Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - BREAKING: Bullpen WOES Reach BOILING POINT—Who Can Step Up for St. Louis Cardinals?

Starting point is 00:00:00 Rough weekend for the St. Louis Cardinals bullpen who squanders two late leads in the series lost to the Minnesota Twins. This is Locked on Cardinals. You are Locked on Cardinals. Your daily St. Louis Cardinals podcast, part of the Locked on podcast network, your team every day. Hey there, Cardinals fans. I'm J.D. Haffern. And today's episode brought to you by Odu. Great organizations win because operations matter. And that's why you should get Odu.

Starting point is 00:00:33 Drive for free today at O'Don. Odo.com slash locked on. That's O-D-O-O-O-com slash locked on. On today's show, we're going to get some feedback from our fans. A lot of angry people out there after what they just witnessed in Minnesota, rightfully so. We'll do that in our cardinal confessions. We'll discuss the offense and the impact that Blaze Jordan had this weekend. But we're going to start with this bullpen, which, yeah, dude, it's had a lot of ups and downs. A lot of ups and downs this weekend against the twins. It was a lot. more downs than it was ups. Not all of it was bad, but most of it was pretty bad. And it ended up costing the Cardinals a series win. And honestly, a serious sweep in my mind, because in my eyes,

Starting point is 00:01:17 if you get just an average performance out of your bullpen this weekend, you probably sweep. You certainly take two of three, but you probably sweep. The better team was the Cardinals for 90% of this series, kind of like the Spurs and Knicks, you know, where the Spurs were We're winning for most of the series and then the Knicks end up winning in the end. And they take the series and the same thing happened here with the Minnesota twins because they're not a great team by any means. They didn't do anything all that special. They were a little annoying, you know, with coming up with some clutch hits.

Starting point is 00:01:49 So credit to them for that. But they also gave up a lot of home runs. Like their pitching staff wasn't anything special. They made errors. The defense was not good. And in the end, it really was about whose bullpins sucked worse. And unfortunately for all of us Cardinal fans, it was us this weekend.

Starting point is 00:02:06 Coming off the loss in New York, which was another bummer on Thursday where Juan Soto hits the home run off Joe Joe Romero to win the game. The Cardinals pitching staff, not just the pen, but the Cardinals pitching staff as a whole, gave up 11 home runs in the past four games. And when one and three, with all three losses coming by one run,

Starting point is 00:02:25 and they blew two saves in their losses. So these are not easy losses to get over to because you're like, oh, so painful. Like it's weird that sometimes, you know, you got the games that you lose by like five or six. You're like, ah, you know, chalk it up. That was a bad one. When you lose by one run, it really kind of stings a little bit more.

Starting point is 00:02:42 Starting rotation does not get a free pass here either. Like I know the bullpen is where a lot of the attention is right now, but the starting rotation, you don't just get off Scott free here. Dobbins lasted just four and a third on Thursday. Leahy just five on Friday. Libby four and a third on Saturday. And only McGreevy on Sunday gives you a quality start with six, and two runs against, although he too gave up a home run to Victor Caratini out of all

Starting point is 00:03:10 people. I mean, come on. That's the way, how they blew their slim one and nothing lead that McGreevy had just received. Caratini had just three home runs at almost 200 of bats this season. So when I say that, you know, of all people, Victor Caratini, it's because that's a guy that should not be taking you yard. And when they do that, you got nobody to blame but yourself. you know, with Byron Buckson just absolutely owning the Cardinals, the whole series,

Starting point is 00:03:38 he gets home roads and stuff. You're like, yeah, dude, he's a special talent. He's a really, really good hitter. Garotini goes yard on you. You're like, what the hell? How did we let that guy beat us? And, you know, when starters can't go long enough, it puts a strain on your bullpen who eventually are going to crumble and fall,

Starting point is 00:03:55 and we saw that this weekend. Even some of the names you have the most trust in ended up struggling this weekend. It was just a bad weekend for the bullpen. Friday, it was Gordon Gricepho, who has been very good this season. And this is, I'm just focusing on what happened this weekend. As a whole, you know, again, it's been ups and downs for a lot of people. But like, Gordon Griceffle's been really, really good this year. This is not like, hey, get him out of here type of talk here.

