Gamethread CXV: Cardinals at Royals

Saturday evening game that starts at 6:00 central time... Brad Keller takes the mound...against the Cardinals. We did this, didn’t we? It didn’t go well, last time. I don’t have much faith it will this time, either.

If you want to read thoughts about this particular matchup...what’s the point? Brad Keller returned to being awful last week after a brief stretch of light. It’s anyone’s guess what he’ll do this week. Jon Lester is not the pitcher anyone remembers; he has a 5.57 ERA this season including allowing more runs than innings pitched since the Cardinals acquired him from the Nationals around the trade deadline. Hunter Dozier, Whit Merrifield, Carlos Santana, Andrew Benintendi, and Michael A. Taylor are all still in the lineup. Nicky Lopez got demoted back down to ninth after hitting very poorly in the two-hold. To be fair to Nicky, he hit poorly for the week before he got promoted, too.

The thing I keep thinking about as I prepare to watch this game tonight is just how many superstars from other teams the Cardinals always seem to be able to get their hands on at will. When I was a kid it was Mark McGwire, Jim Edmonds, Jason Isringhausen, Edgar Renteria, and Scott Rolen. Now it’s Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado. That is, of course, ignoring all of their homegrown stars such as Albert Pujols, Adam Wainwright, and Matt Carpenter. It just doesn’t seem fair that another team in a Missouri city should be able to find and pay all of that talent while we’re stuck with the shell of Carlos Santana and the corpse of Mike Minor.

Lineups