It’s prognosticating season for the United Cardinal Bloggers and Baseball Bloggers Alliance, so it’s time to reveal our fearless predictions for the 2010 season. As for the standings, we consulted Neil Paine’s Marcel-projected standings, BaseballProjection’s Depth-chart standings and their starting-lineup standings and the PECOTA version. Here’s how we see things going* in the National League this year:

The Cardinals and Dodgers are pretty much consensus picks, and for good reason: They have two of the most balanced lineups in the league, and certainly in their respective divisions. The only competition that the Cardinals will have will be their own bodies, though the emergence of Jaime Garcia mitigates some of the injury risk among the starting pitching. Beyond the Cardinals in the Central, the second through fourth spots are going to see a lot of churn, with the Cubs, Brewers and Reds all fighting it out. In the East, a lot of people like the Braves this year, and though they have a meritorious case, we prefer the Phillies’ lineup and first two starters. After all, one team gained Roy Halladay and the other lost Javier Vazquez.

And for the junior circuit:

We know, we know: No one is picking the Mariners to win the West, especially after last week’s news on Cliff Lee, except maybe the statheads, which title we’d proudly accept. One things for sure: They’re going to have the best defense in baseball (John Dewan projects them to save more than twice as many runs as the next-best defensive team). Though they have some delicate pieces — Milton Bradley and Ken Griffey, Jr. — and batters who generate a lot of outs — Jose Lopez and Jack Wilson — their frontline starters are enough to keep them in a division of undistinguished teams.

*On principle, we don’t pick wild-card winners or World Series champions.

During spring training, small samples combine with objectives that are different from the regular season to fabricate statistics that are often misleading. Compound that by looking at stats that themselves have a lot of noise built in and you might as well be getting travel advice from a psychic. Take for instance the notion that the right side of the bullpen has been questionable this spring. With the not-insignificant exceptions of Ryan Franklin and Blake Hawksworth, who between them have struck out only four of the 52 batters they’ve faced, Jason Motte and Mitchell Boggs, the team’s main righthanded setup men, and Fernando Salas have been outstanding.

Of course, the naysayers about Boggs and Motte are looking only at their ERAs, which are 9.00 and 6.00, respectively. In spring, pitchers deal with all manner of abnormalities, such as wind or simply some inexperienced fielders behind them. Indeed, by our calculations, Boggs and Motte have been hard-bitten in the luck department, with unreasonably high BABIPs of .423 and .348. The point is that if you’re going to make judgments on spring stats, at least use some that the players have more control over, such as strikeout and walk rates. And in these, Motte, Boggs and Salas have excelled:

What makes this concern du jour worse is that the pitcher whose name is being bandied about as an outside chance at making the big club, Adam Ottavino, features ERA eye candy (1.93) built on an unsustainably low BABIP of .161. And his walk rate (4.82) and K/BB rate (1.40) are unworthy of a reliever role.

To be sure, spring strikeout rates may also be difficult to rely on; we noted yesterday how Brad Penny’s preseason work seems to correlate poorly with his regular-season performance. But, taken with these so-called “peripheral” pitching stats, these pitchers’ ERAs should at least be considered iffy, too, rather than grim prophecy that the team needs to find some replacements for their bullpen. As for Boggs and Motte, they appear to be just fine, if not in good shape for the season.

With the way that Brad Penny is pitching — surrendering seven runs in five innings Monday as his ERA ballooned to 7.98 — it may seem that the surging Jaime Garcia is trying not for the fifth spot in the rotation, but the fourth. But Penny assured observers that it’s all part of "getting your work in" and though he has had "some really bad springs before," when the season starts, "it’s a different game." Should we take him at his word?

Let’s go back to the spring of 2007, just before the best campaign of the righthander’s career, in which he posted 4.3 WAR, seventh in the league. Penny struggled with shoulder stiffness in the Dodgers’ camp, and in his second-to-last start that spring, he needed 80 pitches to get through four innings (five walks will do that), though he couldn’t "remember feeling better." Stats-wise, he wasn’t much improved in his final tuneup, striking out one and walking one in five innings. As Penny closed out spring training with the Dodgers, what was his ERA? Believe it or not, it was even worse than it stands now: 8.44. Yet, in the regular season, he would go on to put up a 3.63 FIP and face a career-high 865 batters (208 innings).

So maybe Penny knows what he’s talking about. So if the pitcher himself and Dave Duncan aren’t concerned, neither are we.

Steve Sommer from Play a Hard Nine posed one of the most intriguing questions of the UCB’s preseason roundtable Monday: Buying out a prospect’s arbitration years has become a trend among MLB clubs. Do you see the Cards taking a similar path with Colby? If so what kind of parameters do you have in mind?

We agreed with Justin Adams that buying out arbitration years for young players is a smart practice. And it’s not only for "budget-minded" teams, either: The Boston Red Sox extended Dustin Pedroia after the 2008 season, and the New York Mets extended the contracts of Jose Reyes and David Wright near the end of the 2006 campaign. And more recently, Ryan Braun, Dustin Pedroia and Mark Reynolds have traded lucre for certainty. The following table shows the date when those players, along with Grady Sizemore, Hanley Ramirez and Evan Longoria, signed their extensions, age at signing, career WAR in $ at signing and yearly contract amounts for the extensions (option years are in brackets):

*New contract replaced current year
^Bonus is factored into first year of new contract
#Depends on whether Braun is considered Super 2

The Cardinals themselves aren’t averse to buying out young players — Adam Wainwright signed a four-year, $15 million extension (which could grow to six years) after a mere two seasons — though they have yet to commit to as many guaranteed years as some of the clubs in the above table.

