After months of speculation, the St. Louis Cardinals locker room has finally blown up. Much has been made about the "unhappiness" of young slugging center fielder Colby Rasmus throughout the past couple of weeks, but everything came to a head in the locker room after Sunday's 4-2 defeat of the Cincinnati Reds.
According to Joe Strauss of stltoday.com and his report, this really is ugly.
But who is to blame? Is Colby just being a baby? Can he not handle the "spotlight"? Is he an immature brat that has been coddled by his loud-mouth father for all of these years? Maybe....
But I think this is bigger. LaRussa and Pujols have a bigger agenda.
They are deflecting attention away from the poor performance on the field and the lack of leadership in the dugout and in the clubhouse and directing everyone's attention to Rasmus.
Pure Genius.
I'm not defending Rasmus. The kid needs to grow up and get his head outside of Elton John's "%$@" and just go out there and play ball. He needs to get rid of his father, who is his own personal hitting coach. He needs to forget about hitting home runs and simply drive the ball the other way. He needs to use his speed on the bases better and show some determination and grit.
There is plenty more that Rasmus can do on the field and in the clubhouse to incrementally improve this team. He is part of the problem that the Cardinals sit 7 games behind the Cincinnati Reds.
But he is not the entire problem or close to it.
It was not Colby who chose to air this out in the media. Its not Colby who is throwing any one under the bus. That was Tony LaRussa. Once again, LaRussa has flexed his witty muscles and has allowed Rasmus to be the focal point and has used language to divert any personal blame and point it directly towards the 24 year old phenom.
"I think he's thinking probably the grass is not greener other places and that this is a good situation, a great organization, teammates, everything. That's what I think. You can ask him,"
"What do you want me to say? Ask Colby. Just ask Colby. He can handle it however he wants to handle it. He's capable of explaining himself and what he was thinking at the time."Tony has his law degree, so this certainly means he had to of gotten an A+ in Sarcasm 101. LaRussa brought attention to the entire situation out there for everybody, not Colby. Colby never admitted to the media directly that he requested a trade.
And the all-star Albert Pujols bit on Tony's gamesmanship, taking his manager's side, but worsening the problem by blaming Colby for making his request public, when in fact it was aired out by his Hall of Fame Manager.
"If you don't want to be a part of this, then you need to figure out another place to go play,"
“If you don’t want to be part of this great organization man, this is one of the special organizations that you want to play for. And if you don’t want to be a part of this, then you know what? You need to figure out a place to go and play.”
“I haven’t seen him but I’m going to say something to him. I don’t think this is something that should have got into the paper. This is something that should have been between him and the manager and the GM. Plus, he needs to get more years in the league before he says something like that and disrespects the players.
Strong words from the leader of the club, who hopefully finds out that LaRussa made this an event, not Rasmus. And maybe this may wake Pujols up, who clearly is trailing Joey Votto and even Carlos Gonzalez in the MVP voting and he is quickly losing ground in the race for the NL Triple Crown.
Which just proves that this club is just not focused. Between this, attending a Glenn Beck rally, and going 3-10 in a 13 game stretch in August against the Cubs, Pirates, Nationals, and Astros, I'm unsure what this team is really focused on.
But Rasmus has lost this battle. LaRussa has flexed his muscles and used his wit and power on the media once again to deflect the big picture on to Colby's little world.
Nobody is talking today about the fact the Cardinals are still 7 games back in the division race and with the exception of Matt Holliday and Chris Carpenter, looked lifeless in Sunday's victory.
Yes, Colby has been pretty brutal at times throughout the season and he is a reason this team is underachieving, but the leadership of a future Hall of Fame manager, perrential All-Star slugging first baseman, and Catcher who seems to be the back bone of the team is truly the failure.
Looks like we won't have to worry about Colby not being in the lineup next September against the division leader, because he won't be here.
a) you're overreacting
ReplyDeleteb) the one who started this is, again, Joe Strauss, who is known for turning nothing into drama
c) "he had to of gotten" - grammar is your friend
Appreciate the feedback and thanks for reading. Really enjoy hearing other perspectives.
ReplyDeletea) I'm not overreacting when the Cards are still 6 games back; manager needed to deflect the performance on the field to something else, which may turn out to be brilliant, and likely Rasmus to be shipped out
b) Joe Strauss did his job. He reported on what was happening in the club house, and he is the one of the only reporters in the STL market willing to stick his/her neck out
c) My grammar is admittedly bad, but I am working on it. Thanks for catching my mistake.