Bernie’s Redbird Review: Surely, The Cardinals Offense Is Better Than This. Right? Hello?

It was another silent night for the abominable St. Louis offense, and it was nothing new. The bats in the lineup were punchless, and largely lifeless, in a 3-0 loss to the Mets on Tuesday at Busch Stadium, with NY pitchers shutting down the Cardinal hitters on three hits.

Once again the Cards were owned by an opposing starting pitcher, as righthander Chris Bassitt cruised through easy six-inning assignment without stress.

This will pass, right? Surely the Cardinals aren’t this helpless offensively. Surely they will stir, do a more intense job of competing, and occasionally hit the baseball over the outfield wall or cash in runs with timely hits. Surely this is just a phase, a slump, a period of slumber for the lumber.

The Cards enter Wednesday’s 12:15 p.m. series capper with a three-game losing streak. They’ve lost four of their last six.

The BFIB are playing their greatest hits: berating John Mozeliak, questioning ownership’s financial commitment to winning, growling about batting coach Jeff Albert, demanding that Paul DeJong be sent to Peoria, calling for the big-league promotion of strong-man hitting prospect Nolan Gorman, and revisiting the Randy Arozarena trade.

The Nostalgia Season wasn’t supposed to be a tribute to Dal Maxvill and his .220 batting average in 11 seasons as a Cardinal. It wasn’t supposed to get us thinking about Ty Wigginton and the wonderful moments he gave us by going 9 for 57 in 2013. Where have you gone, Matt Carpenter? He’s slugging .488 at Triple A Round Rock, a Texas affiliate, so maybe GM Mike Girsch can give the Rangers a call. Is Dexter Fowler busy?

So yeah, this would be a swell time for the STL offense to kick out the jams, bust up some pitchers, recharge the scoreboard and enliven the season.

REDBIRD REVIEW

STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE: The Cardinals have an early-days record of 9-7. Are they being exposed by the better teams? They’re 2-4 against opponents that currently have winning records, and are 4-5 against teams that are .500 or better. The Cardinals have slapped around losing teams, winning five of seven.

THIS IS WHAT A SLUMP LOOKS LIKE: First of all, we’re not asking for much. We’re not asking for the 1930 Cardinals, who averaged a franchise-record 6.52 runs per game over a 154-game schedule. This season, when the Cardinals have supplied at least four runs for their pitchers in a game, they’re 7-2. But when the Cardinals score three runs or fewer, they’re 2-5.

Notes and updates, scratched out on deadwood:

– The Cardinals have one home run by an outfielder this season, and that was launched by Tyler O’Neill on opening day.

– In their last 10 games the Cards have averaged 2.6 runs, batted .199, slugged .260, lurched to a .546 OPS, and struck out in 24.5 of their plate appearances.

– During the current three-game losing streak the Cardinals have scored three runs in 27 innings, batted .156, and struck out in 30 percent of the time. They’re also 2 for 19 with runners in scoring position in the three straight losses.

– The Cards continue to sink in the MLB rankings for offense. After Tuesday’s zero against the Mets they’re 18th in runs per game (3.88), 19th in batting average (.226), 19th in slugging percentage (.347) and 18th in OPS (.655.)

– The fellers haven’t homered in their last six games, the longest streak by Team Cardinal since the 2015 season. And going into Wednesday’s game the Cards have paraded through 202 at-bats without hitting a home run. With the extreme power shortage the Cardinals have dropped to 21st in the majors with an average of only 0.81 home runs per game. That’s quite a difference from their average of 1.8 homers over their first six games.

– Beginning with the Milwaukee series, the Cardinals are hitting only .198 and slugging .260 with runners in scoring position.

– Starting pitchers have a 3.86 ERA vs. St. Louis this season. But over the last 10 games, the starting-pitching ERA against the Cardinals is 1.79. The Redbirds have failed to score an earned run off an opposing starter in five of the last 10 games. And opposing starters have held the Cardinals to no more than one earned run in seven of the last 10 games.

– The Cardinals did not score a single run in 33 combined innings against Brandon Woodruff, Sandy Alcantara, Pablo Lopez, Max Scherzer and Chris Bassitt.

INDUSTRY-WIDE POWER OUTAGE: The home-run rates are down in MLB this season. Last season MLB players homered every 27 at-bats and slugged .411. So far this year hitters are homering every 36.5 at-bats and slugging a weak .368. Pitchers allowed 1.3 homers per nine innings last season; that rate is 0.9 homers per 9 IP so far this season. That doesn’t excuse the Cardinals’ lack of power over the last couple of weeks.

