LHR Samuel Freeman transferred from Palm Beach to Springfield.
LHR Kristhiam Linares placed on Palm Beach disabled list.
RHR Jorge Rondon transferred from extended spring training to Palm Beach.
RHR Yonathan Gonzalez transferred from extended spring training to Palm Beach.
RHR Pete Parise transferred from Springfield to Memphis.
Memphis activated C Brandon Yarbrough from the seven-day disabled list.
St. Louis optioned IF Brian Barden to Memphis.
St. Louis recalled RHP P.J. Walters (pictured) from Memphis.
Like all Cardinals transactions, these have been reflected on the Cardinals organization roster matrix.
Hey Brian
Walters back up and Barden down; okay this is a surprise. Not Barden going down of course because he’s earned that privilege. Is Walters suppose to be the new long man or are they going to start him in place of Thompson? I thought Hawksworth was the new long reliever.
Speaking of which, how would you have liked to be a rookie, less than a week in the majors and you’re thrown into a late game situation of bases loaded and one of baseball’s hottest hitters; Victor Martinez coming to the plate. Talk about separate the men from the boys. I wonder if he had to change his shorts after the game?
I have a question about Hawksworth’s first appearance. He was charged with four runs and I’m not sure why or at least if it was fair. He had one out, the batter hits to Tyler Greene who throwns it into the outfield. The official scoring was that the batter was not given a hit, but a fielder’s choice. Greene is charged with an error for the bad throw, but apparently it’s ruled the runner would have been safe at second. If Greene throws to first and puts it in the stands, it’s officially: batter reaches on an error. The next batter got out, so technically Hawksworth should have been out of the inning with only one earned run scoring. Next batter clocks a homer and bang there’s four runs. So why was he charged for four? Shouldn’t it be the same thing? The ironic thing is, if Greene throws to first possibility he makes only one error. By throwing to second (outfield) he really made two errors: one throwing and the other an error of judgement. Greene screws up royally and Hawksworth pays the price. It just doesn’t seem very fair to me.
IIRC, Greene threw home, trying to catch the runner (Stewart) who was going from third to home. His throw hit the runner and bounced into the seats. The official scorer evidently decided the runner may have been safe anyway; thus the FC but error allowed the other runners to move up.
I agree, though, the pitcher seemed to have been unduly charged those runs. OTOH, he did serve up the home run pitch to Barmes.
Nice to see Parise and Freeman earn a promotion. Parise was primarily a position player in college. A college senior sign who has done well in pro ball.
There has been an active flow of traffic between Palm Beach and Springfield. 8 promotions to AA are Curt Smith, Kozma, Big Matt Arburr, Nick Derba, pitchers Sanchez, Kulik, Kopp, and Freeman. Scott Gorgen could be next. Two in the other direction have been Mosquito Elvis and Linares.
With 8 promotions from Palm Beach, progress is being made at the A level. Some watched players have not had easy going – Reifer, Diapoules, Garceau, Castillo, Curtis, Pham, Bolivar, and at QC Vasquez, Edwards, Parejo, Ryde Rodriguez, Rosales, and Hooker. Nonetheless others have enjoyed better success, including Mulligan, Cutler, Sanchez, and Additon.
1. I think Lynn should be on that PB to AA list
2. Hawksworth debut had to be the toughest 4 earns runs a pitcher could get charged with – Q shot of a LH bat down the 3rd baseline under Greene’s glove for a double – infield single – runner reaches on FC – then a big blast. I actual have been impressed with Hawksworth – seems to have good movement of his FB and has a nice straight change – he fell of the prospect radar for me when his velocity never came back after all his shoulder problems – with the good change up he has you could see if he had that 94-85 FB with movement he had before injury why he was a top prospect.
Thanks for the clarification Dizzy Dean, I got the sketchy information from my son. Apparently, it was a little off, however, virtually the same scenario. My apologies to everyone who was wondering what the heck I was talking about. Yes, Barmes did hit the dinger, but my point is he shouldn’t have come to the plate to do it.
Vegas Jim, I’ll risk embarassment one more time. According to my son the ball that was hit for a double was outside, off the plate and was a good pitch on Hawksworth’s part. I’m glad to see he’s impressed you. He’s had some tough breaks over the years and let’s just hope he’s finally put it all together because I think he can help us out.
As I speak..er…type Brad Thompson has fashioned a tremendous performance against the Indians. And as usual Albert is carrying us again. It’s time we started to make up new superlatives for him. Everything else is being used up. How about ‘another hallist worthy game for Pujols!’ Okay, I know there’s got to be better, but it’s a start.
Jumbo, based on last year’s performances by our minor leaguers, don’t you find that the results this year have been really helter skelter. Niko Vasquez being the perfect example. Could anyone predict he would perform so poorly with the bat and especially the glove. What’s he got; 24 errors I think? Castellanos and Curtis have around 20 errors each. In fact QC must have the poorest quality field in the league or we need to switch glove suppliers. Anyway, I’m off topic. So many of our guys seem to have numbers way off their totals from last year.
Regarding surprising results year to year…..I believe in Vasquez as a hitter, based on what he did last year. Its still a big jump to the Midwest League. They play him most everyday and he might be helped to get a game or two off per week. On defense, not too much should be made of errors in A ball. Castellanos played 2B in college, so played out of position at 3B to help the team. Curtis played 3B in college, but is said not to have ideal arm strength for the position, so its to be expected he will make errors. SS is tough and Vasquez is going to make errors like other SSes. The errors could prey on anybody’s morale, why it would be nice to give him a few games off, so he does not get run down by the daily grind.
