I thought you guys might like to hear a few things about the year 2015.  I won't bother you with how I'm  writing this from 2015, because i've got a lot to get to.   First a few non Cardinals related items.

    The world does not end in December, 2012.  Somehow, Glenn Beck seemed disappointed. 

     Face-book will is on the inevitable decline faced with competition from a new social network that saves you the trouble of finding real friends and instead picks your friends for you, and a small but dedicated group of boycotting activist upset with Mark Zucherberg's continued Promotion of Mel GIbson films.

     Charlie Sheen is running for governor of California next year.  Noticing his resume was filled with womanizing and drug abuse, he thought politics would be a natural fit for him.

On to Cardinal related notes:  

    Jeff Lunhow became General manager of the Cardinals after Johnny Mo resigned to pursue the position of commissioner of baseball.  Bud Selig was ousted due to the unpopularity of  his 17 tier playoff system in 2013 that scheduled the world series during spring training of 2014.

    Tony Larussa retired after the 2011 season, leaving behind a broken hearted Dave Duncan and a city which, never really cared for him anyways.  He was replaced by the patient  Ron (Pop) Warner who was anxious to show the world that he too, understands the rules of baseball.

    Dave Duncan stayed through the 2012 season, but wasn't quite the same.  His game plans were still simple and brilliant, but every now and again he would smile leading people to speculate Tony's absence had changed him.   Last year he briefly returned to the spot light after assaulting a juvenile with a broom for walking on his lawn.

     Albert Pujols left the cardinals via free agency, signing with the dark horse bidder San Fransisco Giants for an exorbitant 300 Million dollar 10 year contract.   Asked about the cost of the contract, Giant's General Manager Brian Sabean responded, "What a deal, he's like twice as good as Barry Zito."  

    The Cardinals fell into disarray after the 2011 season.  The revolving door in right field and first base became a magnet of criticism for the fans and the rotation was hampered by ill conceived contracts.   Chris Carpenter was allowed to leave  after his option was declined and quickly signed a two year deal with the Pirates.   He was the focal point of that teams worst to first story line as the pirates quickly became the best team in the NL.     

    But this year, 2015, is the team that is going to win it all.   Jeff Lunhow is a die hard grow em' and play em' GM and the excitement around this club is electric.  Here's a look at why.

     Cody Stanley is in his second year of the show.   His appearance as an athletic big league catcher was a relief to wary fans tired of watching Yadier Molina allow balls passed between his legs.  Yadi, once a highly regarded catcher,  was relegated to a back up role after a tattoo artist inflicted nerve damage to his neck that caused a severe loss of motor skills. 

    First base is filled with the unlikely acquisition this off season of 38 year old Carlos Beltran. The injury riddled Beltran,  who after signing an ill advised 4 year contract with the Red Sox,  was acquired by Luhnow for nearly forgotten relief pitcher Robert Stock.  The thinking goes that first base will allow him to stay healthy and productive this year.

   The Keystone is manned with the too gritty Dan Descalso.  Once criticized for being a fungible player, he cemented his way into the teams future after a cleat first slide into the side of Brandon Phillips face.   The twitter war that ensued earned Descalso a nice extension.

    Third base has been a revolving door for the last few seasons.   David Freese underwent surgery replacing both knees which inexplicably left his left shoulder damaged beyond repair.   Hero of the day Matt Carpenter was penciled into the starting role, despite never really being good enough, after a game winning triple clenched the wild card for the ailing 2012 Cardinals.  Zach Cox was pushed through the system and for a while stood at the hot corner.  He proves the Cardinals should not draft infielders from the Midwest for good.   However, optimism abounds about Third Sacker Jason Esposito.  After a June call up last year the defensively gifted Esposito drew comparisons from fans to a young Scott Rolen.   Once considered an overdraft, the  2011 first rounder hit .275/.363/.498 in the second half of last year.

     Shortstop is Luhnow's own Ryan Jackson, now in his third year of service.   UZR says he should have won a gold glove last year, but they keep giving that to tulo even though he has been slipping for years.

      Left field still has a giant head floating around.