Starting point is 00:04:21 Gordon Griskev has been very, very good. And he was handed a three-run lead. And he didn't do so well with it. Gets two outs, but also walks a couple of guys. So Ali pulls him. hands it over to Ryan Stanick, who serves up the game tying three-run home run to Roger Clements' kid, Cody Clements. They get him the lead again, and he serves up Dangers of Royce Lewis and Brooks Lee,

Starting point is 00:04:43 and the Cardinals lose, excuse me, 9 to 8. Five batters, three home runs for Ryan Stannock. Unthinkable, but it happened. It was the first time Stanick allowed more than two home runs in any of his 496 career games in the major leagues. So this was a normal. Danick doesn't get drilled by the long ball all the time. Twins scored seven runs in the final three innings to steal it from the cartons.

Starting point is 00:05:08 Saturday, you got Riley O'Brien, who looked awful in that ninth inning. Absolutely awful. Came in with a four-run lead, walks the first three hitters before wiggling out of trouble and escaping with that 9-to-6 win. Still extremely stressful for what should have been a layup inning for him coming in up four runs and he makes it into this big stress ball of an inning so much that I immediately left and went and started drinking beer partially because of him partially because hey it was Saturday. Then on Sunday you got Jojo Romero who comes in on the seventh inning four to lead.

Starting point is 00:05:45 He walks the number nine hitter, which you don't do even in this day and age where we don't have the pitcher batting ninth, then gives up three straight singles before giving away to George Soriano, who has also been very good this season. He said, where would we be without George Soriano? He's been excellent. But he can't stop the bleeding. Twins tied up. And then with two wouts, he gives up back-to-back doubles,

Starting point is 00:06:08 one, two, the number nine hitter. And then he hangs a sweeper for the other double. Back-to-back doubles, twins take the lead. They win the game. And when the year started, you know, you were banking on, you know, when you looked at the bullpen, and we all knew it. We were like, it doesn't look that good.

Starting point is 00:06:26 I'm not all that excited about this bullpen. Not a lot of dudes. that I can rely on out of the gate. You had Jojo, you had Riley O'Brien, who was really, really good last year, and was very good at the beginning of this year. And you had Matt Sonson, remember? Those were your top three guys. Everybody else was kind of like, well, we'll see.

Starting point is 00:06:43 I don't know about Gordon Grisufel yet. George Soriano just came to the team. He wasn't even with the organization. Stanick, does he have anything left? He hasn't been that great over the last couple years. Who is Justin Brule? How's he going to help us? Is he any good?

Starting point is 00:06:58 So you had a lot of questions. But those were the three guys that you were banking on. And right now, Jojo has an ERA over 10 in his last seven appearances. He's in a rough spot. O'Brien, ERA over six in his last 15 appearances. Still has nine saves, but they haven't been easy. And then you got Sphanson, who was so horrible for most of the year that they had to send him down at the end of May. Finally, they were like, they just pulled the plug and they're like, look, we're trying to win ball games right now.

Starting point is 00:07:27 We can't babysit you. So they set him down and since he's been recalled, pretty good. Got recalled on Thursday, four and two thirds of no hit baseball and three appearances, no walks for a strikeout. So maybe we're getting that version of Matt's Fonson back, which would be great. Stanik hadn't given up an earned run in his last eight appearances. So I know there's people like the Stanik Panic button is back and all that. And I'm like, look, it was a very odd inning to give up three.

Starting point is 00:07:59 home runs, like one and then two in the next inning, but it was a very odd, I should say appearance on an inning, but a very odd appearance for that to happen. But he hadn't given up an earned run in his last eight appearances before he got blasted on Saturday. And then he looked fine on Sunday. Again, Ali pulls him right back out and goes, no, get back out there. You got to get back on the horse. And he did.

Starting point is 00:08:21 And he looked fine on Sunday. Just a rough weekend for the group overall as far as the bullpen and the pitching staff. Now the office, let's get to some fun stuff. The offense was a lot of fun to watch over the weekend. Plenty to talk about there, including the debut of Blaze Jordan. Build the statue? Blaise Jordan? What a weekend.

