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St. Louis Cardinals: Series loss to Miami exposes who this team is, and it's not good
The St. Louis Cardinals lost two consecutive games to the brutal Miami Marlins via walk-off hits and are back in the clutches of sub-.500 baseball at 36-37. Those two wins by the Marlins doubled (yes, doubled) their win total this month, having won a whopping two games in June. By losing to the lowly Miami Marlins, the Cardinals showed they are still an inadequate baseball team.
After losing Wednesday, the Cardinals also dropped to 9-9 against five teams with a winning percentage under .400 (Angels, Athletics, Marlins, Rockies, White Sox). That's inexcusable.
Sure, the Cardinals are playing much better baseball after their awful 15-24 start. It was a much-needed turnaround, led by a revamped starting rotation and a steady bullpen. John Mozeliak and the front office deserve credit for signing new starting pitchers, such as Sonny Gray and Kyle Gibson, who performed well this season. The bullpen has come through despite Marmol's recent management.
But those two losses to Miami should be a splash of ice-cold water on the face of Cardinal Nation. This is still a Cardinal team with a low ceiling and a low floor. It is a team whose best offensive player this season has been Willson Contreras, and he has been out since early May with an arm injury. Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado are the supposed leaders on offense, but they both have wRC+ numbers below 100.
We can talk about how this team is still fighting for one of the last Wild Card spots, but being in a playoff spot with a bland, uninspiring record rewards mediocrity. The Cardinals are not the only team doing this. Only five of the fifteen NL teams have actual winning records, and only Milwaukee has a winning record in the lackluster NL Central division.
After Thursday's Field of Dreams game at Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama, the Cardinals return to St. Louis to play nine straight games against the Giants, Braves, and Reds. Expect a less-than-full crowd when they return to play starting on Saturday.
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