Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - One Bad Inning Sinks Andre Pallante And The St. Louis Cardinals

Starting point is 00:00:00 The St. Louis Cardinals forget their baths back in St. Louis as their road woes continue in New York. 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. I'm J.D. Hafford and I'm your host for Lockdown Cardinals as part of the Lockdown Podcast Network covering your team every day. You can follow me on X at J.D. Sports Radio. You can follow the podcast at L.O. WonderSquardinals. We're on YouTube. Make sure you like, subscribe, and comment, hit that notification button so you know when the new episodes and shorts are posted.

Starting point is 00:00:40 Also available on TikTok and Instagram at Locktonedon Cardinals. This is a show serving Cardinal Nation and giving the best fans in baseball, all of the info about the birds on the bat. Today's episode being brought to you by GameTime, download the GameTime app, create an account, and use the code Lockton MLB for $20 off your first purchase. So the St. Louis Cardinals have been a really good team at home.

Starting point is 00:01:02 So far this season, right? They're eight and four. Four games over 500. Yay. So far at the friendly confines of Bush Stadium, the road has been a different story altogether. And after losing to the Mets on Thursday night by a score of four to one,

Starting point is 00:01:20 their road record now drops to a ghastly, one in six. Yeah. The only other teams with one or less wins on the road so far this year are the Chicago White Sox, who we know are not a good team. They, you know, set a record in losses last year. They're 0 and 6 so far on the road.

Starting point is 00:01:39 The raise are just 0 and 3. They haven't, they've been playing at home all the time. And then you've got the Rockies who constantly are playing on the road, but they're just 1 and 11 on the road so far this year. And that's it. So not really the company you want to be hanging around with when it comes to your record. And on Thursday night, the office. which I mean it's been so good right so good just got outmatched right under griffin canning for the

Starting point is 00:02:10 metz was on the mound face the cardinals this spring and was just as dominant in spring training as he was on Thursday night in that spring training game three and two thirds innings he allowed one hit he struck out five and on Thursday night he goes six innings one run three hits eight strikeouts, which was the season high. And he was absolutely dominant. Mixing the breaking ball away, fastball up, back and forth. He just kept the boys on their toes.

Starting point is 00:02:43 And they, you know, they kept, and one thing that stood out to me is they kept showing his velocity, which, you know, every game does that. And you're seeing the velo throughout the game where his fastball is coming in, 94, 95. Now, a few years ago, that's pretty good. Like I was watching, for some reason lately, I've been watching old Cardinal games,

Starting point is 00:03:06 but like of the 90s in 98 when Big Mac set the record for home runs with 70. I've been watching those just for fun. I don't know why. I just have been. And they're showing guys that are going up against, you know, the Cardinals in those games. And they're like, dude, he is home in the night, 95. Well, that was really good at 1998. that was 30 years ago.

Starting point is 00:03:30 Now 94, 95 just kind of ho-hum, right? It's not really anything special. But time and time again on Thursday night, 94-95, like, Canning was blowing that fastball past the Cardinals hitters who either weren't picking up the ball well or Canning just had some late life on that fastball or it's a combination of a two, which could be as well,

Starting point is 00:03:56 because the guys had little to no success on really anything that he was tossing up there. It was literally a replay of what we saw in that spring training game. And like I said, breaking stuff away, fastballs up. The guys weren't catching up to it. I mean, it looked like he was throwing one-on-one. But then you would see the gun and you're like 94, 95. We're like, what is happening here? But they couldn't catch up to it.

Starting point is 00:04:23 The Cardinals got three hits off of canning. And that's all they had all night. Their bats were completely silent. It won't take long to sum up the offense on Thursday night. The Cardinals first hits game in the third inning. Lead off line drafts, by Victor Scott, the second into center field. He ends up stealing second base,

Starting point is 00:04:41 seventh steel of the season, which puts them in a tie for second place in all of Major League baseball. The Pirates O'Neill Cruz leads to the league with nine. Unfortunately, that was followed up by strikeouts by both Lars Dupar and Wilson Contreras. Wild pitch, moving Victor over to third base. And then you get a two out infield single by Brennan Donovan, only an infield single because Lindorr made a really nice play to knock it down.

Starting point is 00:05:05 Couldn't make a play at first base. But that extended Brinandton Donovan's hitting streak to 13 in a row, which is the best of baseball right now. So Donnie keeps swinging it. But that brings Scott in for the RBI, which made it four to one at that point. Then in the top of the fourth inning, you get a bun single by Alec Berlison. Yeah. That's right. Alec Berlison, the man known as biscuits.

