3B is a wasteland in FA past Rendon. The roster is too old and the farm too barren to try and thread the needle with him. They should have traded for and re-signed Donaldson when they had a chance last year. That extra 6 WAR and near 40 homers may have come in handy when needing to balance out the lineup.

Edman might be the best internal option, but he's more of a super utility guy.
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Can DeJong be a 3 win 3b and Edman a 2.5-3 win SS?

Seems like a tough ask for both of them, but not impossible. I really hate moving a guy down the defensive spectrum when he established that he can play credible SS, though. Paul has turned himself into a pretty damn valuable player there on defense alone.

Eh, maybe I don't dick with him. For as much heat as he took this season, he showed additional development in his approach. His BB has reached tolerable levels and his K rate declined as well. If he can sneak that BB rate to say 10% and get that K rate down just a tick more to say 21%, then normalize his BABIP to match some pretty good hard hit rates, he can have a hell of a nice offensive season. Sure would like to see him even out a bit but there's value in a guy who's white hot at times if the rest of the lineup isn't dependent on him.

So much of that offense comes down to the fact that Goldschmidt and Ozuna were acquired to be steady, consistent 3-4 hitters and pretty much never were. Both guys got intermittently hot but only for short periods and took WAY too many noncompetitive ABs in between. And of course Carpenter.

If your key guys are your key guys, then a guy like DeJong can be perfect in that he can carry the team for a few weeks. A guy like Bader can be hidden because his defense is just so damn good. But when you've got $70+ million or so plowed into Goldschmidt, Ozuna, Carpenter and Molina, let alone the additional $15 million or so in Fowler...well you just don't have a lot of rope left because those guys largely exhausted it through under-performing.
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That's my thing going forward, they're pretty much shoehorned into those guys being here again (minus maybe Ozuna). It's weird that they made it to the NLCS and next season feels pretty meh again.

I don't know what they could even do to bandaid it.
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Yeah, it just bugs the hell out of me to see guys like Bader and DeJong catch so much hell because the team was asking them to do things they never should've been asked to do.

Paul DeJong isn't a 2 or 3 hitter and never will be. But he could be a solid 6 hitter and a real damn good 7 hitter. Bader can be an electric and interesting 8th place hitter and dynamic CFer. Then if Carpenter, Fowler, Goldschmidt and Ozuna did what they were SUPPOSED to do at 1-4, you can even move DeJong up to 5 with Wong and Bader at 6,7 (Wong could be a lot like ER was for the 2004 team) and Molina re-setting things ahead of the pitcher at 8 (but with the bat control to make pitchers come after Bader a bit because Yadi can punish them if they don't; that's the major drawback with Bader 8 but it's alleviated somewhat by Yadi at 8 and Bader 7).

There were ways to make this personnel work together really really well.

But 1/2 of them simply didn't answer the bell. And - SURPRISE - they're all handsomely paid.

Because Moe just had to make 'em comfortable.

Moe's failure to bring in good hitters ended up exposing good players who are flawed but bring value in their own right. It subjected guys like DeJong and Bader to criticisms that aren't necessarily unfair, but are definitely over-emphasized. Those guys aren't the reason this team failed. The 'big bats' we imported and/or extended are. But the young guys, the easier marks, are taking heat from the fans.

Reminds me a lot of the shit Matheny used to do especially that season after they missed the playoffs the first time and flingding shows up to camp blaming the rookies (who were the only reason that team remained competitive for as long as it did). Point the fingers at the proper parties, IMO.
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I agree that Bader could be a real asset to the team.

I may not know the deep stats like you do but I got eyes. Bader isnt learning to lay off the slider in the dirt or outside. Or according to what I heard on several podcasts was refusing to change. He was the player who got Budda fired. He refused everything Albert brought over from the Astros. Bader wanted to do it like he’s always been doing it and let the chips fall where they may......two weeks later after flailing around, he was benched.

If Bader doesn’t adapt at the plate, with our shit offense, we can’t afford a defense first player that hits .200.
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Mozeliak and Girsch both get extensions

:-)
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They both deserve "Joe Dirt" extensions.
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Not a fan of Mo or Girsch getting extensions but am glad Shildt got one.
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They should both be fired and they get extensions. It's the fucking 90s Chiefs again. Fuck DeWitt in the neck.
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everyone knew this was coming. But, still.....:-)

doesnt matter what the fans think. Only Dewitt. Dewitt sees 3 million fans come in every year, he’s not making a change.

Dewitt's fat and happy with the two WS’s championships and competing each year. Chasing some miracle run with mostly scrappy over performing players like 2006/2011 instead of building an Astros/Yankees/Dodgers type of roster.
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The Yankees had a roster that cost over $200M, Dodgers over $170M, Astros over $165M. The Cards were at $147M.
I am sure there are other ways you meant this, but there is a lot of difference there.
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I do wonder if the “Cardinal way” thought process doesn’t make the Cardinals a little too inflexible in adjusting to changes in running a franchise.

It was great when they were ahead of the game.

Now that the playing field has leveled, are they positioned for finding the next edge?
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They announced a plan to revamp the analytics department, but if the leaders built the last faulty one, why trust them to do it right this time?
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Gross
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What a fucking joke. Yeah that playoff "run" sure fucked us in the long run
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