Starting point is 00:08:40 What a weekend. What a debut. Turn it heads, not only with the bat, but also with his glove. I thought he was not supposed to be good at fielding. But we'll talk about him and these guys coming up next on lockdown cards. Throughout the NHL finals, every shift matters, every moment is intense and everything comes down to execution when the pressure is. is at its highest. And just like athletes must be ready to perform when the puck drops,

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Starting point is 00:11:43 Visit fandle.com to get started. Thanks for making Lockdown Cardinals, your first listen of the day. Thank you for making locked on the number one sports podcast network. Get your daily cardinals coverage completely add free by joining the everyday or club. Start your seven-day free trial right now and get closer to your team without those interruptions. just click the link in the show notes or you can go to lockdown on STL cardinals dot supercast.com claim your free trial do it now do it now it's free uh hym bloom our guy softest hands in the world why i met him the other week shook his hand i'm like oh my gosh like i don't want to

Starting point is 00:12:24 come off with being weird they'd be like dude what lotion he used bro because but softest hands in the world super nice dude very courteous and he's been working hard recently made quite a few moves involving the offensive side of the roster. So far, they have been working beautifully. Now, some of the mainstays that were here at the beginning of the year, they've been moved out due to lack of production. You know, the two big names are Victor Scott and Nolan Gorman, two guys who were given over two months plus the years that they've already been on the squad to earn their starting spots and keep them. And they failed to do so. So now they're in Memphis. You can also add Thomas Sejacy and Joel Pozo to that list, but they weren't starters.

Starting point is 00:13:05 And Sejacy needs to play if he's ever going to improve and rejoin the team in the future. So that made sense. Pedro Pahas has been demoted on the depth chart so that Jimmy Crooks can get more playing time. The extended injuries to Ramon Urias. That's a thing that opened up some spots. You know, these guys either not producing or being injured, has allowed the cartels to pull the trigger on certain moves and has led to what I think has been the most complete and most interesting and fun lineup and gives Ali a lot more toys at his disposal.

Starting point is 00:13:37 Nelson Velazquez, the guy that we thought kind of deserved to be up there from the very get-go after his good spring. But they, Cardinals were kind of proven right. He went down to Memphis and he wasn't very good. He had to get back into it and finally earned his spot on the team. Jose Fermin has certainly earned his spot and is deserving of more playing time. Both of them, as the right-handed bats coming off the bench, excellent pieces. You got a lot of power from Nelson Velazquez. Jose Fermin can do a lot of different things for you when you got the lefties on the mound.

Starting point is 00:14:12 Newton Church are healthy now and have locked down their spots in left field and center field. Brian Torres can play both infield and outfield off the bench. He's got speed as well. And now we see the impact that Blaze Jordan has had in his first week and in the big leagues, both offensively and with his glove. which was very impressive. His ability to now play third base and first base. And my every dares are going to remember me saying this when they were talking about, all right, Nolan Gorman, what are we going to do with Gorman? I'm like, teach him how to play first base.

Starting point is 00:14:41 Teach him how to play first base. And they didn't. It didn't happen. It was second and third. And he never really, he played a little, I think did he play a few winnings, but Blaze Jordan has the ability to play third and first. And it makes him a welcome edition because now Alec Berlison can get off his feet. A D.H like he did on Sunday. He doesn't have to be in the field every single time because you don't have a backup first baseman.

Starting point is 00:15:07 Would you rather have Pozo or Pahas doing it over there? No. And Blaise's defense, not exactly what he's known for when you go look at his time in the minor leagues. But he looked pretty darn good at both positions this weekend whether he was in third or first base. A couple of really nice plays,

Starting point is 00:15:25 both sides. You know, the one play in the inning where you got the double play at first base awesome third base made a few nice scoops and tags everything i it looked fine to me i'm good with it offensively he was five or 12 out of the gate two hits on friday had the triple in the big three run blast on saturday added another single on sunday and i hate picking on nolan gorman i do because it's never anything personal but stats are what they are production is production you either are doing it or you're not, and no one Gorman was not doing it. In his last 90 at bats,

Starting point is 00:16:01 no one Gorman had two home runs and five RBIs and 39 strikeouts. In his last 15 games, three hits and 43 at bats, one RBI. And he's batting fifth. He's batting behind Jordan Walker most of the time. And you have one RBI. Blaze Jordan has already done more in the three games he's played than Gorman have been giving the team over the last few weeks. Now can't he sustain it?

Starting point is 00:16:26 that's the question. I don't know. You know, teams are going to get scouting reports on what he can and can't do. Usually there's a high with rookies and then there's a low. I mean, we're seeing J.J. Weatherhold has gone through it where there's some big highs and then there's some lows. But that's also just baseball in general. Like there's just ups and downs. But we're going to find out. We're going to find out it plays Jordan is a full-time piece to this puzzle. But looking at the lineup, like when you, you just take a look at it with now him in the lineup and what they can do against righties and lefties. Normal night when you face a right-handed bat, JJ, Herrera, Burley, Walker, those two, by the way, look at those numbers. If both of them are not at the All-Star game, this is stupid. Just same. Then you got Newt behind Walker, win, Crooks, Blaze Jordan, and Nathan Church.