Starting point is 00:05:30 Not really known for the speed or the bunting, but he lays one down the third baseline when the defense had one of those extreme shifts on. It's not like it used to be where everybody would be on one side of the infield or anything like that. But it was still one of the most extreme shifts you can get to these days, lays it down, beautifully done, props to Burley there. You know, you hear people yelling all the time when they see these guys come up to the play. and there's these shifts against them. And they're like, just laid out a butt for God's sakes.

Starting point is 00:06:00 Just bug the ball. And hardly do any of these hitters ever do that, right? But Burley lays down a perfect punt to start the inning. But then the inning stalls with three straight strikeouts. Walker, Gorman, Pahas, gone, strikeout. And that was it, folks. Not to sound like, you know, Warner Brothers right there. Abadip, abadip, that's all, folks.

Starting point is 00:06:21 Just three hits, four walks, which is great, because they were working the counts. They made Griffin Canning work. Like he ended up throwing 101 pitches in six innings. And he was up like close to 60 after three. But they just could never get any momentum going offensively. A pretty dull and uninspiring performance all around. Pedro Pahas, O for three, three strikeouts, Walker over three, two strikeouts.

Starting point is 00:06:47 Contreras O for three with a walk. His batting average down 139. Even Lars Newpar. The on-based Terminator. himself over for no walks very weird right just a tough night at the play but no need to go back here and touch the panic button it's okay it's one game it happens good pitching beats good hitting a lot of times right and that's what happened griffin canning looked really really good he looked great this spring he looked good uh again on thursday night but uh no need to stress uh canning certainly

Starting point is 00:07:20 has their number right now so hopefully they don't have to face him again i know the uh after this four-game series wraps up. The Mets are going to be at Bush Stadium on May 2nd through the 4th. So we'll see how the pitching matchups line up. But, you know, hopefully we just don't have to see Griffin Canning anymore because whatever he's doing, it's working against the Cardinals. Speaking of pitching, one bad inning, one bad inning sunk Thursday start for Andre Palante.

Starting point is 00:07:47 Like when you're going to look at his line and you're going to be like, ugh. And then you're going to be like when I explain it all to you, you're going to be like, and you're going to have an option of which way you want to go. Door number one, door number two. So I'm going to lay it out there for you coming up here in just a moment because there was one issue that he kept happening. It was one thing that kept happening that led to the bad inning. So we'll talk about it next on Locked on Cardinals.

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Starting point is 00:11:36 Leave your comments on YouTube as well as on X anytime you want. Your feedback is always welcome and encouraged. Andre Palante got the ball on Thursday night, and we all know that the Mets have what I would consider pretty intimidating lineup, especially at the top of the order, where you've got superstars. Francisco Lindor, Juan Soto, Pete Alonzo. And I looked it up just because I was curious. Because you know how the Mets payroll is.

Starting point is 00:12:03 It's crazy high. It's over $300 million. The combined adjusted salaries for those three guys is over $124 million. Just for those three guys this year. That's only $11 million less than the Cardinals' entire payroll. Is that not crazy? And I'm not here to get in a war of words about, Oh, it's the duets being cheap.

Starting point is 00:12:31 That's not why I'm saying it. I just thought it was crazy. Like those three guys is what the almost the entire payroll for the Cardinals is this year. Pretty nuts. You know, those three guys are three of the top players in the world. So that's what it takes to sign guys like that these days. The point being, the Mets are good team. All right?

Starting point is 00:12:49 They got a good lineup. They got a good pitching staff. So the lineup wise, when you see what Andre Palante ended up with, four runs, seven hits over six inning. giving that up to the New York Mets, I just don't think it's something that should be met with disappointment or shame. Like, oh, my gosh, you are garbage. How dare you?

Starting point is 00:13:12 I don't feel like it's that at all. And I think you're giving up four runs. That's a competitive game against a team like the New York Mets. And it really was when you go back and if you were watching it, it's one bad inning. It's one bad inning for. Andre Palante in this one, the second inning. It got away from Palante, and there was one big reason why things happened the way they did, and it was because of his pitch location.

Starting point is 00:13:40 He was up in the zone, which for a sinker ball pitcher is the kiss of death. You got Mark Vientos, who has had a tough start to the year, but he's a guy that just, for some reason, I feel like he's one of those dudes that is just annoying to the Cardinals. Like, he hit him while last year, and I feel like, you know, he had a big gear last year. year. But he hit a lot of people well. But I just feel like he's that annoying guy for the Mets against the Cardinals. But he gets a pitch on the outer half, knocks it down to right field. It just sneaks it. Like, I still don't know how this ball got out, but he sneaks it down the line in right field. You see Jordan Walker keeps going, keeps going, keeps going, keeps going.

