The Cardinals announced Tuesday that they’ve selected the contract of righty Junior Fernandez from Triple-A Memphis and designated left-hander Adalberto Mejia for assignment in order to open a spot on the 40-man and 25-man rosters. St. Louis also announced that right-hander Mike Mayers cleared waivers and has been assigned outright to Memphis.
Mejia, 26, was claimed by the Cardinals just last week and made only three appearances before being cut loose by his third team this season. He allowed three runs on eight hits and a walk with two strikeouts over three innings in his short-lived St. Louis stint.
A former top 100 prospect who profiled as a fourth starter, Mejia never established himself with the Twins and has now bounced from Minnesota to Anaheim to St. Louis this season. He’s posted a 7.54 ERA in 22 2/3 innings, though he’s only a season removed from solid numbers as a starter with Minnesota’s Triple-A affiliate a season ago. Mejia, though, is out of minor league options, so any club to claim him would need to allow him to try to sort things out at the MLB level, as he can’t be sent down without first clearing waivers. He’s missed time due to blister, wrist, biceps and calf injuries dating back to 2017, so durability could be an issue as well.
As for the 22-year-old Fernandez, he’s soared through three minor league levels in 2019, posting an ERA of 1.55 or better at each stop. In all, he’s totaled 61 1/3 innings with a 1.47 ERA, 11.2 K/9, 4.3 BB/9 and, incredibly, no home runs allowed. He’s unlikely to have that type of success in limiting long balls in the Majors — particularly given the apparent changes to the ball in 2019 — but he’ll nonetheless give the Cards an intriguing jolt of youth in their relief corps.
Praying this works out for the Cards
Mejia smh
He’s got a great fastball. Whether or not he has anything else will remain to be seen. But I’m ready to see more young guns given the chance instead of trotting out the “proven” MLB players.
He’s always been a dominant high 90s sinker with a near peak Wacha type changeup. He never developed a breaking ball and had spotty control. He didn’t start missing bats until he was converted to relief work and he’s been truly dominant in every fashion since then at AA and AAA. He’s actually got more Ks than baserunners allowed at all levels this year, so he’s got a good chance of succeeding early.
I can’t believe someone didn’t take a chance on Mayers,,,glad he stayed…I don’t now though…im waiting on what nick stevens has to say lol jk nick
Mayers is hurt.
Can he hit?
He is a pitcher
Mejia would do well to accept a AAA assignment. the league needs to change the way options work in the next CBA. lacking options hurts a lot of guys withought them that sill arent established yet.
It’s tricky. You can’t just get rid of them because teams would be able to stash guys on the 40
They get 3-4 years to ‘establish’ themselves through options on top of years in the minor leagues. Mejia spent six years in the minors and has had 4 more opportunities in MLB. If you haven’t proven yourself by then, it’s probably not going to happen.
I’m a big Fernandez fan. Future closer
Seems like every day the future gets closer!
Who has the most appearances with different teams in one season? Mejia could realistically be at 5 or 6 by the time October roles around.
Pretty sure Bautista played for 5 or 6 his first year. Might have to look that up
Here’s a link to an article last season about Oliver Drake who (I think) set the record with 5 in a season.
nytimes.com/2018/08/20/sports/baseball/oliver-drak…
Confirmed by baseball almanac – baseball-almanac.com/recbooks/rb_ten1.shtml
Cardinals need to designate Wacha. He’s not in the future plans and has been terrible. Give the young guns a chance for the stretch run and just use openers like the Rays for the 5th rotation spot. Could go with Ponce, Helsley, Fernandez and mix and match with the bullpen. We just need to cover like 10 more starts until playoffs and then shorten the rotation to 3 or 4 anyways.
All this won’t matter though if we can’t stop being so streaky with the offense.
Cards aren’t going to make the playoffs. The rotation and offense aren’t good enough. Now, if Carpenter, Fowler, J. Martinez, Hudson, Ponce suddenly find a cure for their struggles then they can make it. But I don’t see it.
