpen 

Perhaps it was all the rumors and speculation swirling around Heath Bell that had the general speculation that Heath Bell was a “must get” for the Cardinals. In actuality, he wasn't nearly as mission critical as you might think.

The fact is though that the Cardinals have a pretty good closer.  Fernando Salas has converted on 19 of 22 for 86 percent of his save opportunities.  He has an ERA of 2.29 in save situations, and 2.20 in the 9th inning. 

Compare those numbers with Brian Wilson who has converted on 33 of 37 opportunities for 89 percent of his opportunities and has an ERA of 2.06 in save situations along with an ERA of 2.43 in the ninth. 

Since assuming the closer role, Salas' numbers aren’t that different and in the final frame are even better than Wilson’s. I don’t see anyone beating down the door desperate for a new closer in Wilson. 

Would Bell be an upgrade? Sure, but that’s not really the point. It’s whether there was a huge need for an upgrade. Bell has gone on record as saying that regardless of what happened he would return to San Diego for next year and give them the hometown discount. 

The fact is that Salas is a legitimate closer.  He’s not the best closer in the majors, but he’s a rookie and he’s good enough. 

That’s not to say that the Cardinals didn’t need bullpen help. They needed it desperately, just not in the closer role.  The fact is that the bullpen help they needed came by way of the rest of the bullpen.

The Cardinals, with 36 holds are third from last in the National League. This is in spite of the fact that they are only fifth in terms of “High Leverage” or the pressure situation which the pitcher enters in. The Red Birds have only entered “high pressure” situations 105 times. 

In other words, the Cardinals are really good at losing games they should have won, but the bulk of the problem isn’t coming in the relief appearances, it’s coming in the middle innings. Their ERA in the sixth inning is 5.55. In the seventh, 4.37 and in the eighth, 3.70. In those three innings, they’ve given up 40 percent of their runs on the season. 

So take a step back and consider, Salas has a 2.20 ERA in the ninth and the Cards as a team have an ERA of 3.74 in the sixth through eighth innings. Some of those are from the starters. As a whole, the bullpen, prior to the trade, was sitting on an ERA of 3.96. That isn’t pretty, and it’s sure not World Series consideration. 

In the Rasmus trade, let’s set aside the Rasmus talk for a moment and consider what the Birds got. They got Edwin Jackson, who becomes the Cardinals third best starter and enables Kyle McClellan to move back to his place in the bullpen where he is an exceptional reliever. 

Secondly, they get Marc Rzepczynski and Octavio Dotel. Thirdly, they get rid of Trevor Miller, who face it, is addition by subtraction. 

If you factor in Dotel’s and Rzepczynski’s full season stats and use McClellan’s last season stats to get some kind of gauge of what the present bullpen situation resembles, you have a pen that has an ERA of 2.66 and a WHIP of 1.07. That’s an enormous improvement. 

There’s no question here that the Cards' biggest need was middle relief and there’s no question that they got it. They didn’t just get a little help or marginal help as some would have you believe but they received tremendous help. 

Fielding 

Defensively, the Cardinals are not doing well.  Their zone fielding runs above average (Rtot) which is an estimate of how many runs above or below average a defense has given up minus 20, second to worst in the NL.  That means they have given up 20 more runs more than an “average” defense would have given up. 

However, their defense is vastly improved for two reasons. First, there is the acquisition of Rafael Furcal and second, there is the departure of Colby Rasmus. 

Rasmus would occasionally make a nice play, but truth be told he was a poor defender.  In fact, only four center fielders in the majors have cost their team more runs than Rasmus, who has cost the Cardinals eight runs.

Projected to the same number of games, Jon Jay, based on his present season average, would be a plus eight, meaning the Cardinals would give up eight runs fewer than average and 16 fewer than Rasmus had he been the starter. 

Rasmus wasn't even the biggest defensive problem though. That's Ryan Theriot, who in his defense, never was a shortstop. Theriot is a minus 12. He's not very good (to be read dryly and sardonically.) Furcal on the other hand is 0. Now granted, that's not fantastic, but it sure beats bad. 

The fact is if you're not sold on the notion Rtot, let's say that in all reality, in Theriot's case, it's probably understating things.  In games in which Theriot has started at SS, the Cardinals have given up .26 more runs than in games when he hasn't. Think about that. 

Why is that? The Cardinals philosophy is to pitch to contact. The theory is to jam up hitters, give them a chance to put the ball into play, but don't let them get good wood on the ball. Force them into hitting grounders and get them out. It's a philosophy that's been working for Duncan for two decades now. 

The only problem with that is that the infielders need to be able to make the play to get the hitters out. Theriot doesn't have the range, the glove or the arm to do that. In acquiring Furcal, the Cards potentially knock off as much as a quarter run a game off their runs allowed. That's a tremendous difference.

