Cards Starting Strong

The Cardinals won their third straight game of the spring today with a 5-4 victory over the Mets on the road. Three in a row is what we call a winning streak.

There was a lot of hype going into this game. It was the Mets’ debut of their new ace Johan Santana. The Cards got to him early, tagging him for three runs in the first, courtesy of a Juan Gonzalez home run. Other highlights from today’s action include a double and a homer from Albert Pujols, and a 2 for 3 day from Brendan Ryan. Derrick Goold has more notes from the game. Here’s the box score.

So far, Gonzalez has been hitting the ball well. At first, I was secretly rooting against him, and hated the idea of a 38 year old has-been taking at-bats away from the younger players. Erik at Future Redbirds shares my sentiment. All things being equal, you’d have to give the nod to the younger player, maybe a guy like Brian Barton. I’m afraid that Tony La Russa will see it differently. We know how much he loves his veterans. Anyway, after thinking it over a bit more, I just want the 25 guys that give the Cardinals the best chance to win. If Juan Gone is one of them, then I’m all for it.

Brendan Ryan continues to make his case for one of the roster spots. One of his two hits today was triple. There were a couple of interesting stories on Ryan floating around recently. Joe Strauss revealed some more of Ryan’s personality, as well as his attention deficit disorder, in his article last Friday. The other story was news to me. Apparently, Ryan was kicked off his college baseball team four times. Jim Masilak had the story way back in July of last year. I don’t know how I missed that one, but either way, hat tip to Ronnie Dobbs, a frequenter of the forums in the Post Dispatch.

Finally, Matthew Leach of MLB.com shares his latest interview with La Russa. Find it here.

The Cardinals hope to continue their winning ways tomorrow when they face the Marlins at Roger Dean Stadium. The Cards will be the visiting team. Let’s hope the streak continues.

Mike

I don't want to see Barton go back to Cleveland. I think Ludwick is a lock to make the team. He could certainly build off of his '07 season. From what I understand, the Cards could keep Barton if he's not on the 25-man if he's on the DL or on a rehab assignment. If that's the case, I guess Juan could be a temporary fill in. He did accept a minor league deal, so I guess we'll see.

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purple iguana

I agree to an extent about wanting the 25 best players on the Cardinals roster, but in the case of Juan Gonzalez, I disagree. We have 5-6 very capable, young, outfielders without him. I don't think there's anyway in hell that the difference between him and the 5th OFer on our roster is the difference in making the playoffs or not.
First off, our 5th OFer is most likely going to be Ludwick or Barton. There's no reason for Barton not to make this team due to him being able to go back to the Indinas if he goes to the minors. As for Ludwick, LaRussa used him perfectly last year, and he defiently has more upside than Gonzalez.
2nd, I read something intersting somewhere(and it might have been this blog) was that Gonzalez was a veteran hitter that knows in spring veteran pitchers try to work on pitches more than getting people out. Gonzalez knows that he can sit on a pitch and try to hit it out so that he can make the team.
In the short term, it may be a little beneficial to keep Gonzalez; however, in the long run, it will be a lot better to keep the 5 younger OFers.

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