After watching the Cardinals and Braves compete for four games, it seems fitting that the series would be tied up 2-2. In three of the four games, the losing team had a win expectancy of at least 80% while in the fourth game, Cardinals ace Jack Flaherty allowed just a single run in the first inning before a homer in the seventh gave the Braves a 3-0 lead that proved too much for a mostly struggling Cardinals offense. In a series this close, the team that blows the lead will inevitably lament the moments they let the lead get away, but in Game 4, the Braves lost not because of a lead they relinquished, but because of a lead they failed to solidify. The Braves refused to put the Cardinals away, or alternatively, the Cardinals relievers came up big when they needed to, and now the teams head to Game 5 for a shot at the National League Championship Series.

Before we get to those blown chances, we should briefly discuss how the Braves got the lead in the first place. The Cardinals were limited to one run off Dallas Keuchel in the first game of the series as Keuchel went off-brand, throwing just 24 two-seam fastballs in his outing. Though Keuchel walked three and struck out none in four and two-thirds innings, he did enough to keep the Cardinals off balance and induced 10 groundball outs, plus two more outs on a double play, and the other two outs on liners. In the first inning of Game 4, Keuchel went back to relying heavily on the two-seamer, but the Cardinals laid off the pitch, even as a strike. Paul Goldschmidt took two sliders for balls, then a two-seamer for a 3-0 count. After a 3-0 sinker for a strike, he hit a changeup out of the park. Up next, Marcell Ozuna took a first-pitch sinker for a ball and then crushed an inside cutter to put the Cardinals ahead 2-0.

Atlanta got a run back in the third before Ozuna hit another homer in the fourth off a slider to give the Cardinals a 3-1 lead. Read the rest of this entry »

In a postseason already filled with great pitching performances, Adam Wainwright’s gem on Sunday afternoon was likely one of the most unexpected. He held the Braves scoreless over seven and two-thirds innings, allowing just six baserunners while striking out eight. If Carlos Martínez had been able to hold onto the slim margin he was handed in the ninth, the headline would have certainly featured the 38-year-old’s gutsy outing. But this latest start was just one more milestone in a career filled with postseason heroics.

2006 feels like a lifetime ago. Wainwright had just turned 25 and was pitching out of the bullpen for the Cardinals in his first full season in the majors. That was where his October legend began, on the road to the Cardinals first World Series win since 1982. The enduring image from that championship season is the final pitch of Game 5 (a cutter) but Wainwright’s crucible was Game 7 of the NLCS. Facing a bases-loaded situation in the ninth, Wainwright struck out Carlos Beltrán on three pitches, the last of which was a nasty curveball that Beltrán could only stare at.

Read the rest of this entry »

After narrowly escaping his ineffectiveness in Game 1, the Carlos Martinez Octobercoaster caused St. Louis to yack up a pivotal Game 3 at home, and cede a 2-to-1 NLDS series lead to the Atlanta Braves. A three-run Braves’ ninth on the back of three hits and two walks spoiled a timeless, if sometimes harrowing, 7.2 shutout innings from 38-year-old Cardinals starter Adam Wainwright, and sent 47,000 fans home in stunned silence.

Up until the twist, Planet of the Apes-y ending, St. Louis had maintained a loose grip on a 1-0 lead first captured on a second-inning Matt Carpenter sac fly, enabled by an earlier Marcell Ozuna double. Throughout the six innings that followed, the Cardinals survived several well-struck fly balls that momentarily stopped the collective heart of Busch Stadium, before they died at the warning track and fell harmlessly into the waiting glove of Dexter Fowler. A Ronald Acuña Jr. laser in the third (107 mph off the bat), a Nick Markakis golf shot (100 mph) in the fourth, and a hanging curveball to Matt Joyce (102.5 mph) in the seventh all amounted to nothing more than a few seconds of concern.

Then came the ninth inning. A leadoff double by Josh Donaldson (who was replaced at second base by human blur Billy Hamilton) immediately put the tying run in scoring position. Consecutive Martinez strikeouts forced Cardinals manager Mike Shildt to make a two-out decision. Either a) have Martinez face lefty-hitting catcher Brian McCann, or b) walk McCann so Martinez could face the right-handed Dansby Swanson, who had doubled off of Wainwright earlier in the game. Shildt chose to face Swanson, who obliterated a first-pitch hanging slider and tied the game on his second double. Adam Duvall followed with a less emphatic, but more significant, single that plated Rafael Ortega (who ran for McCann) and Swanson. Read the rest of this entry »

Nothing feels great with a 1-0 lead. Every hard hit pitch is a reminder that victory is fleeting. Nothing ever lasts. And everybody’s just waiting for you fail–including you.

