Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - Is John Mozeliak One Of The Worst GMs In Baseball?

Episode Date: April 26, 2024

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How far has John Moseilock and the Cardinals' front office fallen in the eyes of their peers? We look at the good and the bad of the Cardinals President of Baseball Operations on today's episode of 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, they're Cardinals fans. I'm Jady Haffern and I'm a National Radio sports anchor born and raised in the Lou and a lifetime Cardinals fan. and I'm your host for Lockdown Cardinals, part of the Lockdown Podcast Network covering your team every day. You can follow me on Twitter, X, the JD Sports Radio, and the podcast at L.O. underscore Cardinals. We do want to thank those of you who make Locktown Cardinals your first listen every day, free and available wherever you get your podcast. I know a lot of people have been watching on the Apple podcast, so appreciate all of you who do that.

On YouTube, you can find us as well, like, subscribe and comment, interact with us, and hit that notification button so you know when the new episodes are posted. This is a show serving Cardle Nation and giving the best fans and base. baseball, all of the info about the birds on the bat. Today's episode brought to you by Monopoly Go. I admit it. I've got a competitive side. I bet you do too. And in my competitive side, is a big fan of Monopoly Go. It is the mobile hit twist on classic Monopoly. So join your friends and download Monopoly Go now free on the app store or Google Play. Once again, make you guys for joining us here for Lockedong Cardinals. My good buddy, Thomas Govain, joining us here today. You can find his work at Redbirdrance.com. Thomas, how you feel

And after night number one of the NFL draft and your chiefs landing just another dude who can run like the wind, pretty good. Yeah, it's a common theme for the team. I'll say that after losing Tahrir kill a couple years ago. It seems like they've got their guy back, speed at least. Yeah, they got the speed. You still got the Mahomes guy, that Kelsey guy. You guys are going to be fine. Nobody's worried about you.

What we are a little bit worried about is the state of the St. Louis Cardinals, Thomas. There was recently on the athletic. They did this article in this poll where I believe it was 40 executives that they asked to have them vote on who the top 10 front offices in Major League Baseball were. And you wrote about this at Redbirdrance.com. We're going to link that in the description down below and in the comment section so you guys can click on that, check it out for yourself. And it's full glory. But I want to talk about that a little bit because the Cardinals, as much as, you know, a lot of people in St. Louis want to say, you know, yeah, we're one of the best franchises.

And obviously, we do some good work. Nowhere to be found on this list, man. What's up with this? What's going on here? Sorry about that. I was muted. I think it's interesting because I would imagine if you did the survey for even five years ago, the Cardinals would be at the top.

I mean, at least top three, I would argue. So the fact that it's been done now, I think recency bias plays a pretty heavy factor in it. One of the authors of the athletic article, Annie McCullough, actually said that. on one of his podcasts that the Cardinals would actually make it up there. But you look at last season, the record, you look at most recent trades after and around the Noon Aronado trade. I mean, we've lost O'Ontara, Gallon, Rosarena, Garcia. You can list five people off top of your head that we've lost in trades.

So I think between the trades and the lost season last year, it looks bad on John Mosea Lock in the front office. Yeah, and just so everybody is aware, I'll give you the top five of who the executives voted for. You got the Dodgers in at number one. Then you've got the Tampa Bay Race, Atlanta Braves, Cleveland Guardians, and then the Baltimore Orioles. And then you've got as far as NL Central teams go. The Brewers are in at number six. And then the Reds got one point off this report card the way that they scored it and everything.

So the Reds got one. So maybe they voted for themselves. I don't know because I haven't won anything. So I don't know what's so great about their front office. But anyway, but that's what they're going up against. And, you know, John Moseil, like, I'm not trying to be an apologist for him or anything like that. Because obviously, out of all the scrutiny that I think is deserved to be upon any other people in the organization, he's the guy I continue to point my finger at too, because, you know, he's the one who builds these teams for these managers to run.