I guess none of the numbers surprise me too much. For instance, Pham did not dominate QC, so it would be hard to step up a level and do better. I can’t explain why Darryl Jones did that, but I would not hold it against Pham that the FSL is not easy. Or I would not expect Ryde Rodriquez to hit well this spring at QC; he ought to be assigned to Johnson City soon and if he does well, he can hit his way up to Batavia.
The closest I am to surprised is Reifer has struggled. He shows that what Mark Worrell and Luke Gregerson did at Palm Beach was not quite as easy as they made it look.
Lynn was overlooked. My intended subliminal point was even though the Palm Beach team has a losing record, it is pumping good players up to help Springfield have the best record in the Texas league. There are still positive things going on, behind losing records at the A level in the first half.
Hawksworth as a pitcher has some similarities with Anthony Reyes. Both have good changeups. Most pitchers do not get past a shoulder operation. It reflects well on Hawksworth that he rehabbed and soldiered on to become an effective pitcher at AAA. The Cards probably respect his hard work and rewarded him with a promotion.
Does anyone have any insight as to why Cutler was by-passed for a promo to PB and instead we activated Murphy and De La Cruz and sent them to PB. Cutler has earned a trip to Springfield in my opinion, so why is he being held back?
Darryl Jones got bumped up on flashes of talent and in hindsight you’d have to say Luhnow and the gang knew what they were doing. I said this right from the start that people were putting too much pressure on him by ranking him so high as a prospect when he was drafted on his athleticism and not necessarily his baseball skills. His primary sport of course was football. He spun his wheels for 3 years and when everyone dropped (or substantially lowered) him from their prospect rankings he took off. Now I can’t say for sure if there is any correlation, but there is evidence to support my theory. The expectation bar was unfairly too high for Jones, but fortunately for us, it’s working out great now.
De La Cruz is not ready for daily play in the Florida State League and the Cards know this. The role there must be part-time or of short duration. Yet he is strong defensively.
Cutler probably has something that needs improving as regards defense. If and when he can improve this, then he will be promoted to PB.
Folks who are Scout.com subs can listen to my discussion with Steve Dillard, QC manager, from last weekend. I asked him about Cutler. His bat is ready, but not his defense. Needs to improve release time. Looks to me to be a Steven Hill clone as Dillard said they are going to start to give Cutler some time at the corners, too.
Cutler was one of the most prolific hitters in California prep history. After his sophmore year, he was a Cape Cod League all star, but played in the OF. So he was well known to scouts and if he had been regarded as great defensively, he could have gone high in the draft, as just shown by the Cards 2nd round selection of Stock. Last year, the first round choice of the Astros was a left swinging catcher from the Bay area, Stanford catcher Castro (the Astro). His junior season, Cutler caught and also played OF. His hitting for a high average in the MWL is not a small n fluke. He has long been a fine hitter.
The Cards may be happy they were able to select 3 catchers in this week’s draft. Not only Stock, but a kid out of Puerto Rico (like Molina once was) and one who caught at baseball elite Pepperdine for two years, before moving to a Division II college this spring. Could be three guys with promising abilities.
Brevard County Manatees stole SEVEN bases off of Murphy today without one being caught. This was with 3 or 4 different pitchers. Are you telling me Cutler couldn’t have done better than that. Springfield has 2 catchers both learning the position at AA. I agree with you on De La Cruz, he just isn’t ready for that level.
I’m pretty sure Cutler understands it’s his defense holding him back, on the other hand he must be slightly discouraged seeing all the many promotions in the system this year; not all of which are earned but due to injury. Not to mention his backup (Murphy) gets promoted. That’s a bit embarassing. Work hard on your D Cutler, we’re all cheering for you to make it!!!
Personally, I think the vast amount of movement in our farm system this year has led to the recent instability where our teams are losing on a regular basis (1 win out of 16 games (?) in the last three days). I’m starting to become less of a fan of this rushing players instead of letting them develop first. It’s the organizations overall policy to be self sufficient that has this fast-tracking going on.
Speaking of catchers, did anyone notice that draft pick Matthew Adams is 6’3″, 245 lbs. This guys a linebacker!!! Pity the dumb-ass that tries to bowl him over at the plate. I’d love to see this guy play.
To clarify, no, I did not mean to imply that Cutler would have been less effective than Murphy. Please note that Cutler has been playing regularly at QC, the Cards are trying to work with him to improve his defensive skills. Murphy has gotten less playing time this year and is probably at Palm Beach because a little older than Cutler, signing last year as a college senior. While De la Cruz is not ready as a hitter to play regularly at Palm Beach, he is very good defensively, so is being given a short introd to a higher level; he will probably move to Batavia after that team opens.
Bang on Jumbo, De La Cruz has been sent down. Sorry man! I didn’t mean to imply you were implying that. I’m just trying to figure out the Cardinals logic on this one. I buy into your theory that they want him to get as much playing time as possible to improve his defense. We do seem to have a bit of a logjam of catchers in front of him.
DLC was training at Jupiter, FL. When a catcher was need at AA, the Cards sent up Derba. Vasquez must have had a short-term injury too. To fill the two roster slots, they called on a nearby guy, DLC, and elevated Cutler’s backup, Murphy. Now with the Batavia team forming, DLC is required there, while Vasquez may be able to play again. The proximity of Extended Spring Training to Palm Beach team makes it convenient to fill roster openings from Jupiter. They recently supplied two pitchers for PB out of EST.
DLC is strong defensively, so can serve anywhere. He just needs at bats to develop as a hitter and he will get these at Batavia.