Want more Se Young Lee? No problem.
Se Young had a lot to say in his column we published in the DI today. Here’s more of his MLB musings:
Cardinals’ woes
Boy, where to begin?
This team did not look too good even before the season began. Losing Carpenter has compounded their lack of pitching depth. While Braden Looper has pitched admirably so far, same cannot be said for Adam Wainwright, who has been awful in his past three starts partly due to his inability to avoid the Javier Vazquez Syndrome – looking fine for the first couple innings then having a complete meltdown around the 4th or 5th inning.
What is astounding is the struggles of the Cardinals lineup, which is second-to-last in runs scored in the National League and third worst in OPS at .670, .064 below the National League average so far. While Albert Pujols is quietly starting to climb back to his usual numbers, the fact that two of the five players leading the team in OPS are pitchers (Kip Wells, Adam Wainwright) bodes ill for this team. In fact, the only other regular starter with an OP over .800 aside from Pujols is Chris Duncan.
Will this club get better? Probably, assuming that Rolen will start hitting and the likes of Adam Kennedy and David Eckstein start their climb back to their usual mediocre averages. But barring a complete turnaround from the starting pitchers, it’s hard to see how this team’s going to even sniff the playoffs.
Runless in Chicago
Although most Sox fans fretted about the pitching staff in the offseason, the biggest problem for Ozzie’s squad has been a lot of terrible bats. In fact, the Sox are hitting about as well against their opposition as their opposition is hitting against them; Sox own the worst team batting average (.222) and the second-best batting average allowed (.227).