Braves pitchers don’t have a long and storied history of 1-0 leads in the playoffs, but Mike Foltynewicz added to what legacy there is on Friday night with a performance that requires us to travel 18 years back in time to find a proper comparison, when the Braves went west to Houston for the 2001 NLDS.

After going up 1-0 in the series with a win in Game 1, Tom Glavine got the ball the next night. The Braves scored him a run on a double play in the third. That was it. Glavine wouldn’t sit on the bench as much as he’d bounce off it, having to so quickly return to the mound following another 1-2-3 frame from his offense. It was clear very quickly that he’d have to take care of the rest himself.

He pushed through eight innings; just him and his 1-0 lead. By the time he left the game, handing the ball to John Smoltz to get the save, they were both still intact.

“Nobody expects to win 1-0,” Glavine told reporters back then. “This is big. There’s no understanding it.”

That’s the last kind of pitching performance you want to be up against when you’re trying to win Game 2 of the NLDS, regardless of whether you’re the Astros in 2001 or the Cardinals this afternoon.

The Braves learned on Thursday that when Cardinals Devil Magic starts stirring, there’s not a whole lot more you can do but hope it at least leaves you your dignity. Their 7-6 loss at home in Game 1 put them in a hole. Fortunately for them, they had Mike Foltynewicz to pull them out of it. Read the rest of this entry »

Before or during Jack Flaherty’s start today, viewers are likely to hear about his 0.91 second half ERA. It is the third-lowest second-half ERA since 1920. The second-lowest second half ERA belongs to Greg Maddux, who accomplished the feat in the strike-shortened 1994 season and pitched barely more than 50 second-half innings. The first belongs to Jake Arrieta, whose 0.79 ERA in the second half in 2015 propelled him to the Cy Young award. Of course, ERA alone doesn’t tell the whole story. For one thing, as with Maddux, it doesn’t show how many innings are being thrown. For another, different eras produce vastly different run-scoring environments. Pitching with a juiced ball or juiced players can make life more difficult for pitchers, rendering a lower ERA even more impressive. To that end, we can put Flaherty’s second half in perspective.

The easiest way to do so here at FanGraphs is to use RA9-WAR, which takes runs allowed, innings, and the run environment into account. Flaherty’s second-half RA9-WAR was 6.4, way out in front of Jacob deGrom’s second-place 4.8 mark. If you cut Flaherty’s RA9-WAR in half, he would still rank ninth in baseball since the All-Star Break. We have second-half splits going back to 1974; here’s where Flaherty ranks among the couple-thousand qualified second-half pitchers:

Read the rest of this entry »

The early innings of Game 1 at SunTrust Park on Thursday evening — and for that matter, the late ones — served as a reminder that you can watch baseball all year long, and drill deep in analyzing and anticipating what might happen come the postseason, but sometimes, things simply unfold in ways that run counter to numbers and expectations. Depending upon where you sit, that’s the thrill and the agony of October baseball. For seven innings, the mistakes by a stellar Cardinals defense loomed large against the backdrop of a low-scoring affair, but then a late-inning slugfest produced nine of the game’s 13 runs against a pair of usually-solid bullpens. Ultimately, the Cardinals overcame a 3-1 deficit, scoring six unanswered runs in the final two frames and hanging on for a 7-6 victory.

In the regular season, the Cardinals made fewer errors than any other NL team (66), posted the league’s highest Ultimate Zone Rating (32.8), second-highest defensive efficiency rate (.706), and third-highest total of Defensive Runs Saved. That excellent work gave a pitching staff that produced a middling 4.27 FIP quite a leg up; the team’s 3.82 ERA ranked second in the league, and the 0.45 runs per nine gap between ERA and FIP was the majors’ largest. Without that defense — which Craig Edwards called the primary driver of their success just a few weeks ago — the Cardinals might well have wound up in the Wild Card game, or even outside the playoff picture instead of winning the division.

