The latest son to make a splash in St. Louis is Ed Spiezio’s kid, but let us first turn our attention first to the Cardinals’ Junior Senior, 2B Ernest Lee Spivey. Response to the move has been… well, oddly indifferent. Most of it centers around his injury history; Ray Mileur of the Birdhouse compares his at-bat total to JD Drew’s, which is apparently an insult although I’d certainly take 300 at-bats of all-star caliber hitting and defense, provided the Cardinals fill the space with Hector Luna instead of, say, anybody else.

File photo: Anybody Else dodges a baserunner to turn a double play.

But let’s keep in mind who the Cardinals have used to fill this space for the last three years. Coming into 2005, the Cardinals picked up Mark Grudzielanek; in hindsight, I panned the deal unfairly, because I was basing his defensive reputation on his spotty work at shortstop and I think subconsciously expressing my fear of spelling his name every day for a full season. In 2004, the odds-on favorite going in was Marlon Anderson until TONY WOMACK swooped in. And in 2003, the Cardinals trotted out incumbent Fernando Viña (recently sighted by U.S.S. Mariner) for one last campaign. Let’s see how Spivey compares to the other… workmanlike players brought in by management in the past. Starting with our good friend, Fernando.

It’s funny to think about, now, but because of the big part he played in the Cardinals turn-of-the-century post-McGwire resurgence, Viña was often thought of as part of the team “nucleus”, right up there with that Pujols kid and Jim Edmonds. (Although, even then, those brave pioneer Cardsbloggers were not pleased. Mike of The Daily Redbird(!) opined, coming up on three years ago, that he was no longer suited for the leadoff spot.) In any case, coming up on 2003 he had no reason at all to worry about job security; he was pretty well entrenched, and he even had sweet, sweet free agency on the horizon. His last three years had seen the second baseman, going on 34, in a marked decline that accelerated in 2002 (games and BA/OBP/SLG):

123 .300  .380  .398
154 .303  .357  .418
150 .270  .333  .338

By 2002, his once-sterling OBP had become league average, and his total lack of power suddenly became noticeable. Nevertheless, he had played 304 games over the two seasons leading up to ‘03, and there was no reason, save a Tatis-forged pessimism, to assume that he was going to do what he did: get hurt, suck it up over 61 games and get Wally Pipp’d by a career minor leaguer with cool hair. Depending on how legit his defense was, his decline and age concerns are offset by his perceived durability, and he’s pretty much as safe a bet as Spivey ‘06.

So, fast forward through 2003: Nando takes a ridiculous contract from Detroit, Miggy Cairo leaves out the back way, and the devil finds a loophole in Bo Hart’s contract. Walt Jocketty deals with it by first signing Marlon Anderson, a decent hitter with defensive issues. Deciding that wasn’t enough, he and La Russa get hopped up on life and hard liquor and, amidst a hard-fought game of Triple Play 97, perhaps, decide that the thing that ill-fated 2003 club was lacking, the one missing piece–was Tony Womack. (This led to quite possibly my favorite Cardsblog moment ever, in which Josh, now of the Birdwatch, guessed at their conversation:)

Jocketty is quoted as saying they’ve been talking about Womack all summer, and when I read that I imagined Tony and Walt in a room with a giant hookah blazed out of their skulls:

Tony: Wouldn’t it be cool to watch him run around? He’s so fast? Zip Zip Zip!
Walt: Like a water bug.
Tony: Waterbugs are cool, you know what would be cool? Fill the stadium with water get water bugs to play all your positions. The other team would have to swim, we’d win all 162 games.
Walt: Yeah, we should totally sign him.
Tony: Is there a rule against filling your stadium with water?
Walt: We’ll be invincible. Is Aquaman a free agent?

So we can thank Womack for that, and for his eventual inexplicable career year, but going into Spring Training this is what the Cardinals brought around to challenge Bo Hart:

147 .293  .337  .421  |  125 .266  .307  .345
145 .258  .315  .380  |  153 .271  .325  .353
145 .270  .328  .376  |  103 .226  .251  .307

… wow. Keep in mind, also, that both players dealt with defense on a strictly hypothetical basis, and it’s pretty obvious that the Cardinals have dealt with the keystone much better than they did in 2004. Even if Spivey misses most of the year, Hector Luna is almost certain to outplay both of these guys. Combined.

Ah, but 2005–here’s the rub. Grudzielanek, the name to end all names. He struggled mightily when with Los Angeles in 2001 and 2002, but his stint with the Cubs was solid and he, surprisingly enough, lived up to those numbers. So we have this:

150 .271  .301  .364
121 .314  .366  .416
 81 .307  .347  .432

Solid play, solid defense. Except… he was a 34-year-old second baseman who had missed two months of the last season with leg problems, not generally a good sign for middle infielders. But, if I remember, the cries of fragility or ineptitude weren’t nearly as shrill as they are for Spivey. And part of it’s justified; the guy’s played 120 games total over the last two years. But keep in mind that his major injury last year was both flukish and unlikely to linger, and as far as middle infielders go he’s a spring chicken by comparison.

The point of all this? Well, first off–what the heck were they thinking in 2004? My goodness. But, more importantly, the Cardinals haven’t had a non-question-mark at second base since the end of 2001… and even then the second sacker in question regressed significantly the next year. As far as gambles go, Spivey may be slightly more risky than Grudzielanek was, but the stakes aren’t as raised as people think.