The 1960 St. Louis Cardinals

Here is the ignominious record, as tweeted by David Feldman:

Last team before #Athletics to be held to 3 or fewer hits in each of their first 2 games of a season: 1960 Cardinals

— David Feldman (@dfeldy) April 3, 2013

So, I thought I'd look at how the A's compare to those 1960 Cardinals. Information comes from none other than Baseball-Reference.

First, keep in mind that in that day, they played 154 game seasons. Here is their starting lineup:

Hal Smith, C

Bill White, 1B

Julian Javier, 2B (father of former A's player Stan Javier)

Daryl Spencer, SS

Ken Boyer, 3B

Stan Musial, LF

Curt Flood, CF

Joe Cunningham, RF

And the starters:

Larry Jackson

Ray Sadecki

Curt Simmons

Ernie Broglio

Ron Kline

With none other than Bob Gibson making 12 starts in his second season, and stinking up the joint with a 5.61 ERA, 5.0 BB/9, and 7.2 K/9. No wonder he was the sixth starter. There's hope for you yet, Dan Straily!

There are also some fantastic names on this team: Vinegar Bend Mizell. Two guys with the last name Bridges: Rocky and Marshall. The manager Solly Hemus. And our soon-to-be-retired friend, Tim McCarver, who was an 18-year old catcher getting his second cup of coffee in the last two months of the season, primarily as a late-inning defensive replacement. (Relatedly: who is the guy on the A's who is most likely to be a knowledgeable but unloved broadcaster 40 years from now? My vote would be for Josh Reddick.)

As far as comparisons to the current A's team, let's look at OPS+. Here is that lineup above with their associated OPS+:

Player	OPS+
Smith	56
White	107
Javier	62
Spencer	104
Boyer	143
Musial	121
Flood	74
Cunningham	99

Remember, they didn't have a DH back then, so here are the OPS+ for their starters: 31, 46, 16, 37, -24, and 4. Looks like pitchers couldn't hit 53 years ago, either.

Now, here is the lineup for the A's, and their 2012 OPS+:

Player	OPS+
John Jaso	144
Brandon Moss	160
Eric Sogard	32
Jed Lowrie	108
Josh Donaldson	89
Yoenis Cespedes	137
Coco Crisp	105
Josh Reddick	110
Jonny Gomes/Seth Smith	140/109

If you do the appropriate math, you can see that those Cardinals had an OPS+ 89, compared to last year's A's of 97. (Fine print: pitchers are not included in the OPS+ calculations from 1960, but DH's obviously are in 2012. So, the numbers might be closer in truth than they appear now.)

Where the Cardinals really got by was on the strength of their pitching. Here are the starters with their ERA+

Larry Jackson 117

Ray Sadecki 108

Curt Simmons 153

Ernie Broglio 148

Ron Kline 67

Suffice it to say, I'm not sure the A's rotation compares. Brett Anderson is the most likely character to achieve an ERA+ of greater than 130, but there would need to be significant steps forward from Parker, Milone, Griffin, or Straily in order for them to get to 130 ERA+ or greater.

If you squint, you can see the outline of some comparisons: those Cardinals needed good pitching to compete, and the A's will also need that. In total, the Cardinals had a 112 ERA+ in total, and last year's A's were at 114. Both teams were relatively light-hitting compared to their league. It'd be a stretch, if not a joke, though, to say the A's have two hall of famers on their roster right now.

I saved the best thing for last: those Cardinals finished with 86 wins and a .558 win percentage. In a 162 game season, that translates to about 90 wins. I think I'll take it.