Cards stay alive for one more game

As if watching the late-August and early-September swoon of the Cardinals hasn’t been bad enough, it appears no one else wants to take the NL Wild Card spot in the playoffs.  The Mets lost to the Cubs tonight, allowing the Cardinals to mathematically remain “in the race” regardless of their outcome versus Arizona tonight (and I fear they just lost their best chance to win tonight, with Albert Pujols whiffing with men on first and third in the bottom of the seventh).

The Cards are a National League second-worst in their last thirty games, at 11-19 (only the Pirates are worse at 8-22, and three of those wins came in a sweep of the Redbirds).

The odds-on favorite to win the Wild Card not long ago, the Brewers have unraveled at 13-17 in their last thirty.

In short, a playoff spot was there for the taking.  The Mets, Phillies, Florida, and Houston (who could’ve been destined for great things until Hurricane Ike forced them into Bud the Brewer’s backyard) have all capitalized while the Cards have faded out of the conscious of pretty much every discussion.

While out of town over the weekend, I didn’t get to see any of the Cubs series.  The disappointing part, for me, is that I didn’t terribly miss it.  It is a real downer - having poured a ton of energy into this team, this season, this roller-coaster ride - to watch the slow death of such a story.  This season was supposed to be LaRussa’s crowning achievement, his coup de grace, the final feather in the cap of a surefire Hall of Fame managing career, right?  This was going to be the ultimate trump card for TLR - even moreso than 2006 - to thumb his nose at the experts who predicted the Cards were going nowhere fast.

Well, it looks like in a way, both parties were right.  The Cards are going home after game 162.  But if you think that Tony and his band of red-and-white clad misfits didn’t put a scare into some folks in Chicago and Milwaukee, you are sorely mistaken.

Golly, I didn’t really mean this to be an obituary.  For some reason, I can just feel the disappointment flowing out of my fingers right now.

Please don’t interpret this as a criticism of this year’s team.  Don’t read this and think that I’m dismissing what these guys have accomplished, or saying that this year was a failure.  I think the Cards learned a lot about some players they needed a thicker ‘book’ on.  I think (hope) that John Mozeliak learned that the Jocketty Plan - throw a bunch of scrap heap guys against a wall and see which ones stick - is not going to cut it against today’s Cubs and Brewers.  Most of all, we learned that Tony can, and will (even if somewhat forced) use young players in all variety of situations, with games on the line.

To the 2008 Cardinals:  You entertained me, and for that I am grateful.  I can’t think of a season that I have followed and allowed myself such a wide range of emotions over sports in a long time.

At the risk of getting too sappy here about this team (after all, it’s the first one that I’ve documented on this here site), I’m going to cut out here - I plan on sticking with this team through the end of the season - we would expect them to play all out until the end of 162, so I will do the same.  So keep reading for more IN-season analysis.

They might not make the playoffs, but I’m just not ready to close the book on the 2008 St Louis Cardinals just yet.

Bob Watson has lost his mind

As I was watching Sunday’s game against the Cincinnati Reds, watching the Cards squander another opportunity for a sweep, I saw something that I hadn’t seen from a Cardinal hurler all season.  I saw Kyle Lohse stick up for someone on his team.  Granted, it was himself he was sticking up for, but he showed some moxie nonetheless.

Edinson Volquez had buzzed Lohse in the top of the fifth, high and tight under the chin, and it was clear Kyle didn’t like it, glaring out at Volquez.  Edinson, for his part, played the role he’s supposed to in that case, stomping around like he was upset with himself for losing the pitch up there - he didn’t intend to do it.  And he’d have a good argument - Volquez is among the league leaders in HBP.  He walked four just in this game as well.

Whether he meant to come in on Lohse or not, Volquez quickly saw a very similar pitch from Lohse when leading off the bottom of the fifth inning.  Said Lohse after the game:

“Same spot,” Lohse noted, referring to his reply pitch. “Wasn’t trying to hit him, though.”

Umpire Greg Gibson quickly popped out from behind the plate, warned both dugouts, and the game went on.

“Well I’ll be danged” I muttered to myself.  All too often this season, opposing pitchers have taken liberties with Cardinal hitters, all-too-conveniently plunking them after a St Louis home run or clutch hit.  For all of the reputation that LaRussa has as a head-hunting manager, I sure haven’t seen any proof this season.  Even in this instance, I don’t believe LaRussa was behind it.  Whether you see it every outing or not, Lohse does have a competitive fire in his stomach, and I’m virtually certain that this buzzer to Volquez was all Kyle’s idea.

