Bernie’s Redbird Review: The Cardinals Promoted Jordan Walker. So Why Is He Sitting On The Gosh-Dang Bench?

THE REDBIRD REVIEW

You may have noticed: the St. Louis Cardinals have a phlegmatic offense. This is a fancy way of saying they have a bad offense. I must use big words to keep myself entertained.

And of course you’ve noticed. This is hardly breaking news, or a problem that’s suddenly surfaced over the last 48 hours.

The affliction has been there all season. Actually, it’s been a problem for a long time. And parting ways with batting coach Jeff Albert didn’t solve the problem. He was the scapegoat, and it didn’t matter if he was fired or made a personal decision to move on.

Albert was a distraction. Firing him (or whatever) created another distraction, as the Cardinals changed the subject and tried to score cheap points with the fans. Look! We’re doing something! Are you happy now?

Um, no. Actually, it’s gotten worse. Over a two-season period, 2021 and 2022, the Cardinals ranked 11th in runs scored. But over the last two seasons, the Redbirds are 24th in runs scored.

This is what happens when two cornerstone players – Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado – get older and hit with reduced impact. This is what happens when a sequence of exciting young hitters get to the big leagues and stall out. Why is that? This is what happens when the front office overrates the team’s position-player roster and doesn’t make major changes. Many of the hitters who were swinging away for the Cardinals in 2023 are still hacking away here in 2024. This is what happens when your big offseason moves, offensively, were to sign Brandon Crawford (age 37) and Matt Carpenter (age 38) to serve as elder leaders and linchpins for the bench.

And some of the stuff going on – right now, in real time – is simply bewildering. The Cardinals demoted second-year outfielder Jordan Walker to Triple A Memphis early this season, giving him time to retool his hitting mechanics. The front office excitedly brought Jordan back to the big club after he’d generated a fusillade of offense against minor-league pitchers for a couple of weeks.

As I wrote, I believe it was the right move to summon Walker; he seemingly rejoined the Cardinals as a more confident and capable hitter. He seemed pumped to spark a dull offense. After a downturn, the young Walker was poised to restore his bright future. “JW” was still only 22 years old, and he’d put up above-average numbers as a rookie in 2023.

After hustling to Cincinnati, Walker was in the lineup for Monday’s game against left-handed starter Andrew Abbott and went 0 for 3 with a walk.

Then came Tuesday’s game, and Walker wasn’t in the lineup.

Then came Wednesday’s game, and Walker wasn’t in the lineup for a second consecutive day. In both cases Walker He because the Reds went with two right-handed starting pitchers. The ace-caliber talent Hunter Greene in the first game, and Emilio Pagan in the second contest.

Walker, of course, bats from the right side. But manager Oli Marmol wants to stack  the lineup with left-handed hitters against the consecutive Reds righties, and so Walker didn’t fit into the platoon-system plan.

This was wrong on several levels. It’s even more bizarre because Walker has been back for three games, and he’s been a spare part in two of them. We all know that the Cardinals do many, many baffling things. This icing of Jordan Walker may top  the list in 2024.

1. Has this organization completely lost its collective mind? The Cardinals welcomed Walker back to the majors with the idea of turning him into a part-time platoon bat? What? Seriously … what the hell?  If you’re going to promote Walker, then he must play and play a lot. Period. He can’t be sitting around eating sunflower seeds. And if the Cards weren’t committed to using Walker in a starting role, then he should have stayed in Memphis to gain more experience and get all the reps he wants and needs. He won’t get better against major-league pitching if he’s parked on the bench, right there with Brandon Crawford. Welcome back, Jordan! Just when you think this baseball operation and staff can’t get any crazier, here they are again, messing with another young outfielder. Please. Stop the madness.

2. Walker had success against Greene in the minors, going 4 for 7. Yes, that’s a tiny speck of a sample. But Marmol didn’t hesitate to go with a sliver-sized sample to justify starting the creaky Crawford in a recent game because the veteran infielder had good career numbers against the other team’s starting pitcher. But because Crawford’s numbers were so old and outdated, it made them absolutely irrelevant. Different standards for different players? Crawford is a one-year backup on the far, far downside of his career who doesn’t do much of anything. Walker was STL’s No. 1 prospect not too long ago – and again, he hit very well as a big-league rookie in 2023 – but evidently that doesn’t count for much. Bring him up, make him, sit. He’ll get better by … watching?

Oh, yeah and the Cardinals scored one run in Tuesday’s loss to the Reds, with Walker doing some spectating. Perhaps he’ll get a chance to pinch-hit Wednesday.

3. Here’s the nutty thing about this: Walker has been more effective against right-handed pitchers than lefties. I don’t want to bore you with a mountain of stats. I’ll just leave it at this: over the last two seasons, in the majors and the minors combined, Walker has a higher batting average, onbase percentage and slugging rate when facing right-handed pitchers. His stats vs. lefties are nothing special. They’re pretty mediocre..Gotta platoon!