And sure, you can figure, you know, where Mike Mathine, he had his issues with certain things and things got really sloppy under him. Losing Mike Schilt, you know, having to fire him where, you know, a guy who in three seasons won a manager of the year award and was up for a second one. And for that not to work out, I think that looks bad on John Moseilac. And then you mentioned the trades. Now, they haven't all been horrible because there has been some stuff. And you mentioned recency bias, which is a reason why maybe everything's looking at him so

negatively right now, but he has made some good moves in the past, trading for Jim Edmonds, or actually trading Jim Edmonds at the end of his rope and ended up acquiring that David freeze guy. Did he do anything important for the Cardinals at any point? One or two things, I think, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So that kind of worked out for him. But again, this is something that happened years ago. We're talking what, 2007-ish, somewhere in that vicinity. he also traded and held on to Matt Holiday, who, if memory serves, isn't he going to be a Cardinal Hall of Famer, Thomas?

Like, he's, he was all right. I'd be a shoe in, yeah. Not too bad, but it would have been nice to have one of his kids join him here in St. Louis, but that's okay. One thing that I know it kind of splits Cardinal fan bases, but deciding to let Albert Pooholz walk in a year where you, you offered him a lot of money.

It's not like they didn't try to sign him, but the angels come in and blew him away with that 10-year, $240 million contract. But he didn't really do anything with the angels. You know, like when he went, when he was gone, the decline in production was massive. It wasn't the Albert Poolhole's that we knew and loved in St. Louis that was playing in L.A. anymore.

And the magical run that he just had in his last year with the Cardinals was better than anything that he'd really done. on either with the Angels or with the Dodgers, you know, because he ended up going there for a little bit. So that was something that, you know, he probably took some hell for. I know a lot of people were mad at him just because, you know, nobody wanted to see Albert leave.

But at the same time, I think you would agree it was probably a good idea. Financially, 10 years, 240 million for what the angels got. Keeping out of Eremalina and Adam Wainwright together, that was something that was huge. And you mentioned the trades for Nolan Aronado and Paul. Goldschman. Those are some big moves, Thomas, right? Yeah, they're huge. And even I think where he really thrived prior to the 2020s were the moves on the margins, those small signings to fill the 20th to 26th file in the roster, the trade like Jed Jerko trade with John Jay. Jericho.

Little moves too. Yeah. That's a deep cut there. But we want those little moves. And those are the things that Moseilock did that set him apart from the other general managers. He may not have spent the best in free agency, but he made up for that with those marginal moves. Yeah, and I do want to point out because we're not here to kiss Mo's butt. We're not here to hold his water, as our friends over at Redwood Rants like to say, because he has sucked in a couple of ways as well. One of the big moves, and I mentioned this just the other day, because it was a guy that I really wanted the Cardinals to get, and when they got him, I thought it was going to be something that would work out nicely, and that was signing Mike Leak back

in 2016. That didn't pan out so well. Didn't work out so well at all. We all know what happened. Brett Cecil. That was an ugly move that just you can't say that name. I remember they signed him too. I don't know what your reaction was to it, but I remember they signed him and I was like, man, I don't know about that. That was one that just felt weird altogether. And I was like, we really gave him that much money? Great Holly. Something that I don't see. And that didn't work out so well. That was a bad one. What else we got here? How about, all right, let me get your thoughts on this one. So, because I talk about this a lot, the trade for Marcelo Zuna.

All right, because there's a couple of layers to this. It didn't just start with Marcelo Zuna and that was it. Like, if memory serves, they tried to sign John Carlos St. They wanted to trade for him, all right? And he said no, wanted to go to the New York Yankees. That's just where he wanted to be. He didn't want to be in St. Louis and vetoed that trade. I believe the Cardinals also asked about Christian Yelage and the Marlins said,

no, we're not going to trade him. So they went to that third outfielder in Marcelo Zuna, who was coming off a monster year. Is that how you remember it? Yeah, I do. I think it's important to remember the year that that happened for him. It was 2017 and everybody was going off that year. That was the year of the long ball and the juice balls and everything. He was one of the best outfielers. Don't get me wrong. And we needed an outfielder spot, especially after Oscar Tavares situation. And so I was fine with the trade. If you can go back and tell me you knew who Saniel Cantor was and Zach Allen, good for you. Right.