So,  no harm no foul, the game plods on to the top of the seventh inning.  That’s when Volquez got too far inside on Felipe Lopez and hit him in the small of the back.  While half-way expecting (and hoping for, because Volquez was cruising) an immediate ejection from home plate umpire Gibson, he made what I still to this day believe was the right call.  The pitch was not intentional.  Lopez took his base, Tony argued a little bit (but you’ll note not much, as you’d think he would if he really believed Volquez wanted to hit him), Volquez remained in the game, and they went on.  The funny thing is that not once did I think to myself “he was throwing at him, he should’ve been tossed.”  And I can admittedly be an over-reactive type, when it comes to things like that.

So, at the end of the day, the Cardinals took a loss, Lohse stood up for himself, and the umpires had gotten it right.  Cooler heads had prevailed.  Or so I thought.

The news came down yesterday that Bob Watson, vice president of on-field operations for MLB, had suspended Lohse for five games.

Um, what?

So for once this season (in the midst of heated battles between ownership and the umpires’ union over replay) your umpires had played their cards right, had let the game be decided by the players and not their rash decisions, and now you’re suspending a guy who wasn’t even kicked out of the game?  Come again?

Lohse, upon learing of his suspension said:

“My intent wasn’t to hit anybody. My intent was to make the opposing pitcher feel as uncomfortable as I did the at-bat before. The way they interpreted it, it seems like they feel I was trying to hit him.”

For a guy who has only 39 walks this season and has hit only two batters, I don’t think I’m too naive to believe that Kyle could have that sort of command of his pitches.  Throw it high and tight, don’t hit him.  To his credit, Volquez responded in kind:

“I don’t know if he really tried to hit me,” he said. “Maybe he was trying to take me out of the game a little bit, and mess with my concentration on the game.”

An excellent deduction.  Volquez was cruising, and Lohse had the ultimate spot and reason to fire off that pitch.  More from Volquez:

“I don’t want to hit a pitcher,” said Volquez, who received no discipline. “If I’m going to hit somebody, it’d be position players. In that situation, that wasn’t on purpose. I had two men on base and two outs. If I hit him, I have to face the No. 9 batter. I just tried to throw inside and the ball went up close to him. I think he got ticked off. That’s part of the game.” [bolding is mine]

Two things strike me here:  First, he’s right, he had nothing to gain by hitting Lohse, and I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, based upon his statistics indicating he can get wild, that he wasn’t trying to hit Lohse.  However, he also says that he thinks Lohse got upset with the pitch regardless, and (at least the way I read it) understands why he might have seen a similar pitch in the bottom of the inning.

That’s part of the game.  Even Dusty Baker was surprised:

“Five games and they didn’t even kick him out of the game. Wow,” Baker said. “The umpires don’t kick him out but the league suspends him. That’s a first, isn’t it? I haven’t seen that.”

Well, apparently not the way Bob Watson sees it.  So in a situation that was completely diffused by the players’ behavior and the calm rationale of the umpiring crew that day, Watson has stepped in and handed down his sentence on Lohse.  Five game suspension and an undisclosed fine.

Of course, Lohse will appeal, and I have to believe that the suspension will be reduced.  SInce he is a starting pitcher, the suspension is likely to have little to no affect on his regular turns in the rotation anyway.  In my mind, that is beside the point.  If Lohse deserved this penalty, Volquez deserved at least the same.  Again, the umpires did not see fit to eject anyone from the game, yet Lohse gets five games and Volquez nothing.  It’s almost as if Volquez is being rewarded for often being wild and having a track record for hitting batters.  Yet I should reiterate, I don’t believe that either player really deserved punishment, but how can you single out one and not the other as well?

Richie Sexson went bonkers earlier this season, charging the mound and throwing his helmet and several punches at a pitcher.  He got six games that was later reduced to five.  How in the world does Lohse’s *almost* hitting a batter come even close to comparing to Richie’s inexplicable display?  Fascinating.

As I said earlier, this will likely (hopefully, assuming that more intelligent heads prevail during the appeal process) be reduced and have little effect on Lohse at all, save for the fine taking a chunk out of his pocketbook.  But the precedent or example being made here is wrong.  Bob Watson needs to let his umpires make the decisions on field, using the knowledge they have of game situations and being in the heat of the moment itself, not by watching on video in his cushy office three days later.

This time the umps got it right.  Maybe they should use instant replay for determining who should be in charge of doling out the suspensions.