Original Draft Series – Team # 23 – St. Louis Cardinals

For those that missed the guidelines I am using for this series of posts, you can find them here.

Team #23: St. Louis Cardinals

General Managers(since 1994)

Walt Jocketty (1994-2007): 1117-968
John Mozeliak (2008-Current): 177-147

Team Performance

Playoffs			Division Finish
WC	League	Playoff App	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th
1	2	8	7	1	3	4	0

The Cardinals have clearly had quite a bit of success on the field, with 8 playoff appearances in 15 seasons, and the 2006 World Championship. GMs Walt Jocketty and John Mozeliak have been extremely productive, and have been aided by the help of manager Tony LaRussa and pitching coach Dave Duncan. All information is drawn from Baseball Reference.

Position	Name	Acquired	Years with Org.	Stats with Organization	Left?
C	Yadier Molina	2000 – 4th Rd	10	1 All Star Appearance, 2 Gold Gloves 730 gm, .267/.327/.361, 37 HR, 292 RBI, 19 SB, 203 R	Currently with Org.
1B	Albert Pujols	1999 – 13th Rd	11	2001 Rookie of the Year, 3 MVP Awards, 5 Silver Sluggers 8 All Star Appearances, 1 Gold Glove 1467 gm, .332/.427/.624, 381 HR, 1162 RBI, 67 SB, 1110 R	Currently with Org.
2B	Adam Kennedy	1997 – 1st Rd (20)	2 + 2	235 gm, .253/.300/.344, 6 HR, 70 RBI, 13 SB, 81 R	Traded to ANA – 3/23/00
3B	Placido Polanco	1994 – 19th Rd	8	489 gm, .296/.331/.385, 15 HR, 134 RBI, 22 SB, 218 R	Traded to STL – 7/29/02
SS	Jack Wilson	1998 – 9th Rd	2	No Major League Appearances with Org.	Traded to PIT – 7/29/00
LF	Rick Ankiel	1999 – 2nd Rd	10	342 gm, .251/.311/.452, 49 HR, 157 RBI, 7 SB, 155 R	Free Agency – 11/5/09
CF	Colby Rasmus	2005 – 1st Rd (28)	5	211 gm, .258/.329/.451, 29 HR, 86 RBI, 11 SB, 114 R	Currently with Org.
RF	J.D. Drew	1998 – 1st Rd (5)	5	597 gm, .282/.377/.498, 96 HR, 280 RBI, 59 SB, 355 R	Traded to ATL – 12/13/03
SP	Dan Haren	2001 – 2nd Rd	3	6-10, 4.85 ERA, 75 K, 39 BB, 118.2 IP, 1.416 WHIP	Traded to OAK – 12/18/04
SP	Jaime Garcia	2005 – 22nd Rd	5	7-4, 2.27 ERA, 74 K, 43 BB, 1.259 WHIP	Currently with Org.
SP	P.J. Walters	2006 – 11th Rd	4	1-0, 8.73 ERA, 24 K, 17 BB, 33 IP, 1.818 WHIP	Currently with Org.
SP	Anthony Reyes	2003 – 15th Rd	5	10-24, 5.38 ERA, 168 K, 84 BB, 220.2 IP, 1.350 WHIP	Traded to CLE – 7/26/08
SP	Clayton Mortensen	2007 – 1st Rd (36)	2	3 IP, 2 K, 1 BB, 2.00 WHIP	Traded to OAK – 7/24/09
RP	Mitchell Boggs	2005 – 5th Rd	5	6-7, 4.84 ERA, 79 K, 65 BB, 119 IP, 1.672 WHIP	Currently with Org.
RP	Chris Narveson	2000 – 2nd Rd	4 + 2	0-0, 4.82 ERA, 5 K, 5 BB, 9.1 IP, 1.179 WHIP	Traded to COL – 8/11/04
RP	Kyle McLellan	2002 – 25th Rd	8	6-13, 3.44 ERA, 139 K, 69 BB, 175.1 IP, 1.30 WHIP	Currently with Org.
RP	Jason Motte	2003 – 19th Rd	7	6-6, 3.54 ERA, 105 K, 36 BB, 96.2 IP, 1.221 WHIP	Currently with Org.
RP	Luke Gregerson	2006 – 28th Rd	3	No Major League Appearances with Org.	Traded to SD – 3/23/09
CL	Chris Perez	2006 – 1st Rd (42)	3	4-4, 3.72 ERA, 72 K, 37 BB, 65.1 IP, 1.347 WHIP	Traded to CLE – 6/27/09
BN	Daric Barton (1B)	2003 – 1st Rd (28)	1	No Major League Appearances with Org.	Traded to OAK – 12/18/04
BN	Skip Schumaker (2B)	2001 – 5th Rd	9	511 gm, .293/.349/.388, 16 HR, 119 RBI, 16 SB, 239 R	Currently with Org.
BN	Brendan Ryan (SS)	2003 – 7th Rd	7	334 gm, .268/.325/.365, 9 HR, 74 RBI, 32 SB, 133 R	Currently with Org.
BN	Tyler Greene (SS)	2005 – 1st Rd (30)	5	58 gm, .224/.273/.336, 12 R, 3 HR, 10 RBI, 4 SB	Currently with Org.
BN	Joe Mather (OF)	2001 – 3rd Rd	9	81 gm, .228/.282/.422, 8 HR, 20 RBI, 2 SB, 24 R	Currently with Org.
BN	Nick Stavinoha (OF)	2005 – 7th Rd	5	111 gm, .240/.262/.352, 4 HR, 27 RBI, 17 R	Currently with Org.

June Amateur Draft

The Cardinals have had quite a bit of success on the field in the last 15 seasons, and as a result they have not had a lot of early picks in the first round of the draft. In the 15 previous drafts (not including 2010), they have had 25 picks, with only 2 picks in the top 10 (J.D. Drew and Braden Looper). Overall, the first round has brought them some reasonable success, as they have drafted players like Matt Morris, J.D. Drew, and Colby Rasmus in the past. Clearly, the biggest victory of all draftees is the one taken in the 13th round of the 1999 draft, Mr. Albert Pujols. Unfortunately, beyond him, there has only been even 1 All-Star Appearance by any of these players while they were with the organization. 22nd round pick Jaime Garcia could change that this year, as he is having an excellent season so far. Overall, the Amateur draft has had some solid picks, but overall they haven’t done a whole lot with the draft.

International Free Agency

I was surprised to find that none of the players I selected were international free agents. Not a single one of them. Digging into Baseball America’s Top 10 prospects for the team, only 1 of the top 10 (Eduardo Sanchez) was signed out of an international market. The team does pretty well with their ability to find good professional free agents, so this has not really been a glaring miss to this point. At some point though, I would have to imagine that they are going to need to improve their scouting and development areas with regard to the international markets, as they are missing out on some talented players.

Overall Grade

C-. The Cardinals clearly are being carried by their best player, Albert Pujols. But if you take him out of the picture, you have a lot of players who have not done a whole lot with the Cardinals. And while they have traded quite a few of these players for key pieces to their success (Barton, Perez, Mortensen, Polanco), many of them didn’t really see any particular level of success with the Cardinals themselves.