A Couple of Wounded Birds

I haven't been paying a ton of attention to the NFL this year. Enough to know Arizona is probably bad. They're 2-2, but both wins came over bad teams, and both required overtime to do it. The offense is the culprit, because they can't manage anything. The team is averaging 2.7 yards per carry. Palmer's already been sacked 17 times, and thrown 5 INTs. David Johnson hurt his wrist three quarters into the season, and probably won't play before Thanksgiving, if at all.

My feeling is the defense gets worn out. The offense can't stay on the field, or Palmer turns the ball over, and the defense is left holding the bag. Sounds a lot like 2010, 2012, any number of other years. The good news is, the Niners still aren't good, and Seattle can't protect Russell Wilson. The bad news is, the Rams made a tremendous leap forward by replacing Tom Selleck Mustache Double Jeff Fisher with a coach with an actual functioning brain. All 7 Rams' fans are thrilled.

On the baseball side, the Cardinals fucked around and lost a bunch of games the last week of the season, ensuring they would not make the playoffs. There's a segment of the fanbase that insists the team was a good, just unlucky, and there's no reason to tear the team down or panic. Which I suppose I can understand, but it's hard to believe when you watch them lose game after game from bullpen meltdowns, defensive incompetence and the ever popular baserunning idiocy.

I'm not sure what the path forward is. Lot of people stumping for Giancarlo Stanton. I guess it would depend on what the Cardinals have to give up, and how much money the Marlins are willing to eat. There's no way the Cards should take on the whole contract and send over much of consequence. Stanton's teammate Christian Yelich is another possibility, a much cheaper one, but not as likely to crush 50 HRs, if that's a thing that matters.

Is isn't so much that they have a glaring weakness - with the depth in their farm system they have enough people to try that someone will work out - but they can still stand to upgrade somewhere. The Team of Average Guys has its limitations.