     After the disaster of allowing Carpenter and Pujols to leave, Johnny Mo quickly signed Rasmus to an extension, Garcia and Wainwright followed.  Rasmus is very popular now  with the fans after the Cardinals insisted upon him taking a public speaking course at a local community college.

     Right field is manned by our very own TTO hitter Rainel Rosario, who after belting 15 home runs in the last two months of the season pushed Nick Swisher into a utility role.   We are all waiting on 22 year of Oscar Taveras, who dominated AAA last year and sits atop prospect charts to step in at the first sign of injury.

    The rotation is headlined by some familiar faces, including Adam Wainwright, Jamie Garcia, who is returning from injury, and Shelby "will rule the world one day" Miller.  Miller is something the Cardinals haven't had in a long time, a true homegrown ace.  After winning rookie of the year honors last year, many look for him to compete for the Cy Young award this year.     Deryk Hooker and Newly acquired reclamation project Scott Baker round out the rotation.

    The Bull pen is Headed by newly inaugurated closer Trevor Rosenthal.   He was excellent for us last year, and only expect more of the same.   BTW, Jason Motte is still learning a second pitch. 

   Anyways, I hope I haven't told you to much,  a little over a month into the season we're just all really excited about this years group of players, and want everyone to know that in the rough times of 2012-2014 there's a lot to look forward to.

Chris Perez easily takes the number 4 spot with 60% of the vote.

1. Colby Rasmus

2. Brett Wallace

3. Jason Motte

4. Chris Perez

BA kicked out their Top Ten today.

Somehow Jason Motte took 62% of the vote for the number three spot.

1. Colby Rasmus

2. Brett Wallace

3. Jason Motte

There's been a lot of good discusions about prospects over the last few days at various sites but unfortunately I don't have time to track down and link.

Here are the next ten candidates.  If there's someone else you think deserves it, say so in the comments, otherwise, vote for who you think is number 4.  Also, feel free to make a pitch for who you voted for, and maybe spark some discussion about the future of our beloved team in the off season.  Without further ado, the nominees for the Cardinals #4 prospect:

Brett Wallace easily takes over the number two spot with 80% of the vote. 

1.Colby Rasmus

2. Brett Wallace

Of course kevin Golstein released his Top 11 Today.

Five-Star Prospects
1. Colby Rasmus, CF
2. Brett Wallace, 3B
Four-Star Prospects
3. Chris Perez, RHP
4. Daryl Jones, LF
Three-Star Prospects
5. Jess Todd, RHP
6. Adam Reifer, RHP
7. Bryan Anderson, C
8. Jaime Garcia, RHP
9. Lance Lynn, RHP
10. Jason Motte, RHP
Two-Star Prospects
11. Niko Vasquez, SS

There is some diversity between the various list that have been released thus far, Goldsteins curveball could be Reifer at number 6 and the absense of David Freese. 

Under consideration for the third spot on our list will be Chris Perez and  jason Motte, who conveniently have been recently analyzed over at Beyond the Box Score. 

 Another prospect who will be getting some looks is Daryl Jones, who is somewhat overlooked with our outfield depth.   If it were a more glaring position of need, would we be more inclined to include him within the top tier of prospects?   Some have called him the best athlete in the system. 

Here are the next ten candidates.  If there's someone else you think deserves it, say so in the comments, otherwise, vote for who you think is number 3.  Also, feel free to make a pitch for who you voted for, and maybe spark some discussion about the future of our beloved team in the off season.  Without further ado, the nominees for the Cardinals #3 prospect:

Colby Rasmus Won the organizations top spot easily with 79% of the vote.  

Of course John Sickels posted his Cardinals Top 20+ list early this morning.   I really enjoy reading Sickels work, but his work shouldn't be considered absolute.   His 10 rankings are

1. Colby Rasmus

2. Brett Wallace

3. Chris Perez

4. Daryl Jones

5. Jess Todd

6. Jon Jay

7. Jason Motte

8. Bryan Anderson

9. Mitchell Boggs

10. Jaime Garcia

One thing that stands out is all of the top ten are within striking distance of the majors,at or above AA.   Track record is important to John, he has a preference for players close to the majors and generally ranks those higher than similar players farther away, although it barely seems applicable here.   Criteria can be a mix of many things including ultimate ceiling, players value, or likely hood of reaching the majors.

