Here's the rub: I remember you rightly excoriating the Cardinals for letting Tatis slip through their fingers and for passing on Soto. It just so happens that the same franchise that acquired both of those players also hired Shildt, but did so in an advisory capacity. Seems like he would have rated higher than Bob Melvin, or gotten one of the numerous jobs available last year if he was that great of a manager. Who knows, maybe he doesn't interview well.

This isn't a defense of Marmol, but it also was a two-out situation with Reyes. He didn't need a K, he needed a pitcher who could get an out, and while Reyes wasn't a 2014 Wacha situation, it was a 2014 Choate situation.
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If the #stlcards maintained their current winning percentage, they would finish the season 52-110.

In 2021 two teams lost 110 games.

Upside: One drafted Jackson Holliday first overall. So there's that.#cardinals #MLB

— Derrick Goold (@dgoold) May 4, 2023

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We saw the IMMEDIATE turnaround in all the major areas a manager can make a difference when he was brought in to replace Matheny. And then we saw a team that played WELL above its station under him.

Say 'well he would've gotten hired if he was all that great' all you want, but again - he took a team that got more than half its starts from guys who never pitched again to 90 wins and the post-season. That team shouldn't have even BEEN there but it made it because of him.

This is the same thing Philly fans said about Andy Reid - "Well he cost us the NFCCG, he sucks!" when in reality he was simply a victim of his own success. He made his teams look better than they were by far but all people wanted to talk about was a tactical decision made/not made.

But y'all got what you wanted - kudos. You 'held him accountable' for not winning a pennant with a team that should've won 80 games. For losing a game where we sent the corpse of Adam Wainwright out there against Max Scherzer and a Dodgers team that had Trae Turner playing 2b and who's 5th starter was Clayton Kershaw. Who had 7 regular's with an OPS over .830 and who ran 4 starters and 4 primary relievers with ERA all in the 2s or lower. What an absolute asshole he was for even having them tied against a far far FAR superior roster going into the 9th. Good job - you got him.

It's worked out great.

Like I said - y'all deserve Ollie.
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Molina quit on his club. Just flat left town for a month.

And great players like Pujols have always made lousy managers.
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Nobody has been fired yet, have they?
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Team was booed off the field last night. Never seen that before...
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Oh...and Shildt fucking sucks but it's a crime that MO fired him to try to save face for himself.

Mo is the villain here. Don't go to a game till he's gone.
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Cardinals were 53 games above .500 under Shildt with an offense that peaked at 19 during his time. The Cardinals went from one of the worst defensive teams in baseball under Matheny to the best under Shildt.

I was kind of hoping the Cubs would fire idiot David Ross to hire Shildt given the FO's focus on winning games through run prevention instead of actually getting good players.
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Man, it's almost like you could see this shit coming:


Or that the "Reyes Decision" hasn't been beaten to fucking death already when in all actuality he had ONE true alternative available in Kodi Whitley:



Or that many of y'all absolutely refused to spot the forest for the trees:





We had an excellent manager. We fired him for the wrong reasons. We kept the wrong people. Now this franchise is a joke.

But yeah - he called in Reyes once. And "regardless of past history, that's a fireable offense..."

Good fucking call, fellas. Keep doubling down on that temper tantrum you threw 2 years ago. It's yielded spectacular results.
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He'll never get a head job again I'd bet
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Fuck Shildt.
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Brilliant, as ever...
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He's never been able to marshal an argument of any sort in support of his dipshittery.

Marcellus and Hamas were just asshurt by a questionable decision but we've all been there before.

Pasta, on the other hand, was always dumb as a fucking hammer and has never really even attempted to establish otherwise.
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That whole game was mismanaged. He pulled Waino after 95 pitches when he had given up six baserunners in 5 1/3. He pulled Gallegos after 12 easy pitches, and after he pulled McFarland, he passed over Cabrera, who had 71 appearances that season for Reyes. And Taylor doesn't have a platoon split.

Yeah, the team won 18 straight games, but that's a statistical anomaly borne of sequencing, not wizardry. It's the same reason why they've never been able to recreate their 2013 production with RISP.

He won 90 games playing almost 60 of them against teams that weren't actively interested in winning.

Oddly once the shift was eliminated, the Cardinals' philosophy of pitching to contact has been exposed as anachronistic. And for all the hate towards Molina, he historically depressed ERA.

Is Marmol unfit to manage? Yeah. But the problem isn't Marmol and the solution isn't Shildt; the problem is ownership and the solution is making them care or making them sell.
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I don't think we really disagree on the ultimate solution though, and all this bickering is distracting from the real problem-- much like Cassel, Haley, Crennel, Tyson Jackson et. al weren't the real problem but a symptom of the broader disease.
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