The nearest comp for Rasmus is probably the contract that Cleveland (small-market) gave to Grady Sizemore (centerfielder), who had only a year and a half under his belt and 6.4 WAR (when he signed what was essentially a seven-year, $33 million deal at the beginning of the 2006 season; Rasmus has 2.2 WAR ($21.2) so far but could come close to or eclipse Sizemore’s total by the end of 2010 — with a CHONE-projected 3.4, he would have a career 5.6 ($25.2) after this season — and would be about the same age as when Sizemore signed (23). Something slightly under that range would be appropriate for both the Cardinals, who can diversify their assets, and for Rasmus, who can’t (as JC Bradbury brilliantly articulated when describing the dynamics of club buyouts). For while Rasmus might offer the same toolset and value as Sizemore, he’s nowhere near the marketable commodity that Sizemore was when Cleveland locked him up. The reality is that Rasmus isn’t now, nor will be, the face of the Cardinals: That honor is held by Albert Pujols, at least for the next couple of years, and either him or Matt Holliday for several after that. The Cardinals should consider a five- or six-year contract with Rasmus at the end of this year, assuming he stays on course, perhaps for as much as $30 million. Here’s an example scenario for the end of the year, based simply on the average yearly values of the eight players in the above table and Rasmus hitting his CHONE projection:

If Rasmus stays healthy, the Cardinals would almost certainly get their money’s worth from their centerfielder on that schedule. It would probably make sense and be possible to go beyond a mere five-year extension and buy a second or even third of Rasmus’s free agency years. It would be a big deal for the Cardinals, but they’ve shown — by drafting and signing Rasmus in the first place, and by signing a free agent at the height of his bargaining power in Holliday — that they’re willing to go big these days.

In honor of that great missionary to Ireland, St. Patrick, we give you the all-time St. Louis Irish team, comprised of players who, according to Baseball-Reference, were born in Ireland and played at least one game for a professional St. Louis team. We confess that we cheated on one of them, but, in fairness, lad, only 43 Irish-born men have actually played in the major leagues.

Pitcher: Pete Daniels (County Cavan, Ireland)
Smiling Pete went eight years between appearances (talk about pitching on rest) and tossed 54 2/3 innings with the 1898 Browns (the Cardinal franchise).

Pitcher: Con Lucid (Dublin, Ireland)
Lucid threw 49 innings with the Browns (NL) in 1897. He ended his career in St. Louis and later, sadly, ended his own life.

Catcher: Jack O’Neill C/1B/OF (Galway, Ireland)
O’Neill caught only 280 games in his career, which began with the Cardinals in 1902. So his claim to fame was being traded with Hall of Famer Mordecai Brown to the Cubs. His 2nd most-similar batter is Pujols. Luis Pujols.

1B: Tony Mullane (Cork, Ireland)
Before Greg Harris and Pat Venditte, there was "The Apollo of the Box," Tony Mullane. Like Billy Wagner, Mullane injured his right arm and learned to throw lefthanded. He resumed throwing righthanded after his arm healed and would even alternate throwing from each side in the same game. Best known as a pitcher, he tossed 460 2/3 innings and played outfield, first base and second base for the Browns in 1883, then tried to sign with the St. Louis Maroons of the Union Association but the reserve clause prevented it.

2B: Hugh Daily (Ireland)
One-Arm Daily broke in as a 34-year-old rookie and once struck out 483 batters in a single season. But his "horrific, cuss-laden in-game outbursts towards the opposition, umpires, fans, and teammates" led to no team ever re-signing him for a second season. One of those teams was the St. Louis Maroons, for whom he pitched (and swore) in 1885. Playing with only one hand, he logged two games as a second baseman the year before and turned a double play as a shortstop.

3B: Paddy O’Connor (County Kerry, Ireland)
O’Connor mostly caught in his 83-game major-league career, but his one game at third base is enough for our team, as are his seven games for the Cardinals in 1914, when he posted a -23 OPS+. We didn’t even know that was possible.

SS: Brendan Ryan
His name is about as Irish as you can get, but alas, "The Flyin’ Irishman" hails from California. Tá bron orm!

OF: Patsy Donovan (Queenstown, Ireland)
With 8172 plate appearances in a 17-year career, Donovan is the most accomplished Irish hitter. As a Cardinal, the slap-hitting outfielder led the league with 45 stolen bases in 1900 and later became the team’s player-manager and baseball’s highest-paid player, with an $8,000 salary in 1902.

OF: Mike O’Neill (Maam, Ireland)
A lifelong Cardinal, O’Neill was was one of four brothers who played in the major leagues, including Jack (see above) and Paul (just kidding there). He was "a good-hitting pitcher who occasionally played in the left field" and is known (well, not by many) for hitting the first pinch grand slam in major league history, which happened to be an inside-the-parker. He also became the first National League pitcher to hit a grand slam in the 20th century.

OF: Sleeper Sullivan (Ireland)
The guy went by "Sleeper," and his given name was Thomas Jefferson Sullivan. His nickname was "Old Iron Hands." That alone is an impressive career. The former Maroon and Brownie outfielder-catcher-pitcher is buried at Calvary Cemetery in St. Louis, resting place of General William Tecumseh Sherman, Dred Scott and Tennessee Williams.