Here we go again. The Cardinals and young outfielders. It just never ends. I wonder what Dylan Carlson is thinking about the loony-tunes going on in St. Louis as he takes he goes into his next game for Tampa Bay with a .353 onbase percentage, .483 slugging percentage, two homers, six RBIs and an .836 OPS after his his first 10 games since being traded to the Rays. You are free, Dylan Carlson. You are the lucky one.

BIRD BYTES

– The Cardinals have lost three in a row, scoring five total runs across 27 innings of at-bats. The Royals (Saturday) and Reds (Monday-Tuesday) outscored St. Louis 18-5. In the three straight defeats, the Cardinals batted .194, struck out 30 times, walked only six times, and left 28 men on base.

– The Cardinals are 12-18 since July 10 for a .400 winning percentage that ranks 14th in the National League and 27th overall over the last month of games. They also have a minus 23 run differential over the 30 games.

– St. Louis is 4-8 in August; the only NL team worse than that this month are the Pirates, who are a ghastly 1-10.

– The Cards are a disappointing 6-8 since acquiring starting pitcher Erick Fedde and outfielder Tommy Pham at the trade deadline.

– Fedde has a 5.63 ERA in three starts for the Cardinals. He’s allowed four home runs and a .500 slugging percentage. Fedde is fitting right in with a declining St. Louis rotation.

— In Fedde’s two road starts for the Cards, he’s been smashed for nine earned runs and four homers in 11 innings for a 7.36 ERA and an opponent slugging percentage of .605.

– The Cardinals (60-60) have returned to .500 for the first time since sitting at 37-37 after beating the Giants in Birmingham on June 20.

– The Cardinals, as we know, had a 33-18 record in 51 games from May 12 through July 8. But before and after that streak, their record is 27-42 for a .391 winning percentage.

– The Cards are averaging only 3.3 runs per game in August. Among the 30 MLB offenses, the Cardinals rank 24th this month in batting average, 25th in onbase percentage, 26th in slugging, and 28th in OPS.

– Another August note: the Cardinals are 30th with a .146 average and a .191 slug with runners in scoring position this month. And they are tied for last with 20 RBIs when batting with runners in position to score. And the Cardinals are the only major-league team that doesn’t have a home run this month in RISP situations.

– After dumping the Cardinals in two straight games, the Reds are only two games behind the second-place Redbirds in the NL Central standings. The first-place Brewers lost Tuesday and still lead the Cardinals by 7 and ½ games.

– Nolan Arenado delivered STL’s only run with a solo homer Tuesday. It was his 12th HR of the season. In his last 19 games, Arenado is batting .300 with a .471 slugging percentage and .827 OPS. And he has two doubles, two homers and 12 RBIs over that time. The third baseman is batting .340 since July 29.

– The Cardinals and Giants are both 3 and ½ games out of the NL’s third wild-card spot. And the Cardinals and Giants are 1 and ½ games behind the Mets, who are fourth in the wild-card safari. The Braves hold the third wild-card spot and lead the Mets by two.

– After getting slapped around by the Reds over the last two nights, the Cardinals have a 4.4 percent chance at winning the division, a 4.5% shot at claiming a wild card, and have an overall postseason probability of 8.9%. That’s according to the FanGraphs Playoff Odds. The esteemed Clay Davenport assesses STL’s postseason probability even lower at 7.2 percent.

– Over his last 19 games, Alec Burleson is batting .192 with a .241 onbase percentage and a weak .281 slug. The Cardinals need the big fella to get going again.

– The Cardinals had only four hits Tuesday and went 0 for 5 with runners in scoring position. Three times in this game Cardinals had a runner at third but each at-bat ended with strikeouts by Nolan Gorman, Burleson, and Willson Contreras.

– It was another rough game for Mister Gorman, who went 0 for 3 with two strikeouts. The nightmare stretch continues for the erstwhile left-swinging slugger. Since June 5, Norman has batted .172 with an anemic .299 slugging percentage and has stuck out in 40.4 percent of his plate appearances. Since June 5, Gorman has a ratio of 15.2 strikeouts for every home run during that time. But hey, at least gets to play!

Note: I have some appointments that I must tend to, but I will return later with my second column of the day.

Thanks for reading …

–Bernie

A 2023 inductee into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, Bernie has provided informed opinions and perspective on St. Louis sports through his columns, radio shows and podcasts since 1985.

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Stats used in my baseball columns are sourced from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, Statcast, StatHead, Baseball Savant, Baseball Prospectus, Brooks Baseball Net, and Sports Info Solutions unless otherwise noted.