Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - St. Louis Cardinals' BULLPEN Struggles While The Offense DELIVERS In Series WIN Over Tampa Bay Rays

Starting point is 00:00:00 The Cardinals fall on the finale, but they do take the series. We break down all the positives and the negatives 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 there, Cardinals fans. I'm Jady Haford, and on today's show, we're going to be catching up with the rest of the NL Central to see where the Cardinals stand after the opening weekend of the Major League Baseball season. the upcoming series with the New York Mets. We've also got the three stars from the series victory over the Tampa Bay Rays, but let's start with what I would deem a very uneven weekend for the pitching staff.

Starting point is 00:00:47 You know, throughout the weekend, the pitching had its good points. And there was a lot of bad points, right? First two games, gold stars for the starting pitch. Outstanding. Matthew Libertor, five innings, one run on seven hits. The one run was a solo home run. He only struck out two guys, but he battled. He kept the raised lineup from scoring, which clearly wasn't as easy as he made it look

Starting point is 00:01:11 when you look at what the raise offense did the rest of the weekend. Michael McGreevy made it look even easier. He throws six no-hit innings while striking out five. What the hell saw that coming? Not me? Not me at all. But you look brilliant. In and out, up and down, changing speeds.

Starting point is 00:01:31 very Greg Maddox-like. Sunday, it did not go as well. It got a little bit ugly for New Cardinals right, and or Dustin May, who did not have a good day. He allowed six runs on 10 hits, just four innings of work while striking out three. And if you, you know, if you break up the plate, home plate, break it up and do three columns, okay?

Starting point is 00:01:58 You got the left, you got the center, you got the right. You're going to find that six of those 10 hits that Dustin May gave up on Sunday came on pitches right in that center column. Essentially, the heart of the plate. Five of them were in the lower portion of that column. But you know as well as either that you cannot live over the middle of the plate. Because Major League hitters will rip that ish, and that's exactly what happened to Dustin May. Daniel Guerrero from SCL Today.com throughout this stat. may allow hard contact, which Statcast defines as balls in play with exit velocities of 95 miles per hour or higher, nine times through his first four innings.

Starting point is 00:02:43 That contact included seven balls. They were put in play hit at 101 miles per hour or higher, five of which resulted in hits. So even the ones that weren't hits were getting smoked. And you just can't live there. It just can't live there and expect to survive. The cartels were down six to one at one point, and despite mounting a comeback, thanks to Jordan Walker's heroics. They cut that deficit to six to four,

Starting point is 00:03:13 and then the bullpen for the third straight day, couldn't seem to stop, but I should say third straight game, not day, because I had it off day on Thursday, or on Friday. Sorry, you know, my day's mixed up. But anyway, third straight game couldn't seem to stop the race offense. Bullpen did not have a lot of answers. The biggest complaint that I got from the fan base from the weekend was how terrible the bullpen looked.

Starting point is 00:03:35 That's what people were bitching and complaining about the most, which is funny, considering how good they looked in spring training. If you remember, we're like, dude, the bullpen. Look at them go. A lot different, though. A lot different when you're facing major league hitters for nine innings instead of five or six. and then facing like AAA, AA, single A guys. So maybe that's what happened.

Starting point is 00:04:03 But the Cardinals relievers have a combined 10.38 ERA after three games. And shockingly, that's not even the worst. That's not the worst ERA. That's not the worst number in the league. The White Sox are at 12.51, followed by the Rays, whom the Cardinals beat up onto the tune of 11.32 ERA. Cardle's bullpen, just ghastly as a whole.

Starting point is 00:04:30 A loud 24 hit, 16 runs, 15 of them earned in 13 innings of work. They walked eight, they struck out just nine. The raise hit 407 against the relievers in this series. That's really bad. Libby came out in the fifth inning on Thursday with this game tied at one, and one inning later it was seven to one. Just game two, the Cardinals were up four to nothing. in the ninth inning. Six shutout

Starting point is 00:04:59 innings by McGreevy. Seventh and eighth innings go just fine. Ninth inning before you know it. Tied ball game, forcing extra innings. Raised would score again in the 10th inning. Of course, you got the JJ walkoff, so ended up being okay, but still, what? You're blowing four run leads already in the ninth

Starting point is 00:05:17 inning? And then on Sunday, May leaves with the score six to four. That's when the bullpen takes over, and the bullpen gives up three in the eighth, two in the ninth, and they end up falling 11 to 7, even though the offense clawed their way back into it. And the names that people are really seething about from the weekend are Chris Roycroft, Matt Fonson, and Ryan Stannock. More Roycroft and Stannock, because we like to pick on Roycroft because he hasn't been very good over the years, and things did not go well for him this weekend either,