Starting point is 00:17:23 It's a pretty darn formidable. Pretty darn formidable. And you get the left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right, left, that Ali likes to use. That way it makes any pitching changes from the opposing bullpen makes it a little more difficult. And then when you get a lefty on the mound, you got JJ, but then you got a ton of righties that you can throw in there. Herrera, Walker, Nelly, Burley, usually bats fifth in those situations. Then it's for mean, win, blaze, and then church. and then you play the matchups with guys when you need a day off.

Starting point is 00:17:59 You can put other people in. Torres will get some playing time. Like, it's a nice balance right now with everybody healthy. This lineup doesn't have the glaring holes that it did earlier this season, where when you had Gorman, Scott and Pahas in the same lineup, I mean, basically they were full-time bat at bats, when they were all three getting full-time at bats, almost guaranteed outs.

Starting point is 00:18:24 right? Eat out of 10 times, it's going to be an out and probably a strike out at that. And now you've removed those and you brought in some other guys that aren't that way. They put the ball in play. They don't strike out all the time.

Starting point is 00:18:40 So it's nice. And it's a shame that, you know, as great as the offense was over the weekend, especially in those first two games, that you only got one win against the twins. But you can't put the blame on the offense. Like that, just they did their job. And it was a lot of fun to watch.

Starting point is 00:18:56 And it's exciting. And it makes baseball more fun when your offense is clicking like that. So stay healthy. Keep it up. Like no complaints. Let's take some cardinal confessions next. Then we're going to wrap up talking about the standings over the weekend. Because even though the Cardinals lost the series to the twins, which is a huge bummer,

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Starting point is 00:22:32 That's O-D-O-O-O-O-com slash locked-on. Thanks for making Locked on Cardinals. Your first list another day. Thank you for making Locked-on the number one sports podcast network. Cardinal Confessions, where I read the comments off of the shorts and the reels and the videos that we do here at Locked-on Cardinals, and we get to hear what Cardinal Nation is saying. So if you want your voice heard and you want your comments read on the show, make sure you pop them in there.

Starting point is 00:23:00 more comments the better um first one up here why do we keep going to the bullpen so early let the starters pitch you don't need to go to the pen after five innings every single night a lot of questions about this one a lot of uh fans on ollie about this weekend uh which which fine i didn't think stanick should have been in that game long as well and uh they they trusted him and it didn't work uh but in my opinion as far as like taking the starters out early ollie is doing the this usually because A, the starter is ineffective and are getting their nuts blasted when they go through the order for a third time. Hello, Kyle Leahy and Matthew Libertor.

Starting point is 00:23:43 And B, they are probably at a pitch count and in an effort to keep these guys healthy, they don't let them exceed whatever their pitch count is on that day. Now, people who are upset about the pitch count stuff, you can't. argue with the success that the Cardinals have had in keeping the rotation healthy. How can you? Like when other teams are losing dudes left and right, the Cardinals have been able to roll out the same five dudes over and over and over for a season and a half now. They've done it better than anyone else, keeping these guys healthy the last couple seasons. And when the pitcher is throwing good like McGreevy was on Sunday, he leaves the men.

Starting point is 00:24:27 McGreevy goes six innings. Libby and Leahy were not very effective in their starts. Libby was, Libby's the most troubling for me because he was supposed to be one of the rocks in the rotation that they could rely on this year. You know, he was the guy that I thought was going to take that next step after going through the struggles last year, and he just kind of seems like the same dude, right?

Starting point is 00:24:50 Where he has that one bad inning. And you see moments where little flash is here where he can be a good strikeout guy, but then he starts walking dudes. And then the one bad inning happens, and it's all for not. So he just hasn't been the consistent guy that I was hoping we'd see in, uh, in 2026. So yeah, it's it. That's been the biggest bummer for me. I knew, I expected Kyle Leahy to struggle to have some issues making the transition. I expected that. Dustin Mays's been good. Andre Palante was unexpected. be this good so you can't bitch and moan about him too much.

