Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - Villain Willy Returns!

Episode Date: April 3, 2024

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Pitching defense and timely hitting, the Cardinals, pull off the trifecta once again to take down the Padres on Tuesday. 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. Haffron 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 Locked on Cardinals, part of the Locked on podcast network covering your team every day. You can follow me on Twitter X at JD Sports Radio.

You can follow the podcast at L0 underscore Cardinals. I want to thank those of you who make Lockton Cardinals, your first listen every day. We're free and available wherever you get your podcast. That's right, I said free. Also free on YouTube. Make sure you like, subscribe, and comment when you stop by, interact with us.

Don't be shy. Hit that notification button so you know when the new episodes are posted. This is a show, serving Cardinal Nation, and giving the best fans in baseball. All of the info about the birds on the bat. So if you're watching on YouTube today, you will notice that I am wearing my 1980s whitey Herzog-esque jacket today, a little cool out, but also because the Cardinals did some things last night that reminded me a little bit about those 80s teams, doing some things

with the pitching, the defense, manufacturing runs. It was a lot of fun to watch last night. So let's get into this. We'll start with the pitching part of this. After the Cardinals inked Kyle Gibson and Lance Lynn, we all kind of wondered what was it about these particular guys that were attractive to the front office? And we got a couple of different answers, right? You know, they wanted to be in St. Louis was part of it. Normally healthy guys, guys you can count on it through a lot of innings to take the burden off the bullpen, which was a huge problem in 2023.

and those innings would lead to a thing we call quality starts. And this is where things got very interesting because as bad as the Cardinals were in 2023, there was something that would happen when they would get a quality start that allowed them to win ball games. When they got a quality start from their pitcher, they were a winning ball club, a very good ball club. In fact, they would go 33 and 15 last year. when they got a quality start from one of their starters.

That's a 687 winning percentage for those of you who aren't good at math. I'm not a good math person by any means. I'm not a mathematician. But even though, I know that's good. I know that's good. 687, just to put it in perspective, the Braves who were amazing last year, when a league high 104 games at a 642 winning percentage.

So that's how different things were for the Cardinals last year, when they would get a quality start from whoever it is, got the ball to begin the game. So getting innings, getting quality starts, that was kind of the target of the front office. They got that from Kyle Gibson on Monday. And they got it again last night from the Lizard King himself, Miles Michael is. Now, a lot of people were spitting some venom in Miles' direction after his start on opening day. He didn't look great. He admits that. He was very hitable, gave up some dingers, didn't go deep in the game. Basically a rerun of what happened to most of the starters last year.

But again, the Dodgers are kind of awesome. They won again last night over the Giants. So it's kind of hard to judge anything that the Cardinals did in that series and be disappointed in them when you're starting to realize how good L.A. really is. So all eyes were on Miles on Tuesday night. Can he bounce back in his second start of the season? Will we see anything different?

Or will it be the same old, same old against San Diego? The one thing we just have to accept about Miles Michaelis, though, and we need to just get over it, is that teams are going to get hits off him, no matter what. All right. I know he's had a game or two here and there where, you know, he has shut people down. But for the most part, if it's going to be a decent offense they face that day or night,

it's inevitable. He's going to give up hits. And it's because he's around the zone so much, that guys are going to put the bat on the ball even more against him. And when that happens, the more times you put it in play, the more times things are going to fall in and grounders are going to find holes. Sure, Miles will pick up some strikeouts here and there, but it really is for him to be an effective pitcher. It's up to the pinpoint accuracy that he offers, being able to change speeds. That's how he's going to get guys out.

He genuinely is a pitcher. He's not a thrower out there. And being that type of pitcher will lead to a lot of hits. It just is what it is. And you have to accept it. and you have to get over it. But Miles was able to do what he normally does well in games that he's going to actually win. Avoid that big inning.