Starting point is 00:05:51 and then Stannock because he's new, and nobody knew any better. And everybody was a little bit shocked about his performance. You know, all three had forgettable weekends. A lot of the hits, let's be honest, a lot of the hits off of Roycroft and Svanson were crap. They were soft contact like the bloopers, duck snorts, whatever you want to call them, dying quails, swinging bunts. It was a lot of garbage, but they still count. And when you're a pitcher and those things are happening and you're making good pitches and they're not hitting the ball hard, but yet everything is falling in where the one spot nobody's at. It's about as much fun as, I don't know,

Starting point is 00:06:31 pouring lemon juice on a paper cut. It sucks. And Chris Roycroft, Matt's Fonson, got to be extremely frustrated with what was happening to that. So some of that, yeah, just luck for the raise hitters, but also you got to give the raise credit for putting the bat on the ball. You know, put it and play. Things can happen.

Starting point is 00:06:52 And it kept happening for the Tampa Bay raise. I lost count in how many just tapers in front of home plate that were just like bunts, swinging bunts that they had. But, you know, you go to the, the old saying is they look like line drives in the scorebook. Stanix issues were two full because first one was control on Friday. He walks three to load the bases to make us sweat. Then he got knocked around on Saturday for two runs on three hits and an inning in a third. And I know with Throsard, which is great, but I was really surprised he was chosen as the closer early on. I don't know. It was a veteran thing. I don't know. I don't know of him being an actual closer.

Starting point is 00:07:31 He hasn't been all that great the last couple of years. So I thought it was going to be where Stanick was more of like that seventh inning kind of guy. It was going to be a Sonson Romero or O'Brien Romero type of closure to the end of games. And instead, Ali had those guys pitching earlier in games than a normal closer would. So I'm sure he's going to adjust. I'm not freaking out about it. But it wasn't pretty for Stanick at his first go around in that role. Rule 5 carryover, Matt Pushart also struggled and his only appearance on Sunday, three runs on three hits and a walk in one inning. The bullpen, you know, the bullpen is always, it's a puzzle early on. It always has been for the card. They figure out who's got which role. You know, you had Helsley over the

Starting point is 00:08:16 years, so you knew he was going to be the closer. But the rest of it got to had to work its way out. and I'm sure that's what's going to happen here. He was like, all right, you know, Stanix's a veteran. So it's pretty hard. You know, let's see. You look good in the spring, right? It's not like you know what you look bad in spring training. And he went with that and it was very stressful.

Starting point is 00:08:38 So Ali, I'll have to figure out which piece goes where to put this puzzle together properly and which buttons to push as the season progresses. So we'll see what kind of adjustments he makes against the Mets. We're going to do the three stars from the weekend up next, and all three are coming from the offensive side of the ball. I know McGreevy deserves one, but we just gave him some love right there. But the offense was really what fueled the fun over the weekend outside of McGreevy.

Starting point is 00:09:07 So we're going to do all three are going to come from the offensive side of the ball. To the surprise of many of us, I did not expect it to go this way. Offense did some serious damage on opening weekend. So we'll do that next here. I've locked on cardinals. It's tax time, but for a lot of us, the old way of doing taxes is a lot, trying to book an appointment. That's not the most convenient sitting in a waiting room with a stack of papers, emailing back and forth, and wondering if they really get your situation.

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Starting point is 00:10:18 Thanks for making Lockdown Cardinals your first listen to the day. And thank you for making locked on the number one sports podcast network. Baseball's finally back in to celebrate. I'm giving you a full month of the everydayer club. for free. Go to LockedonStl Cardinals. That supercast.com. Use the code finally. F-I-N-A-L-Y. You'll unlock every episode,

Starting point is 00:10:36 add free, and get access to our private listener group chat. Tap the link of the show notes. Use code finally to claim your free month. All right, let's talk a little offense with the Cardinals because this was fun. This was fun. Unexpected fun this weekend by the Cardinals' offense.

Starting point is 00:10:52 Most of us that cover this team expected them to struggle this year with the bats. Like we thought pitching will be all right. We didn't expect the bullpen to be as bad as it was on opening weekend, but we didn't expect the offense to put up runs the way they did in this particular series. So they came out of the gate blasted away. They scored 22 runs on 31 hits, five home runs, six doubles. The 22 runs were the fourth most in the league.