FOCUS ON THE OUTFIELD: Time to update a recent note that I filed last week. The Cardinals outfield – so huge over the final three months last season – is searching for … something. The outfield contingent led by starters O’Neill, Harrison Bader and Dylan Carlson is batting only .199, slugging .260 and reaching base at a rate of 27 percent in 204 plate appearances. The collective St. Louis outfield OPS (.529) ranks 29th among the 30 MLB outfields. The Cards outfielders are performing 38 percent below average offensively in park-and-league adjusted runs created. Time to get something going, men.

THANK GOODNESS FOR RUN PREVENTION: Remember when we were all worried about the St. Louis pitching going into the season? Hey, there may come a time when we head to the fainting couch over the team’s pitching in 2022. But for now, let’s express our appreciation for the overall pitching performance. The Cardinals are allowing only 3.06 runs per game, which is fourth-best in the majors. Their team ERA of 3.02 is tied for fifth-best in MLB.

FINE WORK, BULLPEN MEN: The Cardinal bullpen allowed only one earned run in seven innings after taking over for starting pitcher Jordan Hicks (bruised wrist) in Tuesday’s loss. Good job by Andre Pallante, Nick Wittgren, Packy Naughton, Kodi Whitley and Aaron Brooks. And the only run allowed by the bullpen came in the ninth inning after home-plate umpire Mark Wegner missed a strike three call that would have ended the inning.

The St. Louis ‘pen ranks fifth in the majors with a 2.52 ERA. Thirteen of the 18 earned runs that have been scored against STL relievers so far this season were tagged on three guys: Giovanny Gallegos, Aaron Brooks and Drew VerHagen, who have a combined ERA of 6.38. But the other nine STL relievers have allowed only five earned runs in 46 innings for a 0.97 ERA. The nine are Ryan Helsley, Genesis Cabrera, Hicks, Whitley, Pallante, Naughton, Wittgren, T.J. McFarland and Jake Woodford.

BY THE WAY: Wasn’t Packy Naughton a character in the HBO series “Boardwalk Empire” starring Steve Buscemi?

QUICK NOTE ON GIOVANNY GALLEGOS: Through 2021, the righthander had a positive track record against left-handed hitters. But it’s a different look in 2022, with LH bats hitting .455 against Gallegos. And his strikeout rate against LH hitters is only 11.6 percent. (It was 30.7% last season.) Gallegos has faced only 11 left-handed batters this season so I’m not rushing to conclusions. But it’s something to keep an eye on.

TIP OF THE CAP: Rookie reliever Andres Pallante was chipped for an earned run in his major-league debut on April 10. But in his last four appearances Pallante has provided the Cardinals with 8.1 scoreless innings – allowed a batting average of .200 and an OPS of .426 over that time. Pallante ranks second with a 0.96 ERA among MLB rookie relievers that have pitched at least 9 innings this month. The only rookie to top Pallante so far is Tanner Banks (White Sox.) Banks hasn’t given up an earned run in his 10.1 innings.

WHAT’S HAPPENED TO DYLAN CARLSON? Yeah. It’s early and all of that. But Carlson may be the most frustrating hitter on this team so far. As a rookie last season, Carlson battled through a challenging first half but got through it with a respectable .735 OPS. He really came on after the All-Star break, batting .279 with a .847 OPS. And his power game produced an impressive second-half slugging percentage of .505.

Instead of building on his 2021 second-half success, Carlson has regressed in his first month of 2022, hitting .194 with a .488 OPS.

Carlson’s contact profile is mystifying:

➤ Hard-hit rate: 31% last year, 16.7% now.
➤ Avg. exit velocity: 88.2% last year, 83% now.
➤ Barrel percentage: 7% last year, 0% now.
➤ Soft contact: 12.3% last year, 26% now.
➤Ground-ball rate: 40% last year, 52% now.

Another problem is Carlson’s habit of chasing pitches out of the strike zone. Last season he did that 24 percent of the time. This year his chase rate is 30%.

Carlson is 1 for 19 against breaking balls this season.

IT’S GAME DAY: Good luck to Steven Matz today as he goes against the team that drafted and developed him. The Cardinals will encounter another high-end starter in Mets righthander Carlos Carrasco. In his three starts against Washington, Arizona and San Francisco, Carrasco has a 1.47 ERA in 18.1 innings. He’s struck out 20 and walked only two. Only 12 of 67 batters faced have reached base against Carrasco. And right-handed hitters are 3 for 24 against him (.125.) Left-handed bats haven’t done much better, hitting .150 in 40 at-bats.

Thanks for reading …

–Bernie

Bernie invites you to listen to his opinionated and analytical sports-talk show on 590-AM The Fan, KFNS. It airs Monday through Thursday from 3-6 p.m. and Friday from 4-6 p.m. You can listen by streaming online or by downloading the “Bernie Show” podcast at 590thefan.com — the 590 app works great and is available in your preferred app store.

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All stats used here were sourced from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, Stathead, Bill James Online, Fielding Bible, Baseball Savant and Brooks Baseball Net unless otherwise noted.