He avoids the big inning. Tonight, he scatter seven hits over six innings. Seven hits, you're like, gosh, that's a lot, right? Yeah, but when they only amount to two runs and none of them go flying over the wall, that's good. And that's what happened last night. He strikes out four. And yes, for those of you counting at home, that would be another quality start for the

rotation, back-to-back quality starts to be exact. And guess what? Cardinals are 2-1-0. Cardinals are 2-0 in those games. See, stats are working. Another thing about a guy like Miles and Gibson and Lynn at this stage in their careers is that if hitters are going to put the ball in play more against them, which is going to happen, then the defense behind them has got to be rock solid. And so far here in 2024, they have been. They've been very impressive. And I I want to delve into that a little bit more. Plus, we'll get to the small ball stuff that happened last night that had Cardinals fans everywhere, grinning from ear to ear.

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back and forth talking about the Cardinals game. We've got an afternoon one today, so we'll be online for that as well. Well, the Cardinals, at least since I've been on this earth, have been able to count on their defense as one of those pillars that makes the St. Louis Cardinals franchise a successful franchise. Okay? For years, we've had fantastic guys on defense. You know, I grew up watching the 80s Cardinals and huge, huge Ozzy Smith fan.

It has been my favorite Cardinal since I was itty bitty. I got an autograph thing from him over here. One of my most prized possessions. I loved the wizard. Still loved the wizard. And with him on the field, you also had guys like Terry Pendleton and Willie McGee and Keith Hernandez.

Tommy Hur, although I don't think you ever want to go glove was just rock solid. Like that double-play duo of Ozzie and Tommy was incredible. And night after night, they would put on a show defensively and it was tough to score runs against them. Before them, Bob Gibson,

nine-time gold glove winner. You had Ken Boyer 1-5, Kurt Flood, one-seven, Bill White had six. And after the 80s, he had a ton of other guys who were elite position players. At catcher alone, of course, Yadir Molina, one of the best to ever do it. But Tom Pagnazzi, Pags won a couple of gold gloves. Mike Muthini, he was awesome, stud defensive catchers, 15 goal gloves between those three. Albert Pujols, Fernando Vinya, Colton Wong, Scott Rowland, Edgar Rinterea, Jimmy Edmund, and then Nolan Aronado, Paul Goltchman, Tyler O'Neill, Harrison Bader, Tommy Edmund, Brendan Donovan, Adam Wainwright. The list goes on and on and on, man.

The Cardinals have been dripping in gold gloves for decades. And we've been pretty spoiled, pretty spoiled as a fan base to see such a fine display of leather over the years. So in last year, when they become one of the worst defensive teams in the league, even with a bunch of these gold glove winners still on the roster. It's not like they all went away and we started over. No, everybody just kind of played like crap last year on defense. People were concerned. People were concerned.

We're like, well, what is what? This isn't normal for us because knowing the staff that they had, the pitching staff, and now the new guys they were bringing in, you know, if this defense didn't bounce back and become a good defense again, cardals were going to be in some real trouble. You know, and I know it's early in the season. It could all go sideways still. I get that.

But so far, so far, first six games, they're passing the test. First hitter of the game for the Padres last night, Zander Bogartz, hits a flare into left field. Look who's there. Michael Siani, diving catch, sets the tone for the defense, which, by the way, still has not made an error through the first six games of the season. They're one of only three teams who haven't made one yet. The Braves and the Nationals are the other two.

and they're second in the league because they've been getting these double plays, which have been huge for the team, for the pitching staff. They're second in the league and double plays. They've turned eight so far, trailing only the Astros who have nine. This is the type of Cardinals defense that we are used to see. The last couple of days has been the type of Cardinal baseball that we are used to seeing, which has brought wins. And it's been a whole lot of fun to watch.

And as great as it is to make spectacular catches. We've seen a few of them. Ciani last night, Donovan's made a couple. Jordan Walker and right field, you know, you've been seeing these plays. It's the routine plays that have to be made for the Cardinals to be successful. Last year, they're kicking it and throwing it all over the place. It was a mess.

