THE REDBIRD REVIEW The Cardinals have problems: injuries, disappointing starting pitching, an offense that isn’t clicking, and a power shortage by Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado, and a team home-run disparity that puts them at a disadvantage. The Cardinals also...
THE REDBIRD REVIEW The Cardinals are off today, and that’s necessary but disappointing, because I like watching this team play baseball. I don’t think I said that last season. Not much, anyway. Watching the 2023 Cardinals was a health problem for me. My blood pressure...
THE REDBIRD REVIEW After an alarming 48 hours and two losses to the mighty Dodgers to open the season, the Cardinals settled down, pulled their game together, began to establish an identity and won three of their next four games. It was a nice recovery, and the...
THE REDBIRD REVIEW The Cardinals lost their opening series of the season, losing three of four to the Dodgers. I’m thinking that the Dodgers will win a lot of series at Dodger Stadium this year. Two reasons: (a) They had a home winning percentage of .679 over the past...
THE REDBIRD REVIEW The Dodgers are the Dodgers. The Cardinals are not the Dodgers, and no one of sound baseball mind should expect them to be. The visitors are at Dodger Stadium with two more losses to go. Err, I meant to say two more games to go. Perhaps the...
The Cardinals had a firetrap bullpen last season, and responded by making moves to clear the smoke away. This particular gashouse gang blew 41 leads in 2023, and that can’t happen again. With the assistance of new consultant Chaim Bloom, the front office brought in...
Here’s a follow-up on something I wrote about in Wednesday’s column. It’s about the importance of team defense and what it means to pitchers. As I pointed out in yesterday’s column, the 2023 Cardinals had their poorest season defensively since 1930. That’s based on...
THE REDBIRD REVIEW The Cardinals had many, many problems in 2023. Offensively the team statistically ranked among the top 10 in the majors through the end of July, but faded over the final two months because of injuries and the fatigue of chronic losing. Having noted...
THE REDBIRD REVIEW The Cardinals brought in another tool for their extensive bullpen renovation by shopping the free-agent market for a one-year deal with right-handed reliever Keynan Middleton. The contract becomes official after Middleton goes through the standard...