Right. Yeah. I think the trade was necessary. It stinks now to look at who we sent away and what they're doing away from us now. Yeah. And one of the things, too, is that, you know, Marcel, he was coming up a monster year. Like, we're talking Silver Slugger Award. I believe he won the Gold Glove Award in left field.

which we still didn't know like you. I don't remember how he played defense with the Marlins, but we saw what it was like in St. Louis. It wasn't great. It wasn't great. So I'll never get that image of him climbing the wall and the ball falling short onto the warning track. That was one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

But he was this guy that we thought was going to be one of those bats in the middle of the order. That's what the Cardos were looking for because they were trying to win at that point. They sent some prospects away, and those prospects blossom. I mean, that's the idea of a trade. usually the idea is where it's going to be a win-win. Both sides are trying to get some good stuff, and it just didn't quite work out the way the Cardinals wanted to with Marcelo Zuna.

But I remember specifically, I could have sworn that they said, Yelich is not going to be traded. And then later on they decided, you know what, maybe we will ship them out, and that's when he went to the Brewers. But I believe the Cardinals had actually asked about Yelich at the time before they settled in on Ozuno. So they tried to get the other two first before. they got Ozuna, but obviously it ended up not working well.

Another one that was pointed out to me, the extension of Matt Carpenter. He had that one crazy year where he hit, what was like 36 home runs. And we were all kind of like, okay, he's eating salsa. We don't know why he's hitting so many home runs. Like, what is this? And the extension came. And all of us kind of were like, man, I don't know if that's a great idea. And then carp fell off pretty quickly.

So that was one that people have brought up to me over and over. and then of course we got to talk about guys like Rania Rosarena and Dolis Garcia, you know, not being able to keep those guys around. And especially the Garcia one's the one that's always drove me nuts because you really got nothing. Like he just gave a lot. And, you know, you've seen the damage he's been doing with the Rangers ever since we've left. And that's a tough pill to swallow. The Arosa Rana one, I mean, you were shipping him.

At least you got a first round pick and back with Libertor, hasn't quite lived up to what we wanted. but I don't know. It's the Garcia one drives me bonkers. But, you know, there's been some good, there's been some bad, but these are some of the reasons why John Moselock didn't get any votes here. You mentioned the recency biased. Do you think he's as bad as he's being portrayed, or do you think this has been unfair for him?

I don't know. Probably as bad as he's been portrayed. You can be honest. Yeah, probably as bad, especially recently. I don't know. It seems like he's taking him much more. lateral approach than he had in the past. I mean, he got rid of Mike Schilt,

the guy who's going to go against him to put in his guy, Marmal. The other organizational depth that he's brought in with Gersh, it's just been people who have been below him before. He's just bringing everybody up with him. In the past, it was more of a group focus. It seems like it's more unilateral at this point.

No, no, I get it. Because as much as like, I know, they always make me sound like I'm an Ali apologist, but I'm like, he didn't build the team. You know, it's not really Ali's fault. He can only do with what he's got to work with. I mean, last year, as bad as things wore, I mean, for the second half of the season, he's working with a double A, AAA, triple A team the whole time.

So, you know, I always put the blame on the guy at the top. You know, I always think it's kind of unfair in any sport where the head coach or the manager, those are the guys getting fired when they didn't build this team. This is all he has to work with. And then it gets blamed on them. They get canned. Yet the GM who sucked and was doing all of the terrible moves and bad. ideas, he's the one who gets to keep his job and keep rolling with things. So let us know your thoughts

in the comments section about John Moseilac. You hear the good side. You hear the bad side. I know everybody's pretty unhappy with the way things are right now, which is fine. But in the end, like, do you believe that John Mosellock has been a good GM for the St. Louis Cardinal since he's taken over? Like, are you able to get past what you've seen in the last two, three years and look at some of the things that he did previously that might make you think that he's not as bad as everybody says he is. So let us know your thoughts on that in the comments section down below. We've got to talk about Jordan Walker next, Thomas. Jordan Walker gets sent down, Zach Thompson gets sent down.