Meanwhile, a bullpen that lost closer Jordan Hicks to Tommy John surgery in late June wound up finding a silver lining in Carlos Martinez’s rotator cuff strain. As with last August, when he rehabbed his way back from a previous shoulder strain as a reliever, Martinez returned to the bullpen. He pitched very well if not dominant, posting a 3.05 ERA and 2.86 FIP while converting 24 of 27 save chances. He allowed just two home runs in 48.1 innings. On Thursday night, when it appeared the game was firmly in hand, he allowed two more and made things interesting. Read the rest of this entry »

Not only is the Cardinals’ division series roster filled with homegrown talent, the number three and four hitters in their lineup were acquired in successive offseasons for a total of seven prospects who all began their professional careers with the organization. The ability to develop talent in their farm system is a big reason why St. Louis has had 12 consecutive winning seasons, although they’re making their first playoff appearance since 2015.

Here’s how every member of the Cardinals’ 2019 NLDS roster was originally acquired. The team’s full RosterResource Depth Chart and Payroll pages are also available as a resource.

Homegrown (12)

• Yadier Molina, C: Drafted Fourth Round 2000
• Matt Carpenter, 3B: Drafted 13th Round 2009
• Carlos Martinez, RP: Amateur Free Agent (Dominican Republic) April 2010
• Kolten Wong, 2B: Drafted First Round (22) 2011
• Jack Flaherty, SP: Drafted First Round (34) 2014
• Daniel Ponce de Leon, RP: Drafted Ninth Round 2014
• Harrison Bader, CF: Drafted Third Round 2015
• Paul DeJong, SS: Drafted Fourth Round 2015
• Ryan Helsley, RP: Drafted Fifth Round 2015
• Dakota Hudson, SP: Drafted First Round (34) 2016
• Tommy Edman, INF/OF: Drafted Sixth Round 2016
• Randy Arozarena, OF: Amateur Free Agent (Cuba) July 2016

Total WAR: 23.0

Signed in Free Agency (4)

• Dexter Fowler, OF: December 2016 (CHC) — Signed to five-year, $82.5 million contract.
• Miles Mikolas, SP: December 2017 (Japan) — Signed to two-year, $15.5 million contract; signed four-year contract extension (2020-23) in February.
• Andrew Miller, RP: December 2018 (CLE) — Signed to two-year, $25 million contract ($12 million club option for 2021).
• Matt Wieters, C: February 2019 (WSN) — Signed to Minor League contract ($1.5 million salary).

Total WAR: 3.3

Acquired Via Trade (7)

• Adam Wainwright, SP: December 2003 (ATL) — Acquired in trade that sent J.D. Drew and Eli Marrero to the Braves.
• Jose Martinez, OF: May 2016 (KCR) — Acquired in trade that sent cash considerations to the Royals.
• Marcell Ozuna, OF: December 2017 (MIA) — Acquired in trade that sent Sandy Alcantara, Zac Gallen, Magneuris Sierra, and Daniel Castano to the Marlins.
• Yairo Muñoz, INF/OF: December 2017 (OAK) — Acquired in trade that sent Stephen Piscotty to the Athletics.
• Giovanny Gallegos, RP: July 2018 (NYY) — Acquired in trade that sent Luke Voit and international bonus slot money to the Yankees.
• Genesis Cabrera, RP: July 2018 (TBR) — Acquired in trade that sent Tommy Pham and international bonus slot money to the Rays.
• Paul Goldschmidt, 1B: December 2018 (ARI) — Acquired in trade that sent Carson Kelly, Luke Weaver, Andy Young, and 2019 competitive balance round B pick to the Diamondbacks.

Total WAR: 9.5

Acquired Off Waivers (1)

• Tyler Webb, RP: June 2018 (SDP)

Total WAR: 0.1

Acquired Via Rule 5 Draft Triple-A Phase (1)

• John Brebbia, RP: December 2015 (ARI)

Total WAR: 1.3

Please note, this posting contains multiple positions.

Position: Data Quality Engineer

Location: St. Louis

Summary of the background and skill set best suited to excel in this role:
The role of Data Quality Engineer will be to ensure data management (ETL) processes for the Cardinals’ testing and quality standards are met across existing and new data sources being ingested by the organization. This person will work closely with other members of the Baseball Development department to understand their data needs and incorporate them into the data management (ETL) processes. This role requires a detail-oriented mindset, analytical ability, an ability to work independently, and an interest in the game of baseball.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related technical field from an accredited college or university or equivalent work experience
• Candidates in school expecting to graduate Winter 2019 or Spring 2020 with work towards such degrees will also be considered
• Experience with end-to-end data testing and/or data analysis as well as knowledge of best practices and methodologies for data QA
• Demonstrated proficiency with SQL for creating/modifying queries
• Experience with JSON, CSV, XML and other data exchange formats
• Excellent organizational, interpersonal, verbal, and written communication skills
• Ability to work well in a fast-paced environment under deadlines in a changing environment
• Proven problem-solving skills and analytical ability