Starting point is 00:11:18 The 31 hits, fourth most. Tampa Bay leads with 41. About 38 of those were crappy bloop hits. Home runs were fourth. most doubles were third most. They also added four stolen bases. That's fourth most. So it's really hard to blame the offense for not getting the sweep this weekend. They rescued this team twice, tried to do it again on Sunday. And the bullpen was like, no, no, no, no, we're not going to let it happen this time around. So all three stars from this

Starting point is 00:11:48 weekend are going to come from the offensive side. And we'll start with our number one star. And we're going to give it up to the rookie, man. We got to give it to JJ Weatherholt. I mean, how much fun was it watching this kid play over the weekend. Had quite the first weekend. First hit and home run on Thursday plus a sack fly, which was super important to getting that win. Then on Saturday, after making an error in the field of that glove flip attempt thing,

Starting point is 00:12:12 which, you know, do or die situation, tried to make a spectacular play, didn't work out. He ends up driving in the game tying and winning runs in the 10th inning for his first walkoff hit of his major league career, finishes the weekend four for 13 with four RBI and a stolen base has a three-game hitting streak to start the season.

Starting point is 00:12:30 Made some really nice plays defensively as well. So J.J. Weatherhold off and running in his rookie year. Pretty exciting stuff. I know a lot of people, you know, you get the tweet. Build the statue now. I mean, people are pumped for what J.J. Weatherholt has done for this team already just in the first three games. My number two star is going to go to the man who gave us this moment. and if you're watching on the YouTube.

Starting point is 00:12:56 Mr. Alec Berlison. Huge game on Thursday, right? Included that two-run blast to cap the comeback in the sixth inning. An absolute bomb. Great call by Chip Carey. Was also one for three with two RBIs on Saturday. Finishes up the weekend, 4-4-11, four RBI's, two walks. Also snuck in a stolen base there.

Starting point is 00:13:18 He had three runs scored. He played outstanding defensively over at first base. Any worries that we had about him at first base, they're gone. Kind of like Wilson Contreras last year. Remember, we're all like, I don't know. Was he going to be any good over there? And he was fine. Had a little trouble throwing the ball here and there.

Starting point is 00:13:34 But, you know, it's expected. It's not the easiest throw to try to turn two without hitting the runner when you throw it in the second base. So I like Burleson's game. He looked good. He looks confident. And, you know, showing some swagger in that game one. And, you know, the team and the crowd were feeding off.

Starting point is 00:13:52 it. So what a moment to start the season by hitting that two run home run to give them the lead after they had fallen behind seven to one at that point. And my number three star, it's going to go to Jordan Walker guys. I know you thought maybe Michael McGreevy, maybe my guy Nathan Church, but Jordan Walker, maybe even Victor Scott, who are going to talk about a second. But my number three star is going to Jordan Walker. J. Dub had a monster game on Sunday. Losing effort. I understand that. but he goes three for four with a three run home run. He also scored six times in the series. No, he didn't.

Starting point is 00:14:29 It wasn't a three run home run, was it? Now you got me second guessing on what it was. Home run Walker, where they're two, yeah, three run, okay.

Starting point is 00:14:39 Losing track of all this. But three run home run for Jordan Walker. He scored six times in the series as well, which leads the national league. It is tied for the league lead. He walked twice. He only struck out once. Some really, really good numbers for Jordan Walker.

Starting point is 00:14:56 Finishes the series 4 for 10. His OBPs at 500. The sluggings at 900. His OPS 1.4.00. And I know we've said this before, but if Jordan Walker becomes the guy that everyone thought he'd be early on in his career, holy smokes what a boost that would be to this offense. Like that would be monstrous. And then maybe we wouldn't have to see Mason win batting cleanup because I don't understand that one.

Starting point is 00:15:25 whatsoever. I know Ollie's trying to figure some stuff out here early on, but that shocked me. And guess what? It didn't work at all in the series that Mason when it was back clean out. He had a double over here. It just, it didn't work. But we got some other offensive shoutouts to talk about. How about Nolan Gorman? Titanic blast in the game on Sunday, almost 450 feet off his bed, just destroyed a baseball. Unfortunately, nobody was on. But that was his first of the season. He ends up and three for 10 this weekend, four RBIs. Victor Scott, instrumental at the bottom of the order, going five for 10. It's got the most hits on the team so far, two runs scored, two stolen bases.