Are we doing the right thing? Is this a smart move? What keeps happening with Jordan Walker? We'll get those thoughts from Thomas coming up next on Lockdown Cardinals. Today's episode being brought to you in part by Policy Genius. Policy Genius is the smarter way to buy insurance. Their proprietary technology makes it easy to compare personalized quotes and policies from top-rated insurers side-by-side. Policy Genius's team of licensed experts is here to answer questions, handle paperwork, and help you make decisions with confidence.

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Leave your comments on YouTube as well as on Twitter X anytime you want. find Thomas Govane on Twitter X. He is there. I just spelled the way his name is Thomas Gauvain. So, and if you're seeing it on YouTube, you got the handle down below his wonderful face there. And we're talking Cardinals baseball. And one more thought on John Mosella, because I was thinking about that, Thomas, is another thing that we don't ever really know is the restrictions that Mo is getting from ownership, like where they're like, look, this is your, this is where we need you to be. This is what we want you to spend in this section.

And that's what you have to use. So go get them, figure it out. And we don't, we don't never know like what exactly he's told on how to spend things. We know that he's made some mistakes. All GMs do. But that's something that I always forget to think about too is like he's got a boss ahead of him. It's not like he's the owner. He's not like Jerry Jones.

He can just go do whatever the hell he wants because it's his team. He's the GM. He's in charge of everything. and just do whatever makes him feel happy. He's got to make some tough decisions sometimes, and it's just been unfortunate that a lot of those decisions recently haven't worked out so much. Yeah, he can't say how much money he spends,

but he can't say how he spends it. That's true. And there has been pretty significant evidence against him, like the Michaelis extension. That one doesn't look like it's working out so well. So that's another one people have pointed out. But let's move on to a recent thing that the Cardinals have had to do as well, and that is what is going on with Jordan Walker because Jordan Walker just recently in the last year and a half was considered one of the top five prospects in baseball, right?

And he's, you know, a lot of people can't miss prospect. He's had to make an adjustment from being an infielder to an outfielder. I don't know what kind of toll that's taking on him. It hasn't been easy. We know that we think he's getting better. Like it seems like just, you know, the eyeball test. has gotten better, but something's going on with him offensively. Last year, they bring him up. He does very well in spring training. And due to necessity, they decided we're going to keep

them on the roster. And then in April of last year, he has to get sent down because they don't like how he's not hitting the ball in the air. Even though he was hitting, like he was getting on base, he was putting the ball and play, but they weren't getting the slugging that they were hoping from Jordan Walker last year. So they're like, look, we want you to, learn to hit the ball in the air a little bit more. He goes down, comes back up and has a very, very good season the rest of the way. This year, to me, he looks worse than he did last year. Like either the pitchers are pitching him way differently than he saw last year.

They're obviously targeting the outside portion of the plate, trying to get him to chase things outside of the zone over there. And the numbers are just bad. Like they're really, really, I mean, no home runs. There's really no power to speak of whatsoever coming from Jordan Washington. So they send him down again. In your opinion, is this the smart move? Or is he a major league player needs to figure this out at the major league level?

I think it's the right thing to do. I mean, you look at his age. He's only 21. A lot of the times we'll see comparisons between him and Aaron Judge. They're not the same guy at all. But just the size alone, it makes sense to look at the two. Aaron Judge was a junior in college at his age. I mean, he's still another year in college and three years in the minors before we even saw him in the majors.

At the underlying statistics really support some improvement for Jordan Walker. His whiff and chase rates are both down, and that's explained his walk rate going up a little bit. But the biggest thing against him is his line drive percentage is down to 16% from 25% last year. So he's just not hitting the ball in the air anymore. That's why he has no home runs. His extra base hits are really low. I think it's the right thing for him to do, slow it down a little bit, see some pitches that he knows he can hit, get his confidence back up,

and then call him back up to the majors when he's ready. Yeah, because mentally this has got to be difficult on a guy who has crushed the ball at every level, no matter where he's been. You know, we forget about his numbers from last year where, like, you put that over 162 games, and you're pretty darn pleased with what you're seeing from a 20-year-old kid who turned 21 last year. And it sucks watching him. struggle the way he is. And I try to think about it. I'm like, why would pitchers ever change

