gary bennett sweeps

and not as a janitor, as previous entries might imply.

gary "freakin'" bennett? are we talking about the same gary "freakin'" bennett that hit his first cardinal homer against the cubs like last week? the guy who has been dancing around yadi's batting average, but without the power?

the same, yes.

gary bennett is officially off the rabid redbird hook, at least until he has a homerless game. ok, i'll even extend that to say if he doesn't homer, but does hit the game winning rbi, he can remain in my good graces.

note to readers: the nickname "freakin'" will be applied to a different cardinal every year. sometimes, there will even be multiple "freakin'"'s in a year. for example, were he not already "gollum," our backup middle infielder would be aaron "freakin'" miles. it is primarily meant to indicate the player least likely to succeed and/or the player in the rabid redbird doghouse du jour. that is all.

i actually got to go to the game saturday, which was fun (my first time seeing carp pitch live), but i feel really bad for my wife, who was at a funeral, thus missing the third of the four-pack of tickets that was her christmas present. oh well, we've got one more game we might be able to go to, but i doubt we'll have seats that i'll like better than the four pack were.

such is life, i suppose.

dear god

two stratospheric home runs
+seven rbi
+one blown save
______________________
=another outing in the season
of continuous throbbing pain

seriously, all i'm saying is that i wouldn't be surprised to see weaver and izzy sporting blacked eyes today, and bruises the exact size and shape of god-like dominican fists.

woo hoo. go mulder.

maybe his bad rehab starts were just a ruse to put other teams off. maybe he'll come in tonight and throw 101 mph left handed heat, and curveballs that look like they're headed for the upper deck dropping in for strikes in the inside corner. that must be why we're bringing an ailing veteran in for a rookie who will be a key rotation guy next year, and could use all the major league experience he can get.

maybe during batting practice, sir albert can knock shawn green's plane out of the sky so there's not one more met home run threat to worry about.

stop the jinx

it seems that every time i write a post, we end a streak. since our streak is at one for the time being, it's an off-day, and we're going off to face the hardest nl competition available on tuesday, i fugured i should post (going by the theory that if we do lose tomorrow, it will be due to other factors).

some thoughts:

anthony reyes demotion is probably purely a business thing, but it doesn't sit too well with cardinal nation. i for one am not confident that mulder is going to be any better than he was before the dl stint, and if we find ourselves unable to make moves without clearing waivers on possibly important (next year: ie weaver) pitchers, i will be pissed off. however, that said, reyes is the only starter we can safely send to the minors without waivers, so i'm sure that's the thinking. if mulder gets shelled on his return, i will be calling for his head.

fat sidney isn't a yankee anymore. turns out, sometimes, one man's trash is another man's litter.

baby dunc. i still don't believe it's the real deal, but he's damn sure trying to prove me wrong. in this past series, he even looked pretty good in left field.

gollum has played some pretty decent (though fairly routine) short, and after watching yesterday, i actually think he might have a better arm that eck; either that, or eck intentionally throws to the dirt in front of first. i hope that they give eck ample time to rest and recover, possibly even dl him so our bench isn't entirely made up of injured guys.

we've won three of our last four series. i can live with that. if we keep playing at that level, there's no telling. especially if glavine and pedro are injured for the rest of the year, we might even make it to the series, though i don't think it will be a fruitful one if we do.

t-shirt idea:
cuck the fubs
muck the fets
ass the fucktros

ron ron in frozen

so last night, i was at trader joe's, picking up some hormone free frozen chicken breasts, when i looked up to see none other than cardinals second baseman ronnie belliard. this wasn't a guy that looked like ronnie belliard, this was the fat-lete himself. he looked exactly like his mlb mugshot, same expression, same cock to his hat. he wasn't wearing a cardinals hat, but who does wear their work hat to the store on their day off?
he also had a spanish speaking posse with him, neither of whom i recognized. i didn't say anything to him, but i think he knew i recognized him.
i don't see a lot of celebrities, if you don't count a very drunken alicia silverstone and her pack of dwarves at the viper room the one time i went to l.a. if i could pick a cardinal to run into, it probably wouldn't be ronnie belliard, but hey, this is already the fifth time i've told the "story."

go cards. come back strong from a sweep at the hands of the worst team in our division, why don't you...

viva el streako

ok, well three games may not constitute a streak to everyone, but it sure does to me after an eight game slide.

that was the weaver we paid virtually nothing for. if he had shown some measure of consistency, i'd be more comfortable with the fact that he's probably going to take anthony reyes spot in the rotation when mulder comes back. to be fair, though, it isn't like reyes has shown any consistency either, except to consistently not live up to cardinal nations overly high expectations for him (in the off season, as i recall, he could walk on the water he had just turned into bud select and feed forty thousand spectators with only six hot dogs and twelve pretzels).

j'enc and yadi busting dingers in the last two games has me grinning pretty big as well. i make no secret of the fact that i like juan encarnacion in right, and i've felt all season that yadi was a far better hitter than his average showed. last two games have given some credence to those thoughts.

is it a dodgers-style 10 game streak? well, not yet...

looking forward

we're in first place in our division, yet, i'm already entertaining thoughts of next year... what does walt need to do in the offseason? a few thoughts from a newish fan...

rotation:
carp
serious pitching acquisition/healthy mulder (tbd this season)
reyes
wainwright
#5 guy better than weaver/ponson

i can even deal with suppan or marquis as the #5 guy, but we can't carry this many mediocre pitchers and expect good things come october 2007.

relievers:
replace flores
fill wainwright's spot competently
i'm not sure what izzy's contract length is, but i like keeping him as long as it doesn't cost us more than he's getting now ($12 mil this year, i think, or 13% of payroll?)

lineup
restructure and resign edmonds
a hard hitting left fielder (that isn't chris duncan) so we don't have to rely so much on edmonds' streaky bat
lose so, duncan, and jrod. i like them all, but we have to do better than this. if we have to keep one, make it jrod, who is getting better in the field and is better off the bench than the other two.
lose gollum and belliard, replace with a honest to god short stop
move eck to 2nd (his [all-american] college position)
keep yadi, but get a better hitting back up catcher than gary freaking bennett.

next off-season is also the time to start negociating future contracts with rolen, pujols, and carp.

perhaps it's time the secret weapon was our manager.

now that i've got this down, maybe the team will get back from the slide, get mad (not frustrated), and start kicking ass again.

filthy little jorge

ok, so first of all, i'm not all that bothered by the jorge sosa signing, because it cost us very little, and maybe his heat will be a good thing to mix in with our pitch to contact set. he is also a relief pitcher we can allow to bat for himself without too much concern, so he can span a few innings without necessitating a pinch hitter. no, sosa isn't the problem so much as he is not the solution. what about the impact move we've been calling for/hearing about? what about the lack of off-season moves being to save money for the big trade deadline snag? where's my championship calibur team?

my complaint about our backup ss still stands as well. the first time i see miles and belliard as our middle infield, i may have to slit my wrists. hell, let spiez do it. i think i recall so taguchi playing some middle infield in an emergency situations before. christ, let rolen play short and put spiezio at third, just don't play gollum at short!

thanks, reverend redbird, for helping me share with cardinal nation aaron's true name...