Juan E. "prepared to miss opening day"

[TGantz]

I know I'm one of the few that feel this way, but I actually want Encarnacion to do well. Let the guy have his chance. He helped out the team a hell of a lot more than J-Rod or Preston did last year, even if most people don't give him credit for it.

I think if he is healthy, he has a starting spot over Wilson, Taguchi, and J-Rod. I'm sorry but I can't sit here and have people tell me that Juan is equal with any of the outfielders on the bench.

I don't see any reason to believe that Preston can do better. He will probably strike out more than Juan, has had knee troubles so he wouldn't be able to play CF as effectively, and he doesn't hit for a high average.

Taguchi doesn't put up the numbers that Juan can offensively. Juan doesn't have any trouble with fielding, so there's no reason Gooch beats out Juan in that department.

J-Rod has a weak arm, can't run the bases, and gives nothing but a decent average and good OBP. I like J-Rod and hopes he makes the team, but unless I see some sort of power or improved defense, I don't see how he can start.

I don't see what's wrong with Juan batting 6th full time. I think it's a good spot for him.

Eckstein
Duncan
Pujols
Rolen
Edmonds
Encarnacion
Molina
Kennedy

That looks like an improved line-up to me. I don't see how Juan hurts that if he puts up similar numbers to last year. Judging by the trend of his career stats, I don't see why he won't have a similar offensive year.

[Radbird]

I'm prepared for him to miss opening day too.

Funny.

Indeed. And sums how many of us feel quite well.

[GatewaySnayke]

Eckstein
Duncan
Pujols
Rolen
Edmonds
Encarnacion
Molina
Kennedy

That looks like an improved line-up to me. I don't see how Juan hurts that if he puts up similar numbers to last year. Judging by the trend of his career stats, I don't see why he won't have a similar offensive year.

I don't know if it's "improved" or not. Most projection systems think the Cardinals' offense will worsen rather than improve. As for Enc putting up similar numbers, he probably won't because he's dealing with a bad wrist.

[TGantz]

Well, that could be a pessimistic way to look at it. You could also look at it as he played with an injured wrist for the second half last season and he is dealing with it now. He could come back stronger than ever for all we know.

I was mainly saying it was improved because of a few reasons:

1) Rolen is 100%.
2) Edmonds finall dealt with some problems he was dealing with last year.
3) Kennedy is an upgrade over Miles/Luna IMO.
4) Molina may have figured out how to hit at least a little bit better.
5) Duncan has probably improved since last year.

I know some of that may not seem like much, and there are a lot of question marks still.

But I think it has improved.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Well, that could be a pessimistic way to look at it. You could also look at it as he played with an injured wrist for the second half last season and he is dealing with it now. He could come back stronger than ever for all we know.

I was mainly saying it was improved because of a few reasons:

1) Rolen is 100%.
2) Edmonds finall dealt with some problems he was dealing with last year.
3) Kennedy is an upgrade over Miles/Luna IMO.
4) Molina may have figured out how to hit at least a little bit better.
5) Duncan has probably improved since last year.

I know some of that may not seem like much, and there are a lot of question marks still.

But I think it has improved.

1) Rolen wasn't the problem, his playing time and performance were on par with his previous non-injury years
2) Edmonds has regressed each year since '04 and turns 37 in June. I think things will get worse before they get better for him.
3) Kennedy's production is astonishingly similar to what the Cards got out of 2B last year.
Kennedy: .273/.334/.384
Cards 2B: .263/.326/.375
4) Hard to argue with that, although how much better is the question. For the sake of the children, I hope he doesn't regress any further.
5) Duncan repeating his .950 OPS from last year is pretty unlikely, never mind improving upon it. Probably looking at some regression towards his career norms.

On the positive side, getting Wilson a signifcant portion of the CF ABs against LHP would go a long way. Edmonds is terrible against LHP, Wilson crushes them, and it saves wear and tear on Edmonds. If that's not an option, Wilson in LF against LHP can spare Duncan some humiliation as well. Oh, and Eckstein had a down year last year, so that may be more fluke than leaving his prime, although his BABIP numbers don't seem to indicate so.

[JohtoVillage]

5) Duncan has probably improved since last year.

I don't know how I can agree with that. If Duncan duplicates his last season numbers out to a whole year while improving (like you said), then he will be in the top five in MVP voting. If he improved by ten percent, with a full season under his belt...he'd have almost 50 homers. So if Duncan has improved his hitting, then I think we are in for a treat. I just hope he can maintain his hitting.