their approach against Jordan Walker? Like the opposite, you know, because they continue. It's low and away, low and away, low and away. And they just keep going out there. And then they bust him in on something because he's staring that way and he's trying to go that way. Because you've seen some games where he's been able. And again, they're not doubles or home runs or anything opposite field, but he takes that pitch to the opposite field, laces it in there for a base hit. And you're like, okay, that's what a good hitter would do. What do you think it is about what he's doing so far that is leading to him, not being able to be good enough at that to force pitchers to bring the ball back in

where, you know, his power stroke will be significantly better? Yeah, I'm not inside his head, obviously, but from the outside, it looks like he's trying to do too much. He's not settling into what's comfortable and what he's familiar with. He's looking at that outside pitch, and he's thinking, if they miss, I'll go for it. but he's he's twitching on it still he's going to pull the trigger he's going to swing for it and then like you said he gets lost on the outside on the inside pitches he may fight some off every once in a while but they're in his hands so he's not going to get any power behind it yeah i would imagine that he's overthinking some things which can happen i mean it's it's tough

it's tough to be a hitter at the major league level and being 21 he's he's a kid he's still trying to figure all this stuff out and he's trying to figure out how to play the outfield so that everybody's not ripping him for being out there all the time. He's a plus defender, though. I'm going to say, everything I've seen this year, like it happens to all outfielders once in a while, but for a guy that looks so bad last year, I mean, he's been covering a lot of ground out there,

and he's made a lot of diving catches, and he looks significantly more comfortable in right field than he did last year. He's a neutral defender. I'm sorry, I shouldn't say plus. He's a neutral defender. You're lying to us, man. What's up with that? But either way, that's way better, way better than what he was last year?

What was he? Minus what? It was crazy last year. 20, I think, wasn't it? Yeah, it was a lot of average. Yeah, it was disgusting how bad he was in the outfield. But again, first year figuring it out. And so I wonder, you know, he's got all these things going on.

And maybe it's just a little bit overwhelming right now. So I'm also pro sending him down. I mean, you have options so you can do it. So, and I mentioned something else out the other day, I was like, if you could send Goldie down to, figure things out. You would do it because he's had a tough time. You just don't have options for a guy like him. So yeah, he'll be back. And I'm not, I'm not sweating it. I'm not freaking out about it. And I'm glad that he's not striking out as much. I was telling a buddy of mine that works

with the Cincinnati Reds was asking about him. And he was like, what's going on there? And I go, well, he's trying to do all of this stuff on the outside pitches. And then for whatever reason, And doesn't it seem like when you're struggling, the umpires call even more pitches like six inches away on Jordan Walker. Like he'll see it. And he'll see it. And he's like, okay, I'm not supposed to chase that. And he gets rang up anyway. And you're like, how do you want this kid to figure it out, man? It's just been it's been really, really tough for him. And, you know, he wasn't doing himself any good by just looking horrible at the major league level. So I think it's a smart move. And I think he'll be back up here at no time. And everything will work out just fine. I want to move on into the state of the Cardinals right now because a lot of people believe that the Cardinals are just same guys as last year, same team as last year.

Look at their records. Nothing's really changed. They still stink. Not necessarily the case. They may not have won as many games, but they stink for different reasons if we want to put it that way. So we'll talk about it a little bit more with Thomas Govain from Redmond's.com next on Locked on Cardinals. Baseball season is officially underway, so don't miss your chance on being able to add your favorite players

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Pick more, pick less. It's that easy with price. picks. Lockdown has launched the first ever national sports 24-7 streaming channel on YouTube. It's now available on Amazon Fire TV in the Free Fire TV channels app. It's here for you 24-7 covering the top sports stories of the day with the local experts of lockdown plus our national shows covering every league. Find Locked on sports today now available on the Free Fire TV channels app. Obviously, if you're an NFL draft person, they're all over that right now. They've got locked on every team in the NFL just like they do here in Major League Base.

ball. So if you're a fan of the chiefs or the Packers or even if it's the Bears, I mean, we won't yell at you for that, but it's stupid. But anyway, they got you covered when it comes to all the NFL draft stuff going on. Bears had a good, good night on Thursday night, man. So of the Detroit Lions. So anyway, let's talk more about the Cardinals and what's going on with the state of this team right now. You're coming off of a series win against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Thomas. you have a great come from behind win, you have the walkoff home run for Gorman, and then you get smashed right in the chin on the second game on Tuesday. Then on Wednesday, you're back to life again against Jordan Montgomery and you win.