Starting point is 00:25:30 Michael McGreevy is doing Michael McGreevy things. So, you know, none of them are dominating pitchers. Like, eventually they're going to have to upgrade the rotation, you know, having some of these guys like McGreevy or, you know, even if it's not Andre Palante down the road, even somebody who's like that, you know, those guys need to be back at the rotation guys. You've got to find and develop guys who can be top two. starters in this league. They don't really have that right now. But they've got some pretty good

Starting point is 00:26:02 pitchers. But when they can't get out of the fourth inning or the fifth inning, what do you want Ali to do? Like if he leaves them in there to get their butt kicked, you get mad at him for not pulling him. But then you get mad at him for pulling these guys when they start to slide and he can sense that coming on. So the ballpoint just has to do their job. And that's really what it is. Bad series loss, Romero and O'Brien are losing trade value. Yeah, they are. That's the Jojo I know. Jojo, yeah, he's had a rough go recently. He was really good earlier on this season. Remember last year he had a tough start to the season and then he figured some stuff out. I almost said a bad word. And he figured it out and he was really good last year. So I don't know. Hopefully it all clicks

Starting point is 00:26:49 again for him. But it's one of the reasons why bullpen pieces are so volatile. It's why you don't give long-term contracts to bullpen pieces because one year they can be great, the next year they suck, and then you're on the hook for all that. So, but yeah, got to get, got to get, those guys moving into the right direction again, because those are two of your back of the end bullpen guys that you're, you need. Another person, pathetic, ridiculous, unbelievable, embarrassing, uh, make Soriano the closer for a bit. How do you do, how do you do on Sunday? Uh, but O'Brien, he says, make Sorriana closer, put O'Brien in during the six, seventh, or eighth rather than the ninth. If he starts to feel his confidence again and plays well,

Starting point is 00:27:27 make him your closer again right now. He isn't confident and it shows on the mound. Yeah, I can get on board with the confidence thing. That's kind of what it looks like. Raleigh O'Brien is suffering from. He's having an issue getting the sinker over for strikes. And that's his best pitch. And when you can't pull that off, people aren't going to chase your sweeper. So that makes life tough. A lot of anti-stanic stuff after Friday's game. People keep asking, is there anybody in Memphis worthy. You know what? My guy Luis Gastilum, remember me talking about him this spring? There he is. That's so awkward with my face right next to his on the video. Six and one, 2.83 ERA and 28 games hasn't allowed to run in his last 10 appearances. Max Ratchik,

Starting point is 00:28:11 former Cardinals pitcher of the year, 4 and 2, 2.63 ERA over 24 games. Those are the only ones that really stand out to me that are like bullpen guys. Neither of them are on the 40 man, which is something that they would have to address. But those are the two that stand out right now. But honestly, the guys that you have, they just got to be better. It was just a bad weekend for them. Standings-wise, we got the Brewers with that crazy game by Mizorowski on Friday, 15Ks, 9-a-minute shutout, throws a Maddox under 100 pitches, absolutely insane.

Starting point is 00:28:44 And then Harrison shuts out the Phillies on Sunday for six innings. They take two of three beat Christopher Sanchez in the process. The brewers are real. They also go three and three this past week. Sort of the Cardinals. So they don't lose any ground there. Still five back of Milwaukee. Cubs also go three and three after taking two of three in San Francisco,

Starting point is 00:29:04 37 and 35 on the year, two and a half back of the Cardinals. Pirates go two in force with series losses to the Dodgers and the Marlins, lost both of the starts by Paul Skeens and have now lost seven of their last nine. They're without O'Neill Cruz. Connor Griffin's out. Both of them are gone due to injuries. They're now at 500 at 36 and 36, three and a half back of the Cardinals and are slipping. Then you got the Reds, two and four after losing to both Padres and the Diamondbacks.

Starting point is 00:29:29 They're at 33 and 37. Should be getting L.A. Dela Cruz back soon after his hamstring injury. Hunter Green is throwing again and is due back next month, but they're five and a half back of the birds and four games below 500. So they got a lot of work to do. Cardinals still hold the top wild card spot. One game up on Philly, one and a half over the Padres, who they will be facing again tonight. Justin May will get the start. Took the loss against the Padres back on May 9th, but didn't pitch bad.

Starting point is 00:29:55 It wasn't on him. Three runs, two earned, six innings, struck out seven, but ended up taking a loss in that one. So hopefully this newly formed offense will be better tonight. Thanks for making a lockdown Cardinals. Your first listen every day, if you haven't already, give us a follow on X at L1 underscore Cardinals. TikTok and Instagram and Lockdown Cardinals, like subscribe on YouTube, making that push for 15,000 subscribers. If you'd never miss an episode, the Everyday Air Club, it is built for you. You get locked on Cardinals ad-free, members only Discord access, and more.

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Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - BREAKING: Bullpen WOES Reach BOILING POINT—Who Can Step Up for St. Louis Cardinals?

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