But this year, it's been a different story. Nolan Aronado looks healthy. It looks like himself over there at the hot corner. Mason went and Nolan Gorman. They've been fantastic up the middle so far. Mason win has been a difference maker in short. out. Like he looks incredible over there. Goldie, steady is always over at first base, doesn't get as much love as he probably deserves. Victor Scott may not be hitting quite as much

as you were hoping at the plate, but he's tracking down to everything in center field and looks so smooth out there doing it. Donovan and Walker have made amazing plays in the outfield, as I mentioned. Siani, obviously, good defensive player. And I love how, as I told you, they would that Ali has been deploying him when he's not starting, which he got to start last night, but they've been deploying him into right field later in games for Walker. So just to make sure that they got the best defensive lineup they can to be out there while still missing Tommy Edmund is a gold glove winner and Lars Newpar, who we know is very good. Dylan Carlson, solid in the outfield.

So they're missing a lot of really good pieces, but yet they've got these guys stepping up and just doing great. just doing great. I like how everybody's been using hashtag hands team. Kind of, you know, if you're a football fan, you know, like when somebody's doing an onside kick and they bring out the hands team to get out there in that front line to catch it, make sure that the other team doesn't get their hands on it. And that's what they're calling it, late in games, when they're moving people around and Siani's coming in. Donovan went to left last night.

They brought Gorman in at second base. And it's just to make sure that here at the end of the games, they've got the best defensive team out there that they can possibly, field at the moment. So they're not hurting themselves. They're not shooting themselves in the foot with shabby defensive play. And that's been huge for the first six games of this season. Wilson Contreras, how about we get some credit to Wilson Contreras? I know we all think about offense when it comes to Willie, but gosh, he's looked a lot better behind the play with the framing. Like you can see the progress that he has made from last year and spring training into this year. I mean, he looks

fantastic back there. And I was just curious because some of the catching stats and stuff, I'm not even sure where you find this stuff, but I'm glad John Denton at MLB.com dropped this nugget among catchers who would caught 60 borderline pitches going into Tuesday, Contreras's 54 strikes and 100 instances are first in baseball. So the eye test where you're like, man, Willie does kind of look good back there. It's real. It's real. He's better. He is good back there. And of course, his ability to call games along with the pitchers has vastly improved. I mean, we're from last year where pitchers are accusing him of calling pitches that he doesn't even throw to maybe moving him to left field. And now here we are where so far this season, he's been one of the best framers behind the plate defensively.

He's looked good. The arms look great. And he's getting along with his pitching staff. And Miles Michaelis raved about him after the game last night, about two. how he's calling games. And when the battery is cohesive and the defense is strong, this Cardinals team can have a lot of success. Now, of course, you need offense to complete the game plan. You got to score runs. And the Cardinals, who look lost against the Dodgers starting rotation, have been able to manufacture some runs recently. They face U. Darvish on

Tuesday night. You Darvish is really good. Like, I thought it was funny that people were like, oh, here we go, Cardals can't hit again. What do you mean? You Darvish is one of the best pitchers in the National League. Like, shut up. You've got to be kidding me with this stuff. Like, it's embarrassing when people make these kind of comments. So it wasn't going to be easy last night.

You knew that going into it. You Darvish is the ace of the Padre staff. You've got him. You got Dylan Cis now. But you would list you Darvish is their number one. but in the third inning, a trio of rookies got this whole thing going, did the basic things right. And this is the area where it reminded me of the Whitey Herzog era, which is why I got this jacket on. Because it was the small ball type of stuff that got the birds on the board.

Rookie Victor Scott laces a shot into the right centered gap. Easy double, right? No. You've got Gold Glove right fielder Fernando Tatis Jr. over there. He cuts it off. The dude made a couple of really. slick plays in the gap last night, man. You can see why Tatis Jr. got that gold glove last year. He's got a great arm as well. And only someone with Victor Scott's speed could have turned that

into a successful double, which he was able to do. Tatis made it very, very close. Like, it was an awesome play by him in right center. But Victor Scott just, you know, speed doesn't take a day off. And it did not there, which was nice to see. As he slides into second base gets there, despite that great effort by Tatis. So next. batter. You got Michael Siani. Not a great offensive player by any means. We know that. He knows that. Ollie knows that. So what does he do? Has him laid down the sacrifice, bun. Moves Victor Scott over to third base, which brings up another rookie. And by the way, Michael Siani is listed as a rookie again this year. And that brings up another rookie in Mason Wend, who rips the second pitch he sees into left