So inconsistent so far for the Cardinals, people are saying, yeah, that's what they were last year. They couldn't do this, this, this, and they were good at this, this, and this. And it was just up down, up down, up down. how do you feel about the Cardinals and what you've seen from them compared to what we went through last year? Things are a little bit different, obviously, for different reasons or why they're losing and winning ball games? But do you feel like they're on the same path as last year? Or do you think this team actually has a chance to dig themselves out of this and actually become a winning team down the road? Fair warning, I'm a forever optimist, so I will always be happy with the Cardinals.

It does feel much different. I mean, you bring in guys like Lance Lynn, Kyle Gibson, and Sunny Green. for that fire, you bring in the veterans, you know what they're doing with Brandon Crawford and Matt Carpenter. The youth has been exciting to see. So I think while the record is the same and the struggles might be in different areas, but they're still struggling, the team feels much different. And I think that spells positives for the long run. The pitching is doing what nobody expected them to do. And the hitting can easily come around to what people did expect them to do. I think there's a path to a 500 finish in April, especially with the Detroit Tigers

at the last couple of games, the Mets while they're hot, I think they're a beatable team. So if we finish out the way we should, it's fully possible. The Cardinals are 500 at the end of April, which is much different than what they were last year. And let's not forget, John Moseilock, the St. Louis Cardinals, and everybody involved with them warned you that April was not going to be easy. Like you go through the group of teams that they've had to play. Some very good baseball teams in there. Like even Oakland wasn't playing bad when they, when they faced them, you know, and that was the Marlins.

Nobody expected them to be as bad, but, you know, you take two of three from them. But you've had to face a gauntlet of very, very good baseball teams. And they kind of warned you like, hey, this ain't going to be an easy month. Like getting 500, I think when you looked at the schedule and say, if you can end at 500, you'd be pretty happy with that, wouldn't you? yeah absolutely i mean it was i think they've had the toughest strength of schedule so far and to come out 500 what more could you ask for at this point it's all easy it's easier from here i should say

but yeah and that's what i also want to point out too is like when you look at this team and how it was built this off season nobody said this was a hundred win team like nobody was like oh it's going to be perfect these guys are amazing and are going to take the pennant no problem no Most people thought they were an 84, 85 win team. So to expect more than that, especially against the schedule that they've gone up again so far, that's kind of messed up, right? Like it doesn't make a whole lot of sense if you're a family. And that's what I've been trying to tell people.

It was like, well, didn't you expect them to be kind of this way? Isn't that what we thought was going to happen? Like the amount of people who were so disappointed with what's going on is a little bit shocking because I thought this is what everybody predicted. Yeah, and they're built for the long run. I mean, look at the pitcher health right now. Our starters are good. We're fine.

Like, they're going to pitch 180 innings for the most part. You can't say that for other starting pitching staffs. In my mind, as long as we're in the race by the trade deadline, there's going to be guys out there available for us to work the margins. The offense will level out more than likely. If the pitching can maintain its 15th ranking in most stats, the bullpen can be what it has. husband and the offense levels out.

I think that's exactly what we expected out of the team. It'll be 85 wins. We will edge our way into the playoffs, and we'll see what happens from there. Yeah, and that was just kind of the path that they were taking. Like, they were never going to sign one of those big guys to make a huge impact. They weren't going to get involved in any of those contracts. So this is the plan. Like, it is actually working the way they thought it would.

The only thing that's come up short is, you know, people like Wai. and Goldschmidt and Gorman coming out of the gate as slow as they have. You know, when people point the finger at Ali, I keep saying, well, have you noticed the situations, the guys that you want up in those situations are coming up? Like it seems to be working all right. Those guys just aren't coming through yet. And we're hoping we're starting to see a little bit of positivity coming from Goldschmidt looked better in this last series, you know, well, the 14 to one game, everybody looked bad.