Preferred Qualifications:

• 1+ years of experience with software and/or data quality assurance
• Experience with Cloud data pipeline tooling and principles

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

Position: Data Engineer

Location: St. Louis

Summary of the background and skill set best suited to excel in this role:
The role of Data Engineer will be focused on supporting the data pipeline infrastructure that supplies the Baseball Development department with the data needed to make actionable insights in day-to-day operations. The person in this role will be responsible for maintaining the current data infrastructure and develop new innovative methods to deliver data to drive actionable business outcomes. This person should be detail oriented, analytically inclined, and have an interest in the game of baseball.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Mathematics or related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• Candidates in school expecting to graduate Winter 2019 or Spring 2020 with work towards such degrees will also be considered
• Experience with data processing software (such as Hadoop, Spark, Pig, Hive, Beam) and/or algorithms (MapReduce, Flume)
• Experience in writing software in one or more languages such as Python, Go, Java, C++ and/or JavaScript
• Demonstrated proficiency with SQL for creating/modifying queries
• Experience with JSON, CSV, XML and other data exchange formats
• Experience working with API endpoints (REST, oAuth2, CRUD, SOAP)

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience working with data warehouses, including architecture and design of infrastructure components, ETL/ELT processes, reporting/analytic tools and environments
• Experience working with big data, information retrieval, data mining or machine learning
• Experience with Cloud data pipeline tooling and principles

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

Position: Analytics Engineer

Location: St. Louis

Summary of the background and skill set best suited to excel in this role:
The role of Analytics Engineer will be focused on supporting the analytics pipeline that supplies the Baseball Development department with the data tools and processes needed to make actionable insights in day-to-day operations. The person in this role will be responsible for facilitating the analytics team members with the necessary components in their data modeling processes. This person should be detail orientated, analytically inclined, and have an interest in the game of baseball.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Mathematics or related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• Candidates in school expecting to graduate Winter 2019 or Spring 2020 with work towards such degrees will also be considered
• Experience working with big data, information retrieval, data mining or machine learning
• Experience working in Python and/or R
• Experience working in SQL and/or NoSQL

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with data processing software (such as Hadoop, Spark, Pig, Hive, Beam) and/or algorithms (MapReduce, Flume)
• Experience in one or more modern machine learning languages, such as TensorFlow, Caffe/Caffe2, PyTorch, Keras, MXNet, Scikit-Learn
• Experience with Cloud data pipeline tooling and principles

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

Position: Senior Data Scientist

Location: St. Louis

Summary of the background and skill set best suited to excel in this role:
The role of Senior Data Scientist is to conduct quantitative research aimed at developing/enhancing predictive, machine learning, and other quantitative models to help the Cardinals organization gain insights as well as make actionable decisions related to all aspects of baseball operations.

Minimum Qualifications:

• BS, MS, or PhD in an appropriate technology field (Computer Science, Statistics, Applied Math, Operations Research, etc.)
• 3-5+ years of experience with data science
• Expertise in R or Python
• Expertise in SQL
• Solid communication skills with demonstrated ability to explain complex technical issues to both technical and non-technical audiences
• Passion for baseball and strong intellectual curiosity

Preferred Qualifications:

• Proficient in a modern machine learning framework such as TensorFlow, Caffe/Caffe2, PyTorch, Keras, MXNet, Scikit-Learn
• Published research demonstrating clearly defined methodologies and use of technical abilities

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

Position: Application Developer

Location: St. Louis

Summary of the background and skill set best suited to excel in this role:
The role of Application Developer is to design, implement and maintain analytics and technical systems (Frontend & Backend) in collaboration with the Baseball Development department. These applications will be used by Baseball Operations personnel and field staff. This person should be detail oriented, intellectually curious, and have an interest in the game of baseball.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or equivalent practical experience
• 1-3+ years of experience as a software engineer, developer, or equivalent technical experience
• Proficiency working with one or more of the following: JavaScript (including MVC frameworks such as AngularJS, Angular, React, or Vue.js), Java, Python, Go, CSS or HTML
• Proficiency developing, securing and consuming REST / JSON APIs using modern server-side or client frameworks (such as Node.js, GraphQL, Angular, etc.)
• Experience with SQL

Preferred Qualifications:

• iOS and/or Android Mobile App development
• Familiarity with NoSQL
• Experience with cloud developer tooling

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

The content in this posting was created and provided solely by the St. Louis Cardinals.