Starting point is 00:16:07 When the Cardinals had him on Sunday, the only one thing I'll point out is right, when the Cardinals had him on second, JJ's on first in Sunday's game, I would have loved to have seen a devil-steel attempt right there with Herrera at the plate. I understand that you trust Yvonne Herrera. maybe it's a little too aggressive, but I'm willing to try it with those guys. Both of them run extremely well, Victor with the elite speed. I would have tried to pull that off to try to keep a Bon Herrera out of the double play, which he ended up rolling into anyway.

Starting point is 00:16:40 So that was, yeah, that was a bummer. Herrera and when were the biggest disappointments as far as hitters this weekend, going a combined four for 27 with just two RBIs in the second and fourth spots in the order. runners in scoring position, Mason went over four with two strikeouts. Herrera one for six. That one hit, though, was a big one. He had that two run double in the eighth inning on Saturday, which at the time didn't seem like it was going to be all that important,

Starting point is 00:17:05 if you remember, like they were up to two or nothing, and he hits this double and two runs scoring. You're like, you know, insurance runs, but like, we'll be good to go. Yeah, we needed those runs because Tampa Bay ties it up in the top of the ninth inning. but I'm a guy. So some people like to stick with a lineup that's, you know, let's give it some time. You don't have to move people around all the time.

Starting point is 00:17:30 I say hogwash. I love moving people around. You know, if some guy's cold, I'm not going to keep them in the big spots. I'm going to move them down in the order. So I'm a guy that goes with that hot hand. Right now, Mason Winn, I'm swapping them out, man. He can't have that dude back and clean up.

Starting point is 00:17:45 I would put Jordan Walker's hot right now. I'd put him in, in the cleanup spot. But Ali is very much more patient person than I am. So he might let this go for a little while, not put too much pressure on Jordan Walker. Ollie's the pro. I'll let it go.

Starting point is 00:18:06 But if he continues to get over these situations and just nothing's happening, like you just can't have him hitting there. You got to move people around a little bit. So we'll see, again, what kind of adjustments he makes against the Mets. overall, would love your thoughts on the pitching and the offense for the Cardinals on opening weekend, opening series. I keep saying weekend, like if the game was Friday, Saturday, Sunday, but Thursday, Saturday, Sunday.

Starting point is 00:18:32 You know, what are your thoughts? Most people are pretty worked up about the bullpen pitching staff in general. Like what they saw from Libby and McGreevy, obviously, but everybody else are like, whoa, we got to fix all this. This is a lot of trouble. And, yeah, it wasn't great. It wasn't great out of the bullpen. A couple of guys were good. but for the most part, as a whole, the bullpen was just trash.

Starting point is 00:18:54 It was brutal this weekend. So, yeah, they got to get that together for sure. Coming up next, we're going to take a look around the NL Central, let you know where the Cardinals are as far as how things went for the first few games of the season. And we're also going to preview that METS series, which is coming up. We'll do that next on Lockdown Cardinals. What of sports were traded like markets? Now you can put your sports IQ to work in real time with Robin Hood,

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Starting point is 00:20:00 and cleared swaps trading involves significant risk and is not appropriate for everyone. Event contracts are offered by Robin Hood derivatives LLC, a registered futures commission merchant, and swap firm. Thanks again for making Lockdown, Carlis your first list of the day. And thank you for making Lockdown on the number one sports podcast network. I almost forgot to point out that I'm wearing the ugly shirt, which for those of you who are new to the show, maybe you weren't with us the last year or so. I wear this ugly shirt that they gave out a Shagin Company shirt, by the way. But, you know, it's the ugly old man type of shirt that they give away as a promotion item.

Starting point is 00:20:41 And every time the Cardinals won a series, I would put this nasty thing on to celebrate. And here we are, first series of the season. And we got the shirt on. take it in enjoy the only problem is just like um on video it like dims because it's so bright it like dims all the lights around me the same thing with like white jerseys you'll notice when i wear a white jersey a home jersey during uh the videos that the lights they all dim and uh makes things look a lot darker because the shirts are so bright so i apologize if uh if it looks that way because of this but anyway taking a look at the standings guess who's at the top

Starting point is 00:21:20 again Milwaukee Brewers. Milwaukee Brewers sweep the Chicago White Sox. They start the season 3 and no despite trading Freddie Peralta to the Mets, despite losing Jackson Cheerio and Andrew Vaughan to injuries already this season. They outscore Chicago 29 to 10. And we'll welcome in the raise next. I will tell you this, Milwaukee, Chuck, who runs Locktown Brewers,

Starting point is 00:21:48 get ready for some annoying at-bats because this. That's going to be a fun series for the offenses because both of them are very much alike, where they just constantly put the ball in play. So that's going to be annoying. So hopefully the Rays do what they did to us and do this to the Brewers, where it's just death by a thousand cuts over and over and over. Just crap. Second place, you got your cardinals.

