The Best NL Central Fans in Baseball 2020

cardinals front office has a great track record, but this willson thing is a colossal fuckup

apparently they think his framing sucks? statcast has him in the 35th percentile for framing, but also says that it's cost st. louis . . . zero runs. (knizner is somewhat better -- he's saved a run! -- although it's offset by his abysmal 32 wRC+.) fangraphs actually has contreras as a positive defender!

in any case, none of this should come as a surprise to the club, against whom contreras has played 95 games in his career. if he can't frame, why did you give him $85m? he's certainly not worth that much at any other position

kinda feel like this is the cardinals pitching staff throwing a tantrum because it lost its binkie yadi. pitchers and teams have been successful with far worse catchers than willson; maybe just pitch better instead of scapegoating the new guy

cubs won a World Series with willson

Athletic says:

The Cardinals — in what is being deemed a long-term strategy to improve both inefficiency behind the plate and an underperforming starting pitching staff — have moved Contreras to the designated hitter role, revoking his starting catching duties for the time being. Their initial plan included Contreras playing some in the outfield to keep his bat in the lineup. However, as of Sunday, the Cardinals have slightly reversed course.

“Obviously the Cardinals were used to one guy behind the plate for close to two decades,” Mozeliak said. “The nuances of that position, maybe very subtle, are what a lot of our pitchers were used to. What we were seeing was a lack of confidence. Normally, you would say, why didn’t you address this in spring training? But in spring training, it’s so different in terms of what people are trying to work on. Pitchers are going a couple of innings. It doesn’t really count.

“With this, we’ve noticed a lot of puzzling trends we know we need to fix. We know we need to address it. … We just decided to do it head on, put it out there. Do we think we’ve seen Willson catch his last game? No. But this is going to take a little time to get him to where we feel he understands the expectations of what this role is for us.”

last six games: rays/jays 37, pirates 7

Poor diplomacy from the Cards throwing Contreras under the bus. What has happened to these pirates?

Poor diplomacy from the Cards throwing Contreras under the bus. What has happened to these pirates?

Normally, you would say, why didn’t you address this in spring training? But in spring training, it’s so different in terms of what people are trying to work on. Pitchers are going a couple of innings. It doesn’t really count.

lol

it's nice to see it confirmed that six weeks of spring training is *so useless* that it can't even get pitchers and catchers 'on the same page'

xp the pirates are not actually good, that's all. but then neither is the rest of the NL Central

Reds don’t care, why should I care?

nl central should donate an extra playoff spot to the other 2 NL divisions

potentially we are just goofing this year

That is a very Cards excuse for sucking…Yadi’s gone like a neck tatted Yoda…hence we lose the force.

Cubs have just gone back to ‘we make far stacks whether we win or lose’.

...backup catcher andrew knizner, who is the worst hitter the cardinals have had since pete kozma...

Since getting the full-time job : 1.118 OPS/200 wRC+

totally sustainable right?

for a second, we all believed in pete kozma

i used to be a big knizner fan - he was projected as average defensively, an asset offensively. it was tough on his development to be a backup to yadi for 3 years. he spent a lot of that time in AAA playing everyday, though, and his projected + offense has always been very negative, and his defense isn't carson kelly level. ivan herrera is next in line, i expect him to take over the primary catcher position by 2024, maybe even later this year.

the contreras signing is a bad misstep if they don't keep him at catcher. the only possible way moving him off of catcher makes sense is if he truly is awful at gamecalling, and if that's the case, the cardinals need to keep up with the rest of mlb and figure out different ways to call the game. the rest of his defense is middling, which is fine -- they signed him to be average to below-average defensively, and well above average (for a catcher) offensively. that's exactly what he's done, so i don't understand destroying his value by making him a dh (blocking several equally good alternatives) and replacing his bat in the lineup with kozma

congrats to the pirates for reaching .500

usually this is a good thing! but instead they're on a 6-18 streak

nevertheless they're still only a game and a half back in the NL central! which is so bad yet notably better than the AL central

Reds are really trying pretty hard to get me to give a damn again.

Matt McLain looks like a goofball, but the dude is off to a nice start in the bigs.

I hate to say anything, as being a Reds fan has been like having a festering wound that won't heal right and itches like fxxx.

it isn't easy to start 20-8 and be under .500 on memorial day

Cubs 5 run lead over the cards in sunny London is just so gotdamn beautiful on Fox this afternoon, cheers!

wainwright is washed

Has been for a while, was only covered by that hot streak they had where they won a few games iirc