Here's my take on the lineup:

1) Eckstein (SS): He's healthy (I think) so he should improve on his numbers from last year. I think we can expect him to drive in a few more runs and get on base a little better than he did last year. So I'd give this a slight upgrade over last year.

2) Duncan (LF): While I don't think he will keep up his torrid home run rate from last year, I don't think it's outrageous at all to say that he can hit 35 home runs with 90 rbi's and get on base at a 365 clip. Projecting this spot out all year compared to last year should give our offense in this spot a slight upgrade compared to what it was last year.

3) Pujols (1B): Don't have to say much here, but it's hard to envision Pujols getting any better. But he was injured for a few weeks, so if he is healthy for the entire year....(gasp).....we should be even better than last year at this spot.

4) Rolen (3B): A fully healthy Scott Rolen should mean that he should improve slightly on last year's power numbers.

5) Edmonds (CF): If Edmonds comes back healthy, then we should be much better out of this spot compared to last year.

6) Encarnacion (RF): This spot is probably a wash, because what you see is what you get with Encarnacion.

7) Kennedy (2B): He should be an improvement over what we had here last year.

8) Molina (C): It can't get much worse here, so I think Molina only can better his 216 average. Hopefully the postseason was his first step.



All in all, it really seems like the offense is much improved over last season. But it really all depends on the health of Edmonds/Eckstein and if Duncan's season wasn't a fluke. Encarnacion is replaceable and I think Kennedy is as well. But if we don't have a healthy Eckstein and have to trot Miles out there everyday, or don't have a healthy Edmonds and have to trot Encarnacion to center and Wilson to right, it's going to be a long year of missed opportunities and muchos strikeouts.

[haltz]

2) Edmonds has regressed each year since '04 and turns 37 in June. I think things will get worse before they get better for him.

I understand he is trending downward from 2004, but that is a hell of a peak to work from.

All of the projection systems expect a bounce back of sorts and platooning should help as you noted. Despite being concussed and hobbling around, amazingly, he managed to OPS .947 against right-handers last year. Whereas Cardinals center fielders as a group were good for a .739 OPS last year thanks to So Taguchi and 100 terrible plate appearances from Juan.

3) Kennedy's production is astonishingly similar to what the Cards got out of 2B last year.

That is kind of creepy. He's a defensive upgrade though, and those numbers are from a tougher league and hitting environment. A difference of about 8 points of OPS+.

4) Hard to argue with that, although how much better is the question. For the sake of the children, I hope he doesn't regress any further.

PECOTA says 20 runs, but who knows.

5) Duncan repeating his .950 OPS from last year is pretty unlikely, never mind improving upon it. Probably looking at some regression towards his career norms.

Against righties it's even higher. 1.034, I'm not saying that he'll maintain something like that in 2007, or anything close really, but he should be an upgrade over the .778 OPS from the left field goof troop from last year. Hopefully he doesn't give it right back with the glove.

I'm not so high on our offense at the moment. But, I'd put the over/under at 770 runs just off the top of my head. Something similar to last year I guess. With the pitching improving that should be good enough to likely be playing meaningful baseball at the end of the year.

[greenback44]

On the positive side, getting Wilson a signifcant portion of the CF ABs against LHP would go a long way. Edmonds is terrible against LHP, Wilson crushes them, and it saves wear and tear on Edmonds.

While sitting Edmonds against lefties makes some sense for, as you say, wear-n-tear reasons, he is not terrible against them. He has a career 784 OPS against LHP actually.

L/R splits for RHB are pretty much useless for predictive purposes.

[haltz]

While sitting Edmonds against lefties makes some sense for, as you say, wear-n-tear reasons, he is not terrible against them. He has a career 784 OPS against LHP actually.

Is there anything to the notion that when left-handed hitters start to decline that it shows up first in their platoon splits against lefties? I think I remember that Ted Williams suffered from this, and it makes some sense intuitively.

Don't know if you know the answer to that question, or if it's just a case-by-case thing (ahem, Bonds).

[greenback44]

I asked Szymborski about the effect of aging on platoon splits years ago and he didn't answer. I haven't seen anything on it, and I'd guess the sample sizes are small enough that it's hard to get much of anything from recent numbers.