Starting point is 00:14:22 and it ends up hitting off the base of the right field foul pole for a solo home run. It's his first long fly of the season, hit over 30 last year. One of the ugliest, shortest home runs you will ever see hit at any ballpark. It was gross. It traveled a whopping 338 feet. Like that wouldn't have got out a lot of high school fields. But it landed in the perfect spot. the guys were touch it and Brad were talking about on the telecast like it like got into some kind of like jet stream or something and just carried out like it was gross I thought it was just like a lazy fly ball that was going to go foul and then all of a sudden it's a home run it was gross but it counts it counts one to nothing two batters later you get the veteran uh starling marty who's making 20 million this year by the way when I was looking at the guy I was like is he really uh but he ends up ripping a double with a lot and he ends up ripping a double with a lot and he

Starting point is 00:15:19 He's thorned in the side of the Cardinals for years now, going back to his time with the Pirates. But it wasn't exactly a bad pitch from Palante there down in the zone, but 107 off the bat. Marte didn't miss that one. Two batters later, you get the lefty, Brett Beatty up. He dumps one down the line in left field for a single. But the pitch was center cut. Missed the spot. That makes a two to nothing.

Starting point is 00:15:41 The next hitter is Cyron Taylor. First pitch swinging up and in the zone. It's a right-handed batterer. and into him, but it was in the zone. It wasn't like up and in where it was like on his fists or anything. He knocks that into center field, makes it first and second. And then he, Palante is a nice battle against one of the best centers in the world in Francisco Lindor. But again, the pitch that Lindor ends up getting a hit on right down the middle, center cut. Lindor rips it to right, drives in Beatty. And then it gets caught in that, that run down play that you see teams. The Cardinals have done this

Starting point is 00:16:17 play before too where there's a guy who's ready to round third base and then the runner who just had gotten a hit gets caught up in a rundown between first and second to draw the attention that way the run can score basically sacrifices himself is what happened and that's what went down makes it four to nothing after that though after that Palante was outstanding you know when when things are going well for him you're going to see a lot of ground balls and after that inning after the ball was elevated and up. He ends up, you know, finding his release point, gets the pitches down, and things go well for him. 12 of the 18 outs that he ends up getting in this game, he throws six innings, we're by ground ball. That's awesome. That's a good Andre Palante outing.

Starting point is 00:17:04 After the second inning, after that mess, he retires 12 of the next 13 hitters. So you can look at this outing in a couple of ways. As I mentioned, you've got door number one, Palante's final line reads as a guy who had an average to below average outing, four runs on seven hits, one home run, two strikeouts in six innings. Or you can look at it as here's a dude who had one bad inning. Mechanics were off, whatever was going on, got the ball up. But you feel pretty positive about what you saw from Andre Palante throughout the rest of his time in the game.

Starting point is 00:17:42 And you build from there into his next start next week. I prefer to go with door number two. But I completely understand why fans would be like, I like door number one and would choose that one. You know, the bad inning put the Cardinals in a four-to-nothing hole. And they were never able to climb out of it. It's not like it didn't happen. It happened.

Starting point is 00:18:06 And when the way things have been going for the offense normally, four runs are like, you can fight back from that, no problem. Hasn't been much to overcome for this. offense, but it certainly was on Thursday. They end up losing the game four to one, and they fall to nine and ten on the season. But there were a couple of bright spots in this game that I do want to mention because it's not all negative every night. Just because you lose the game doesn't mean everything was horrible because it wasn't. There were some nice things that went on there. I want to tell you about them next. And I'll also give you a preview about

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Starting point is 00:20:13 Cardinals your first listen today for your second list. Check out the all new locked on MLB game night, every game, every night, all season long. Get local analysis on a national. scale. You can find MLB Game Night on Locked on MLB on YouTube or wherever you listen to your podcast. So with the offense quiet, very, very quiet on Thursday and the Mets with the lead, things could have actually gotten a lot worse. But the Cardinals defense, particularly on the infield, were outstanding on Thursday. Kept them in the game. And it was led by the two Nolans,

Starting point is 00:20:52 Nolan Aronado and Nolan Gorman. Over the years, we've come accustomed to seeing Aronado making these incredible plays where the bare-handed plays where he's charging in and contorts his body and makes a perfect throw over the diamond. We've seen the off-balance throws. We've seen where he's fading away from third base. He's incredible. He's the best man.