Prospect list season is in full swing and having a Viva El Birdos list would be a nice addition to the many other list currently available. 

Some of those existing list are Future Redbirds, Derrick Goold's Birdland and Scout.com's community List

Here are the first 10 prospects under consideration for the number 1 spot.  If there's someone else you think deserves it, say so in the comments, otherwise, vote for who you think is number 1.  Also, feel free to make a pitch for who you voted for, and maybe spark some discussion about the future of our beloved team in the offseason.  Without further ado, the nominees for the Cardinals #1 prospect:

i'm re-posting lboros' roster matrix for reference.   community question, who are the diamonds in the ruff of the 09 season.  those unappreciated, misused, unhealthy and generally unknown players that come out of nowhere every year to have a nice impact with their club?  think grant balfour, y. soria, carlos pena kind of production for a small investment.

Dear Diary, and good morning

i'm going to paint with broad strokes quickly to sell an idea and hear feedback from the knowledgeable VEB community.  Both jake peavy and johan santana could be shopped by their teams this winter.  Surprising, the expected return in players for both pitchers will be in the same general level of talent.  That surprises me because peavy has two years left on his contract while santana is in his walk year.  

so i begin to wonder what the difference between the two pitchers in actual wins would be.  using 2007 win shares percentage as a guide, their difference is negligible. Is it possible the idea that Santana is the greatest pitcher in the game adds another level of value on the free agent or trade market. will A-rod command his large contract because of the wins he brings to a team, or rather will the idea that he is the greatest player in the game command it.  

Do teams still over value players who are considered best at their position, or even players who have the best tools.  Does the idea carl crawford can steal bases so efficiently make him more of a commodity than he actually is?  

which brings me to the cardinals and yadier molina.  Molina has quickly attained the reputation that he is the premier defensive catcher in the game, and with good reason. nobody is denying that he is a great player, but is it possible that he is overrated? I took a look at win shares to get some tangible evidence to work with. the hard ball times has molina accountable for 11 win shares on the season, 7.5 are attributed to his fielding. That's not prorated, so we have to take into account the time he missed. So instead I'll use Win share percentage, .518.

where he falls in WSP for 2007

J Mauer        .922
J Posada      .853
C Snyder     .795
R Castro      .683
R Hernandez .546
Y. Molina      .518
G Zaun        .439
R Paulino     .398

obviously this is not an all inclusive list, but the 7.5 win shares through defense molina brought last season did not equate to him being an extremely valuable player in terms of win shares.  another thing that stands out to me is free agent R. Castro having a higher WSP than molina. It's a small sample size, and Castro is a borderline starting catcher. But the idea is, the win shares molina has can be overcome with a  relatively inexpensive catcher with marginal tools across the board.

 still with me?  If molina is only worth .518 WSP, and the market values him higher than his actual worth in wins, it's feasible that he could be replaced with little win cost behind the plate with a free agent pick up such as Castro. It's not trying to upgrade the catcher position, it's turning molina into player responsible for more wins because the market could overvalue his particular tool set.

Lets me use this in practice, theoretically of course. The Marlins, angels, mets and yankees Really want a defensive catcher. They want the best one in the game, so naturally, they turn to Molina. marlins win by trading J. hermida, cardinals in turn sign M Barrett, Castro or loduca and trade Duncan for pitching. The cardinals now have a better outfield, a starting pitcher or two of some caliber, and have lost only one or two win shares behind the plate, while adding app. 7 million in payroll.

Broad stroaks, Intentionally leaving out things like projection, I'm relying heavily on one Stat(never a good thing)could just be over estimating Molina's value on the trade market, and perhaps most importantly, completely underestimating the personal relationship molina has with his teammates and managers or his "intangibles".

in my constant attempt to think of ways to outsmart the market, I wonder if molina is worth more to the cardinals on or off the team?

finally, i'm curious as to what tools or skills readers think teams overvalue or undervalue in the current market.