field, 102.4 off the bat. A missile. And it just happened to be almost right at the last. And left fielder. Any lift at all and that ball's in the seats. That's a dinger. But it gets the job done. Sack fly, Cardinals tied up one to one. The old saying is you get them on, get them over, get them in. Perfect execution by three rookies. And it led to a run. It was beautiful to see. Later in the game, I was a little surprised they didn't actually try that same formula when Jordan Walker had that lead off double. But we'll get into that a little bit later. Let's go to the sixth inning. One out, Brynn Donovan, who looks locked in right now has an outstanding at back. against Starbush. You hadn't thrown a lot of pitches. The Cardinals were trying to jump on him

with some of those first pitch strikes. He was trying to get across. Donovan falls behind in the count 02. He comes all the way back eight pitch at bat, earns the walk, magnificent stuff. Goldie then strikes out again. He's got nine of those already this season. Okay, I know we're giving Nolan a rough time for all the strikeouts. He's been doing. Paul Goldschmidt's striking out a lot, man. I don't know what's going on with Goldie, but hopefully he gets it's figured out here soon. put the ball in play is usually a normal thing for Goldene. He's not doing that a lot. But in comes Wilson Contreras.

Here comes our hero, and he smokes a splitter that hung in the zone just a little too long. It wasn't a horrible pitch by any means, but Willie recognized it and bashes it over the center field boards. Two-run shot gives the Cardinals a three to two lead, 106.7 off the bed, 420 feet away, almost in the same spot that he hit the home run the previous night, which was like a 419 foot shot. Then in the seventh inning, this is when the bunt situation,

I thought was an obvious call, but it didn't happen. Jordan Walker leads off with a double, which brings up Victor Scott, who's the fastest player on the roster. He's an accomplished bunter. But instead, they let him swing away. I didn't understand that part.

He strikes out. Then Michael Ciani's up. You're not going to bunt with one out, probably. So he gets a chance to swing away. He strikes out. And then Mason Winn fly. out in the inning's over, threats over. So not sure why. They weren't bunning there with a one-run lead because it was three to two at that time. So a questionable call there for sure. Wasn't,

wasn't all on board with what happened there. But then in the eighth inning, the Cardinals, got to Padres import reliever, Yuki Matsui, Donovan leads off with the single again, the table setter, Brennan Donovan. Goldie works a walk. And that's when we saw the return of villain Willie. You remember that guy, right? Remember him in Boston last year at Red Sox reliever, Kinley Janssen's mind in a blender by keeping his foot out of the box until he had to be in there. Jansen didn't know exactly what the rules were, so he kept coming to a set, and then eventually, after getting worn, ended up forcing a couple of balls to be called against the Red Sox Closer, and ultimately he ends up blowing the game. Same idea kind of happened here. First and second,

nobody out. Here comes Villan Willie, knowing that Yuki Matsui, new guy to the league. Maybe he doesn't get all the rules so far and gets Matsui charged with a ball due to a pitch clock violation after Contreras kind of threw his timing off by keeping that foot out of the box, kind of messing with him a little bit. That throws off Matsui's rhythm and he eventually walks Contreras, which loads the bases with nobody out, Bill and Willie, the mind freak himself gets another one. Then comes the most bizarre play of the game. I'm going to break that down for you next on Locked on Cardinals.

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Find Locked on Sports today now available on the Free Fire TV channels app. So we're in the top of the eighth inning here. The cards are up three to two. They got the bases juiced. Nobody out. Best guy in the world to come up, right? Nolan R. Renato coming to the plate chance to really break things open. And Nato unloads on a ball that hits the ground.

three feet in front of home plate. Yeah, three feet. Got on top of a changeup, which was low in the zone, got fooled a little bit, and it dribbles down to the third basement. And he's playing in, is able to make like a shovel pass to the catcher. And it appears that Brendan Donovan is going to be out of the play.