Starting point is 00:21:13 And I'm really glad he's still a cardinal because I love watching defense like that. I think it's outstanding. Gorman, Nolan Gorman, your other Nolan. not much going on with the bat right now, but he was over at second base, and he had a handful of plays in this one that stood out to me and were really nice. Very much, you know,

Starting point is 00:21:35 he looked like Nolan Aronado playing second base tonight. There was that slow grounder that he had to charge, and he makes the flip to first base, but he uses the glove hand. That is not an easy play. You know, that ball can get hung up on the leather inside your webbing. Like, that ain't easy what he did there. And I thought that was spectacular.

Starting point is 00:21:52 I was very impressed with that move. He had another Aronado-esque bare-handed play where he had to do the same sort of thing, charged on the middle of the end field and made a nice throw over to first base to Wilson Contreras. The hardest part about that, it's not getting to the ball, but also like, first of all, you got a, you know, the ball spinning and stuff. So grabbing it and getting a nice handle, that's the difficult part. But then you have to contort your body to get an accurate throw. And they make it look so easy.

Starting point is 00:22:20 They make it look so easy. So a couple of other plays stood out. Like just Nolan Gorman was, despite not being very successful at the play, the defenses looked really, really good at second base. Since Brennan Donovan was over at shortstop, he had a couple of nice plays as well. So pulling off the shortstop move pretty well. You know, I know when we first started thinking about when Victor Scott made the team, we're like, so Donovan's going to play shortstop now?

Starting point is 00:22:46 He's got the range? Can he do it? So far, so good, man. Is there anything Brennan Donovan can't do, really? But the defense has been a strong point for the team so far this season continues to be an asset. Big shout out to Matt Svanson. Rookie made his major league debut, throwing a shutout inning. It was hitting around like 97 with the sinker on Thursday night.

Starting point is 00:23:06 So that was cool to see. He's had a lot of success in the minor leagues. And he was part of the Paul DeYoung trade with the Toronto Blue Jays. It was kind of the under the radar guy. And look at Sonson showing up. So could he become an asset at the? the back end of the bullpen or any part of the bullpen. It came in the seventh inning in this one.

Starting point is 00:23:27 But at any point, you know, just getting out. That's the idea from the bullpen. So look good, liked it. John King, score listening of work as well. Friday night's matchup, Miles Michaelis will be on the hill against the Mets, David Peterson, obviously when Miles is on the bump, defense needs to be ready. You got to be on your toes, man,

Starting point is 00:23:46 because the ball is going to be in play. We had the bad game in Boston, but the other two starts for Miles this year. Not as bad, right? So we're going to put it nicely. They weren't that bad. Competitive games in his other two outings, the one in Boston, obviously,

Starting point is 00:24:02 it was a complete nightmare. So hopefully it's nothing like that in New York on Friday. Peterson, left-hander, sinker change, four seam. He's got a slider in a curveball. Sinker is his main pitch. throws that about 29% of the time. Not a hard thrower.

Starting point is 00:24:18 A lot of ground balls kind of like Palantes, a ground ball guy. He can get a few strikeouts here and there, but he's not like, you know, one of these guys who throws 98, 99, you know, he sits around 93, 94. So we'll see how they do against the left-hander coming up on Friday. Also, quick note, Mason Wynn, who's been out with the back spasms. He's heading to Memphis to make a rehab assignment over the weekend. If things go well, he's eligible to be activated on Tuesday. So it might be getting Mason Wynn back here real, real soon. All right, guys. Thanks for making a lot on You first listen every day.

Starting point is 00:24:51 If you haven't already, give us a follow on X at L.O underscore Cardinals at a JD Sports Radio, TikTok at Lockdown Cardinals and Instagram. Like, subscribe on YouTube, help our channel and love for the Cardinals grow. Standings-wise, I don't want to get out of here before we do that. Cardinals 9 and 10, as they mentioned. The Cubs still in first place.

Starting point is 00:25:09 Two games up on the Cardinals at 12 and 9. The Brewers are in second at 10 of 9. They've won two in a row now. Then you got the Cardinals. Reds lost their second in a row to the Seattle. Mariners in extra innings on Wednesday. And then you got the Pirates. They've won two straight.

Starting point is 00:25:26 They're at 8 and 12. So that's how things are shaping up in the NL Central so far. You guys are the best fans in baseball. We'll see you next time on Locked on Cardinals. Have a good one.

Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - One Bad Inning Sinks Andre Pallante And The St. Louis Cardinals

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