Renewing the Rivalry

The debut of Anthony Reyes was probably even better than expected. 6 1/3 innings, 2 earned runs (he left a fastball up that Bill Hall hit out for a two-run shot), 5 strikeouts and a walk. While he returned to Memphis right after the game, I can’t believe he won’t be back up on the Cardinal roster when they expand September 1. Whether he’ll make the post-season roster, that’s a different story. I’d be a little surprised if he did, though he can make people swing and miss, which was something that was missing during the 2004 postseason that really caught up to the Cardinals in the World Series. ‘Course, Chris Carpenter was missing, and he gives the rotation that strikeout ability. Since the St. Louis braintrust has been saying that Reyes is a starter only, I think they’ll probably leave him off the postseason roster for him to get some rest, but he’ll be part of the Cardinal rotation in 2006.

Then the Cardinals, figuring that they are making it too easy having four regulars on the DL and the Memphis brigade, for the most part, starting games, sit Mr. Pujols on Wednesday afternoon as they take on Ben Sheets. Sheets is hard enough to beat when the regulars are in there, but the JV didn’t have a chance, right? Nope, they pulled out a 3-0 win as Jeff Suppan pitched probably the game of the season for him. What is up with this team? They are really embodying LaRussa’s favorite saying, “Play nine.”

And this weekend they take on those lovable (to some) losers (to all), the Cubs. The Cardinal/Cub rivalry is a wonderful thing that doesn’t require police ringing the field as it does in certain Northeast venues. I got to go to a Cardinal/Cub game a couple of years ago in Busch. It was a great game, except for the outcome. Mark Prior made a 1-0 lead stand up until the top of the 8th, when Pujols went deep to tie it up. Unfortunately the Cubs scored in the 9th to win it, but it still was a great experience.

No matter where they play, the stadium is about 35-40% full of the other team’s fans, which makes it tough when you are listening to the game to determine what has happened by the crowd noise. The Cubs come into today 19 games behind the Cardinals and owners of an 8 game losing streak. It’d be great if it was 12 by Sunday, but it’s always tough to sweep the Cubs, especially with their pitching. There are at least 2 Cub fans in the PPT, though, so I may have to do some talking, especially if the Cards win tomorrow. Today’s game is in jeopardy by rain, though, at least as I write this. (EDIT: Wish it had been rained out. Bad guys lead 10-4 in the 6th.)

More baseball: The other young pitcher, King Felix, had a spectacular home debut on Tuesday. No earned runs in 8 innings and got the win. That’s probably just a flash of what he can be. After he makes it around the league once or twice and still can put up those kind of games regularly, he’ll have arrived.

Kenny Rogers had his 20-game suspension reduced by a week when an arbitrator decided that Commissioner Selig had overstepped his authority in assigning one of that length. There have been numerous times that I’ve disagreed with Selig and I’ve found him basically a substandard commissioner, but this was one thing he did get right. From the video, there wasn’t much if any provocation, and 20 games for a pitcher is basically like 4 for a starting player, since that is how many starts that he’d miss. Seemed fairly reasonable to me, and I’m not really sure why it didn’t to the arbitrator.

The rotisserie league is starting to heat up. Both Matt and I made some trades this week to strengthen our teams, though they won’t take affect until Monday’s games. The gap was a measly 0.5 points this morning, though I think it’ll probably expand back up today. It should be an interesting run to the pennant, as it were.

Unfortunately, there’s even odds that it’ll be the last one. Out of the nine owners in the league, four are undecided about returning next year. I’m hopeful of bringing them all back or filling their slots with new blood, but I’m not sure I can replace four if they all leave. We probably need at least 7 (what we had before this year’s expansion) to have a competitive league.

I guess that’s enough for today. Tomorrow’s Friday!