With news of Adam Wainwright’s elbow injury and his impending Tommy John surgery, Dave Duncan has his work cut out for him to get a starting rotation ready for the 2011 season.
Duncan has been the pitching coach for manager Tony La Russa since 1983, when he took over as the pitching coach for the Chicago White Sox. Duncan has been with La Russa ever sense, with stints in Chicago as well as in Oakland and St. Louis.
In St. Louis, Duncan replaced Bob Gibson. Gibson was a Hall of Fame pitcher turned coach, as well as a local hero in St. Louis, where he led the Cardinals to World Series championships in 1964 and 1967.
So when La Russa took over as manager in St. Louis, Duncan knew he had big shoes to fill. He knew about pressure. In fact, Duncan is one of only a few pitching coaches that weren't pitchers themselves. Talk about pressure and criticism.
Duncan has been very successful. It’s no big secret that Duncan has been able to work his magic on MLB pitchers for years. He has even had a few Cy Young winners he has waved his magic wand on.
He will have to start waving that wand yet again in this 2011 season.
With Chris Carpenter and Wainwright, as well as Kyle Lohse, Jaime Garcia and Jake Westbrook, on the roster last season for the Cardinals, they carded the major leagues' lowest ERA at 3.50
In light of Wainwright's injury, Cardinals fans have to be concerned. After all, it wasn’t more than three seasons ago Carpenter was out with the same Tommy John surgery. Garcia and Westbrook also had the same surgery in August 2008.
Lohse underwent surgery on his forearm last year because of a compressed nerve, and in 2009 he was out with two forearm flexor problems, as well as leg and back maladies and a pulled groin.
So injuries have to be on the mind of Duncan as he scrambles to find a replacement for Wainwright with that all-important fifth starter.
The good thing for Duncan and the Cardinals is after having Tommy John surgery, players usually come back strong for years to come.
The question is, with three pitchers on the Cardinals staff having had Tommy John surgery, will they be able to put up numbers like last season now that Wainwright is headed for that same surgery?
Will they be strong enough? Results of the surgery say yes. They should be able to handle the pitching chores in St. Louis; however, they will be very careful with Carpenter and Westbrook, Lohse and Garcia for the rest of this spring training.
Dave Duncan is going to be responsible to work that magic wand he has on the rest of that rotation without the services of Wainwright. Will he find that special magic yet again? We will see in the season to come.
Then you have to ask, with Wainwright on the shelf for the rest of the season, will the Cardinals entertain trade offers for Albert Pujols?
Sonny Clark is also a writer for examiner.com. Check out his Dallas and local stuff at http://www.examiner.com/sports-in-garland/sonny-clark . He also does an online sports show called "The Couch Potato Sports Show" heard on BlogTalkRadio Monday and Thursdays at 7PM CST, as well as Saturday morning at 10AM CST. Click Here to go to the show page.
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