Starting point is 00:22:19 Tied with the Reds, both of them two and one. Reds took two of three. three against the Boston Red Sox. They beat up on our former Cardinal, Sunny Gray, on Saturday. A lot of Boston people already jumping in and like, this guy sucks, man. Like, why we don't want them? Well, you're stuck with them now, man. The trade is done.

Starting point is 00:22:36 So, yeah, they took advantage of Sunny Gray on Saturday. They give a three-run shot by AU80 Oswears on Sunday to win that game three to two. They'll have the pirates coming into Great American Ballpark next. Cubs and Pirates each went one and two over the weekend. Cubs got throttled in game one. by Washington. They returned the favor on Saturday, but then lost again to the Nationals on Sunday by a square of six to three.

Starting point is 00:22:59 Shota and Managa took the loss. They got Mike Trout and the Angels coming to Wrigley Field. And who they played, I think they played four games. I think the Angels are two and two. Pirates avoided the sweep against the Mets on Sunday with a four to three win in ten innings. Their new additions,

Starting point is 00:23:14 Brandon Lowe and Ryan O'Hern are off to hot starts. Laos was hitting 4-17 with three home runs. O'Hern hitting four. 29. As I mentioned, they're going to be facing the Reds. Picardels are going to be hosting the Mets for three on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday to wrap up their six-game homestand to start the season. Monday's probabilities have Kyle Leahy making his season debut against Clay Holmes. Tuesday, Andre Palante against Kodai Senga. And then on Wednesday, Matthew Libertor against Freddie Peralta, Battle of the Aces on Wednesday on hump day.

Starting point is 00:23:46 So we saw the Mets a decent amount this spring. so watching them shouldn't be unfamiliar. We didn't see a lot of Juan Soto because he was off of the WBC, but their lineup includes Francisco Lindor, who was hurt a lot. Soto, Boba Chet, Marcus Simeon, Jorge Polanco, Brett Beatty, Luis Robert Jr. has been hitting quite well here at the beginning of the year. Leads the team in RBIs with five so far. Lindor is off to a cold start.

Starting point is 00:24:17 As I mentioned, he missed a lot of time. had a broken hamlet bone and was out for most of the spring. So hopefully he keeps his bat in the freezer when he's in St. Louis, because we know how dangerous he can be if he starts to heat up. So hopefully the cardinals are catching him at a good time. Boba Chet was, I want to say a bad word, but he wasn't was poop. Let's say that. Boba Chet was poop in the first series, one for 14 with 8Ks in the first three games.

Starting point is 00:24:45 Polanco was one for 10. Rookie Carson Benj, one for 10. Simeon was two for 11. So the pirates, we know the pirates got a good pitching staff. So not shocking that the Mets had a little bit of trouble hitting against them. But yeah, some ugly numbers there for the Mets offense. We'll see if the Cardinals can keep that going. And if this bullpen can get back on track and look more like they were during the spring

Starting point is 00:25:07 than how they looked in the first three games of that series against Tampa Bay, because that was fugly. First pitch for Bush, Monday night, 645 St. Louis time. Thank you for making Locked-on Cardinals for first listen every day, be having already. Give us a follow on X at L-O-U-U-U-U-Skardinals. You can find us on TikTok and Instagram and Locked-on Cardinals. Like subscribe on YouTube.

Starting point is 00:25:30 If you never miss an episode, every day or club obviously built for you. Use the code finally. Get that free month. You get locked-on Cardinals to add free, plus members only in Discord access and more full free month. With the code finally, head to Lockdownsstl-Cardinals. com to join the club.

Starting point is 00:25:45 For those of you on video, we send you to the first ever, 24-7 national lockdown podcast network, YouTube channel on audio. Make sure your second listen is locked on MLB. You guys are the best fans in baseball for a reason. You were great at Bush, the first three. Let's see it against the Mets.

Starting point is 00:26:00 We'll see you next time on Lockdown Cardinals.

Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - St. Louis Cardinals' BULLPEN Struggles While The Offense DELIVERS In Series WIN Over Tampa Bay Rays

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