After winning their respective divisions, the Atlanta Braves will face off against the St. Louis Cardinals starting on Thursday. This series looks evenly matched, with our Depth Charts projections (53%) and ZiPS (55%) both seeing the Braves as slight favorites. Before we get to the meat of the preview, let’s lay out the schedule. All games will be televised by TBS.

When and Where:

• Game 1: Thursday, October 3, 5:02 PM EST in Atlanta
• Game 2: Friday, October 4, 4:37 PM EST in Atlanta
• Game 3: Sunday, October 6, time TBD in St. Louis
• Game 4 (if necessary): Monday, October 7, time TBD in St. Louis
• Game 5 (if necessary): Wednesday, October 9, time TBD in Atlanta

What We’ll Be Watching For:

Injured Players
Ender Inciarte will remain out for this series, at least, after a hamstring injury struck him down in mid-August. Matt Joyce and Adam Duvall have platooned some with Inciarte out, though the Cardinals have no lefty starters, so the 35-year-old Joyce could play a big role in the series. He hasn’t shown a ton of power the last few years, but he’s walked 15% of the time against righties since the beginning of 2016 with a decently low 21% strikeout rate. Inciarte’s replacement in center actually meant an upgrade as Ronald Acuña Jr. took over, but the Braves’ star outfielder has injury concerns of his own; an apparent hip injury was classified as a groin strain and it is unclear how that injury might affect his superb baserunning or his defense in center field.

The health worries don’t end there for the Braves. Freddie Freeman has a bone spur in his right elbow, which he is still favoring, and though he played over the weekend, he struck out four times in 11 plate appearances and didn’t come up with an extra base hit. It was only the third three-game stretch all season during which Freeman struck out that often and didn’t get an extra base hit. All three stretches have come in the last six weeks. Every player is going to have sporadic, three-game down stretches, but given what we know about Freeman’s elbow, look for a lot of inside pitches to test whether the injury will continue to hobble the Braves’ first basemen. Josh Donaldson sat out the last game of the season after being hit on the hip with a pitch, but that injury appears less severe. Donaldson, Acuña, and Freeman have accounted for half of the 27.9 WAR accumulated by Braves’ position players this season (Ozzie Albies is the only other position player with more than 2.1 WAR); Atlanta would be a completely different team without that trio at full strength. Read the rest of this entry »

When he stepped off the mound after a dominant seven innings last Tuesday night, Jack Flaherty surely thought he’d thrown his last pitch of the regular season. The Cardinals led the Diamondbacks 1-0 and the Brewers by 3 1/2 games in the NL Central. A win that night would all but lock up the division; three games up in the loss column with five games left to play is a tough lead to cough up.

But it wasn’t to be. Andrew Miller gave up a tying home run in the ninth inning, the Cardinals ended up losing in nineteen (!!) innings, and the Brewers started to catch up. Saturday night, after a beatdown at the hands of the Cubs was matched by a Brewers loss in Colorado, leaving the Redbirds a game ahead in the standings, the Cardinals announced that Flaherty would start Sunday afternoon.

In the real world, the game was a breeze. Flaherty put together another strong outing, going seven scoreless and allowing only two hits, and the Cardinal offense came to life en route to an easy 9-0 victory. The Brewers, meanwhile, pulled their starters when a St. Louis victory became inevitable, eventually losing 4-3 in 13 innings.

But those are the results that actually happened, not the results that could have happened, and knowing what could happen is often more interesting than seeing the actual results. To that end, I was curious: did the gambit of starting your best pitcher in the regular season rather than saving him for a potential elimination game make sense? Let’s do the math.

To work out the cost and benefit of starting Flaherty, we need to work out the potential scenarios that follow a Flaherty start. First, there’s the world that actually occurred: the Cardinals win the NL Central and move on to face the Braves in the NLDS. In that situation, the cost of starting Flaherty in the last game of the regular season is low. He’ll start Game 2 of the series, and can start a potential Game 5 on regular rest. There’s almost no cost here; if Miles Mikolas had pitched yesterday instead, Flaherty would start Game 1 and Mikolas Game 2 instead of vice versa, and Flaherty would still start Game 5. Read the rest of this entry »