Big chance of this right here, huh? But he's called safe. What? safe. Wait, wait, what happened? And then you realize when they show the replay that the catcher never had his foot on the plate. Never had it on the plate. Would have been out, would have been out, but Camp Osano had his foot a couple of inches, like four or five inches in front of the plate. Home plate umpire, although he had a kind of a tough game behind the plate last night. He saw this. That's for sure. And it worked out for the Cardinals. Donnie hustling all the way. He scores the run on the

fielder's choice makes it four to two a very demoralizing play for the Padres, but exhilarating for the Cardinals. I got a tweet from someone during the game last night after this play happened, and I couldn't agree more with them. It was plays like that that went against the Cardinals last year. Like the roles would have been reversed. That had been something that happened to the Cardinals last year. Instead, it goes in favor of them. And if it was still the same way where the Cardinals were on offense, Donnie would have been out. It had been a bad call. Donnie would have been out, probably rolled his ankle and missed a couple of weeks in 2023. It would have been a disaster.

But this time it goes the Cardinals way. We enjoy that. Then Ali pinch hits rookie Yvonne Herrera for Burleson, who hits a sack fly to center to bring in Goldie, making it five to two. Another manufactured run, you know, taking some walks, making the pitchers work a little bit, getting guys over, hitting sack flies. Like, that's baseball, man. Like relying on the three run shot and having to, deal with a bunch of strikeouts. That is not fun baseball to watch. And it happens to the Cardinals a lot,

at least it did last year, where they'd come up in these situations. They strike out. Some stupid happens hitting two double play. Endings over and everybody's hanging their heads. But this time they got the job done. They push two more runs across the plate. Ballpen trio of Giovanni Gallegos, Andrew Kittridge and Ryan Helsley close things out. Gallegos had us a little bit sweaty. there in the seventh inning, but got a big double play ball. Kittredge magnificent. Again, three outs and just seven pitches.

Does that dude even sweat? Does Andrew Kitchard even sweat? Is he like Marky Mark's character and Daddy's home where he just doesn't sweat? Like the guy is just so calm and relaxed out there. It's awesome. It's awesome. I love this dude.

And then Helsley, yeah, I gave off that lead off single, but then whiffs the next two before getting Bogarts to pop out. Game set, cards win at 5-2 and are now beaming with confidence. You can see it in their faces and in the way that their body language is right now.

They're beaming with confidence after winning three of their last four. Could have won four in a row. Got a chance to make it a winning road trip today. After that rough start in L.A., they can make this a winning road trip today as they go for the sweep. A couple of injury updates real quick. Lars Neupar hitless and his three at bats in his first rehab game for AAA, Memphis. They were in Indy on Tuesday night,

had an RBI and a run scored. He's expected to be the DH in today's game for Memphis. Mother Nature continues to be a problem and just be straight up rude to Sunny Gray because of the forecast calling for rain today in Indianapolis. Sunny Gray's scheduled start. It got moved. He will now pitch a simulated game

against the AA Cardinals in Springfield and we'll then make a rehab start next week in Memphis, weather pending. Come on, Mother Nature. We're trying to get our sunny back. It seems like every time he's set to do anything on a mound, rain gets in the way. And it's kind of been a pain in the butt so far. But I don't know, maybe it's Mother Nature saying, hey, take it easy.

Take it easy. Take it slow. He's coming back. But either way, he continues to make progress. And so does Lars. So that's great news. Cardinals and Padres today left. He's Jack Thompson on the bump for the Cardinals against Joe Musgrobe for Sandyengo.

first pitch going to be at 310 St. Louis time. All right. Thanks for making a lockdown Cardinals your first listen every day. If you haven't already, give us a follow on Twitter X at L0 underscore Cardinals at a JD Sports Radio. Like I said, during the games, I'm right there with you the whole time. Any feedback you want to give me, you angry about something, you happy about something, let me know. We're on there together.

Like and subscribe on YouTube, help our channel and our love for the Cardinals grow. You guys are the best fans in baseball for a reason. And I'll see you next time on Locked on Cardinals. Let's get that sweet. Thank you.