The two most important positions on the field in the baseball defensively are shortstop and center field. Those were the two weakest positions for the Cardinals. No, they aren't fielding gold glovers at either spot now, but merely elevating to slightly above average is an enormous improvement. 

Rotation

Edwin Jackson may be the hidden gem in all of this. Since May 1, he's got a 2.99 ERA in spite of the fact he's been saddled with a .327 babip.

 Add to that he's yet to be "Duncanized." Dave Duncan is arguably the greatest pitching coach in the history of the majors. If he can win in the postseason coaching Jeff Suppan and Jared Weaver, he sure as heck can win with Edwin Jackson on the mound.

Jackson's been looking like he's on the threshold of "finding it" the last couple of months and Duncan may be just what he needs to get there.

Jackson couldn't have come at a better time. Credit Kyle McClellan for doing what he did, but it was becoming clear that he wasn't going to make it as a starter. He is an excellent relief pitcher, but he wasn't going to be be a stable spot in the rotation for the duration of the year.

At worst, Jackson is a stable fill in. At best, Jackson continues to pitch like he did in his first start and really carries the Red Birds into the postseason and deep into it. Jackson gives the Cardinals what they desperately needed for the postseason, a number three pitcher that can go deep into the ball game. 

That's just for this season.

For the long term, if Jackson remains, he really could be a player that does what Chris Carpenter did. In his years in Toronto, Carpenter had a 4.98 ERA and had a 49-50 record. As a Cardinal, he's 90-40 with a 3.06 ERA, a Cy Young award and a World Series ring.

Edwin Jackson will be a better player over the next five years than Colby Rasmus. It was not a "win now" deal. Rasmus has plummeting value and honestly those who are raving about him now seem to have suddenly converted to Rasmus fans since the trade because he sure wasn't getting this much credit at the beginning of the year. 

Lineup

The Cardinals right now boast a team OPS+ of 116, the highest by any National League team since the Reds and the "Big Red Machine" won the World Series back in 1976. That's in spite of the fact that Pujols, Berkman and Halladay seem to be taking turns getting injured. 

As if that's not enough, their fourth best hitter, David Freese, has missed a large chunk of the season as well. 

The team is finally healthy right now and it's not like they need it, but Rafael Furcal offers help in the lone place in the lineup where they need help, at the all important lead off spot. 

The Cardinals have only gotten a .313 OBP and a .332 slugging percentage for a .645 OPS from the lead off position. Furcal's career numbers leading off are .351/.416/.765.

While he's had a bit of a struggle this season, that's been because of injuries. He's gotten hot lately and not just because he's gotten hot. He's gotten right.  He's corrected the issues with his swing, gotten his timing back and is getting square on the ball again. He's getting back to the player he is. 

It also matters that he's going from a team that had two players with a .800 OPS to hitting in front of potentially six consecutive hitters with an .800 OPS or higher. Essentially, what that means is he's going to get pitches to hit. This is important because he is a good "strike" hitter.

The Cost

 So the review is that there's no question that the Cardinals helped themselves this season, but at what cost?

First, let's be honest. The only player of note they lost was Colby Rasmus. Trevor Miller was the dead weight in their bullpen so that's addition by subtraction.

Second, and to me somewhat surprisingly, what gets lost in this conversation isn't Jon Jay, but Allen Craig. The Cardinals have huge depth at outfield and truthfully what you should do is deal from a position of strength to fill a weakness. The Cardinals were strongest in the outfield and their most tradable outfielder was Rasmus.

Craig has an OPS this year of .923, for his career, .817. He's also a better fielder.  Rasmus has an OPS of .723 this year and .753 this year. Two things are noteworthy. First, the obvious, Craig is a better hitter. Second, Craig is better and Rasmus is getting worse. 

So why exactly is it that Rasmus was the "five tool" future of the Cardinals? Pardon me for stating the obvious instead of going along with the general media hype, but just in terms of baseball, Rasmus had already lost the starting job to Jay and wasn't far from dropping down further on the depth chart.

Of course, it's worth stating that Jon Jay also has a better OSP (.797) and is a better fielder than Rasmus too. 

So that puts Rasmus as the fifth best outfielder the Cardinals have. 

I'm not sure that qualifies as the "trade of the decade" for Toronto. I don't recall the last time I've heard this much hype about a career .750 OPS player.

That's not even counting all the melodrama that surrounds him. The Cardinals got rid of a cancer when they got rid of Rasmus, it's just too bad his son had to go with him. 

In sum, the Cardinals went from being one of the worst bullpens in the league to top 10.

They improved their two most important defensive positions, easily cutting their runs allowed by a quarter run a game.

They secured their rotation and added a number three starter that can help them in the postseason.

They added their first honest lead off hitter since I don't remember when.

And they did this all at the cost of what really was the most controversial player on the team. 

Sorry to disagree with "experts" but to me that grades out as an A.