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define "uncertainty"
Viva El Birdos — ... i asked (and answered) Five Questions About the Cardinals for the Hardball Times' series of preseason articles; it's up today. i turned in my copy just before the latest news o' the outfield broke, viz.:

Names and Numbers
Cardinals Diaspora — ... Lboros answers 5 Questions about the Cards over at the Hardball Times.

for the luvva jim lindeman
Viva El Birdos — ... but (and here's where my sympathy ends) all the "where's duncan?" talk wasn't really about duncan anyway; it was about the glaring void in the st louis outfield that has gone unfilled since reggie sanders and larry walker departed 18 months ago. of all the players the cardinals have trotted out in place of those two --- juan encarnacion, larry bigbie, hector luna, scott spiezio, john rodriguez, wilson, taguchi, schumaker, timo perez --- only one has come close to matching their offensive presence: chris duncan. as i noted elsewhere, st louis leftfielders not named duncan hit .258 / .326 / .375 last season, with 7 hr and 36 rbi in 516 plate appearances; centerfielders not named edmonds went .252 / .321 / .345 in 302 plate appearances, with 4 homers and 29 rbi. that's what this is about. it's about the acceptance of outfielders who hit worse than shortstops.

Game 16 Open Thread: April 20, 2007
Viva El Birdos — ... i think they're both half-right. pujols and rolen will come out of it; edmonds and speeze, i'm not so sure. speezer saved the cardinals last autumn, but before 2006 he'd topped the .800 ops mark only once in a 9-year career; all the projection instruments pegged him as a .250ish hitter with a .730ish OPS, and so far that looks about right. as for edmonds, he hasn't been himself since mid-2005, when his creaky shoulder (the same one he had surgery on this off-season) began bitching in earnest. of his 9 hits this year, 2 have been infield singles and 3 have gone the other way; his lone extra-base hit was a double slapped down the left-field line. jimmy has displayed no evidence this year that he can still pull the ball with power; it's early, and he got a late start, but if there's a reason to panic about the cardinals it's edmonds. "the fate of the st louis offense may rest in his hands," i wrote in my

confronting mortality
Viva El Birdos — ... nobody is confronting his baseball mortality quite as starkly as jimmy. i wrote at the beginning of the season that "the fate of the st. louis offense may well rest in [edmonds'] hands" (see the last sentence of question no 2), and so far its fate has indeed mirrored his fate. if it's up to edmonds to bail them out, the outlook ain't so bright. at sports illustrated yesterday, albert chen had

center pieces
Viva El Birdos — ... from the very young to the very old: i've been musing on jim edmonds lately. if the cardinals are gonna make any serious dent in last season's 100-run negative differential, edmonds will have to account for a big chunk of the runs. at the start of last season i wrote that the fate of the st louis offense might depend on his health; that wasn't necessarily an overstatement. for his first 100 or so plate appearances, which amounted to edmonds' spring training (he didn't get his first exhibition AB until march 25), he couldn't hit and the cards couldn't score. once he got ...

monday roundup
Viva El Birdos — ... 'nother Hardball Times item: i'll be writing the annual "5 Questions" article for the website again. i ask of the community: which 5 questions should i ask / answer for that article? take a look at last year's iteration, if'n you're not familiar w/ the trope. it strikes me that 5 questions aren't nearly enough for this year's cardinal team. just off the type o' me head: was ankiel a fluke? is rasmus ready? how much / how well will the injury reclamations be able to pitch this year? will they miss rolen's glove? how bad will the middle infield suck? who leads off? will youngsters ...