But, you know, he looked much better in the other two games. You can see Gorman's making adjustments. You're seeing him take it to the opposite field. Walker is learning. He's going to figure it out on his own at Memphis right now, and hopefully he'll be back. But you've gotten new. You still got the good defense with Siani and center field.

Donovan's taking over left field pretty much full time now. You've still got an Alec Berlison to back him up. I know Crawford's in the lineup here on Friday night to give Mason win. His normal day off, this is not like that something's wrong with him, whether it's the back stuff, still, you know, they're just keeping him fresh. Everybody relax a little bit.

But I'm just, I guess I'm just a little bit shocked at how many people were like, they're terrible. And I'm like, I thought this is what we thought they were going to be. Nobody said it was going to be much better than this. And we knew April was going to be tough. So they are in New York this weekend. I want to wrap things up here talking about this series a little bit. What have you seen from the New York Mets and what have you seen from the Cardinals

and how do you think things might play out? this weekend in New York. I think it's a barometer matchup for both teams. The Mets started off cold, and they have been one of the hottest teams in the last 15, 20 games, I think. So for them to continue that, it says a lot about them. If the Cardinals can put a stop to it and even just win the series, that sets us up for, as we just talked about, a good finish April.

There would be a tough matchup. I'm not sure who are going up against the next couple of games, but we've got, I'm going to butcher's name, Jose Butto, Budo. It's Budo, but you can say but because it's spelled but. It's okay. I haven't heard much about him. I know he's a young guy who's got some potential, but if we can jump on him early,

get him out of the game, we can attack the Mets bullpen. Yeah, coming up on Saturday, it is Houser, Adrian Houser, who you're familiar with because he spent some time with the brewers. He'll be starting. And then our old friend, Jose Quintana, gets the ball on Sunday.

So it's not like, beat us. Yeah, and it's not like we're going through, you know, three of the top pitchers in baseball. Like this is a possibility to kind of get right offensively in these next few games against the Mets. Going for the Cardinals, we mentioned that you do have Miles Michaelis on the hill tonight. What do you think he needs to do to kind of turn things around?

Because you'll see him for like two or three innings where he looks outstanding. And then it just all comes crashing down around him. What's going on with Miles in your opinion? He's got to work the edge is better. I mean, you look at that home run that I don't remember who it was and crushed it off him. It's like an 84 mile power slider right in the middle. Yeah. He's got to work at the edges better to make it deeper into games

and not get himself in trouble. Yeah. Lance Lynn will be on Sunday, and then Sunny Gray gets the ball on Saturday. So got to be pleased with everything we've seen from Sunny Gray. So far, Lance Lynn, other than watching him try to beat Corbyn Carroll to the bag at first base has been fantastic in just about every way, shape, and four, man.

Give him as much hell as you want to about what he looks like on the mountain in those crappy uniforms. But Lance Lynn has been a pleasant surprise. I couldn't have been more wrong about him because I was really nervous about him coming into the year. And he's proven me wrong so far. So I'll, I'll accept that. And I hope he continues it. So it should be a fun weekend in New York. Unfortunately, Friday night game on Apple TV. Some people are going to be upset about that. But, you know, we'll be on Twitter X tweeting and talking about it. I'm sure Thomas will be on there as well. If you want to give him a follow there at Thomas Gauvain, G-G-A-U-V- A-I-N is how we spells it.

But you've got all of his articles at Redbird Rance.com. Anything coming up that you're going to be writing about soon that you want to push real quick before we wrap it up? Yeah, I have one piece talking about the additions over the off season and the trade deadline and how those were good moves by John Moseilock. And then I've got another one talking about the fan base as a whole and the feelings around the team. All right. So get on over to Redbirdrance.com, check out all of his work and the rest of the great writers over at redwood rants.com. It's a whole lot of fun to be there and give them a follow

on Twitter X there. Thomas, thank you very much as always for joining us here today. And thank you guys for making Locked on Cardinals, your first list in every day. If you haven't already, give us a follow on Twitter X at Latternerscore Cardinals and a JD Sports Radio. Like and subscribe on YouTube. Help our channel and love for the Cardinals grow. You guys are the best fans in baseball. And we'll see you next time on Locked on Cardinals.