S.O.S. – Stop Our Streak!

–Keep calm and start winning–

It’s a good thing the new Stan Musial Veterans Memorial Bridge is almost completed.  Judging from most of the reactions I’ve seen over the last day or two, the Poplar Street, EADS, Jefferson Barracks, and Clark bridges don’t collectively provide enough room for all the jumpers in the greater St. Louis area following the Redbirds’ recent slide.

In fact, on Tuesday, the club managed to do the only thing worse than lose a game to the Pirates…they lost two games to the Pirates.

Now, I’m not suggesting that this isn’t a serious matter, losing all these games (not to mention, the way the games are being lost), but it’s worth pointing out that it’s a long season.  It’s a marathon, not a sprint.  There are 162 games, and we’ve got to take them one at a time.  I’m just trying to get a good pitch to hit, not do too much, and put my team in a position to w…sorry, got a little carried away there.

I took my little league team from this past summer to the game last Thursday at Busch, when Lynn looked really good, and the Cards completed a sweep of the Phillies.  The Redbirds haven’t won since.  And while a streak of losing a week’s worth of games straight obviously isn’t ideal, let’s keep a few things in mind.

  • If you’re going to go on a losing streak, the best starting point is to have the best record in baseball.
  • There’s roughly a third of the season to go, and a lot can happen in 50 games.
  • Two wild cards means the current (awful) pace would need to continue a little longer for a playoff berth to become jeopardized.

Having said that…

  • Having the best record in baseball is great, but when there’s not much distance between you & the teams chasing you, it’s moot.
  • No losing streak is good, but to go cold right about the time you head into PIT and CIN for 8 games is as bad as timing can get.
  • Cards have mustered six runs since their last win, scoring 2 twice, 1 twice, and have been shutout twice.

The thing about that last point is that, when you’re not hitting many homers, you’ve got to string 2 or 3, or sometimes 4 hits together to score.  The Cards have been held to A TOTAL of 4 hits or fewer in 4 of the last 6 games–the offense is clearly in need of a shot in the arm.  All in all, I’m not overly concerned at this point, but will grant you that the Cards had better turn things around, and today would be a good time to start.  With Wainwright taking the mound tonight, you have to feel good about tonight being the best opportunity for turning things around, in terms of keeping them from scoring.  Maybe even if the offense only comes up with a one or two-run night, it could be enough to win, behind Waino.

–Plenty to catch up on–

Tuesday was a very full day, in terms of Cards news, and C70 covered a lot of it in his earlier post.  I’ll not attempt to rehash all of it, but he’s done a good job of covering big news like the departure of Scrabble, and Yadi’s trip to the DL.

–Movin’ on–

With Jake Peavy ending up in Boston, as part of a 3-team, 7-player deal, Cliff Lee is the only (ok, not really the “only”) starting pitcher out there that may be packing his bags today.  Yesterday, on MLBNetwork, Phillies’ GM, Ruben Amarro Jr. said that Lee was unlikely to be traded.  I was talking about this with my podcast (ignore the 10 seconds of craziness at the beginning) co-host, Chris, yesterday, and wondered aloud if Lee ends up on waivers, and relocating under those circumstances.  I suppose anything could happen, as this IS, afterall ,the time of year when teams put players on waivers and fan bases lose their collective mind about certain guys, when they find out about it.  Rare is it, however, that anything ever comes of it, though it could happen.

–8 (more) men out–

Following the recent discipline of Brewers’ star, Ryan Braun, MLB notified the PA of their intentions to suspend A-Rod and 8 other players this week.  Details are sure to become clearer as the day and week wears on.  But according to Joey Nowak’s piece on MLB.com today, the approach MLB is taking isn’t unlike one most of us who are parents would take.  According to the report, ARod will face stiffer penalties (than Nelson Cruz, Jhonny Peralta, and others), “for lying to MLB investigators or interfering with baseball’s year-long Biogenesis investigation.”.

“Alexander Emmanuel Rodriguez!  Get in here, young man!  You took PEDs?!  You are in serious trouble, mister!  But you’re in even MORE trouble for lying to me about it!”

–Contest winner–

Congratulations to Evan Fisk, our contest winner.  Evan, we’ll be reaching out to you soon for details on claiming your prize.  Congratulations!

 

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