JMart and Munoz starting is the biggest farce I’ve ever seen. They’re both terrible and below replacement level. It’s a terrible indictment of Shildt that they’ve been playing over O’Neill, Bader, and even Lane Thomas. They don’t even have better bats and are light years worse on D. O’Neill should start in CF when he gets back because Fowler is also still bad in CF, especially when flanked by a baby giraffe on roller skates in RF. We’d be in 1st place if they’d just let the kids play in the OF. Edman can’t hit either, yet he’s a coach’s darling. Defense matters.
I say let’s cut ties with Mo and his pet Monkey ! The Dewitt’s have gonna fess up and let’s start all over ! Sure wish we could have keep Lugwin ( I know it’s misspelled) look at the Astros now !
It’s easy to say Luhnow is the savior of the Astros franchise and a huge genius and all of that, but look at how massive a tank job it took to get where they are now. They had three straight number one picks followed by a number two pick, and all of those picks sandwiched by a 5 and an 11.
I’m not saying the guy isn’t good at his job but let’s be realistic about this here. It’s a lot easier to win with that kind of star power from the start.
Not drafted by Luhnow in the tank job. Verlander, Cole, Reddick, Gurriel, Brantley, Osuna, Miley, Will Harris, Marisnick. Springer and Altuve drafted before Luhnow arrived. So there’s all that. Also, when you actually research his tenure there and how the team was built, you’ll find that he made awesome trades, FA acquisitions and International signings. Like most draft picks, most are busts. He had a few just like other teams. It’s how you View these guys and their progress that counts. When it’s time to sell, you sell. When it’s time to choose what guys are getting better and what guys getting worse, you choose. Unlike Mozeliak, Luhnow analyzes his talent much better than most. The Mozeliak over Luhnow decision by DeWitt will go down as the worst non-trade in history.
I agree, Lunhow has done a good job with what he has to work with. But he has had a lot to work with. Mozeliak also looked good early on and made some good trades to win a lot of games including the 11 WS. But people won’t know what Lunhow is really made of until the team runs into an aging core and the lower draft picks that come with success.
Every GM runs into that at some point in their careers and fans hate it. Look at Epstein and all the criticism he’s getting after saving the Cubs. Lunhow hasn’t had to deal with that, so the jury is still out on how he will react to that situation.
I’m not sure I understand your comment of, “Luhnow has done a good job with what he’s had to work with?” He’s the guy who dealt his own hand. He built what he’s working with. The 2017 WS champs had 37 of the 40 man roster that he brought in. Only guys there before he arrived were Springer, Altuve and Keuchel. In fact, Keuchel is a great example of him knowing not to give a contract to. Yes, he will need to make more tough decisions as these guys age, but so far, he has let guys walk, traded them etc that have mostly paid off. As far as Epstein goes. Both of them took over their roles after the 2011 season. It’s obvious Luhnow is way ahead of Epstein right now.
By the way, Luhnow was still in STL for the WS title year of 2011.
He was dealing from a stacked deck as soon as he took the job. They had five top five picks in a row including three number ones and a number two. Having those top picks allowed them to move lesser but still highly sought-after prospects for talent they needed, including a lot of the names you mentioned above.
Again, I’m not disagreeing that he’s done a good job, because he has. But he’s had fifteen extra buttons to push than pretty much anyone else in the league, a lot of current GMs would be looking really, really good if they had taken that job rather than Lunhow. When his core is older and the last five, six drafts have been high 20s, that’s when you really find out if he’s that much better than the rest of the GMs in the league.
You need to do your research.
He’ll eventually get claimed by a non-contender and stick. He’s starting to look like Wilmer Font 2.0
Another dumpster dive.
Tough break for Mejia. He had a cup of coffee for us against tough teams and got kicked to the curb. While guys like Mayers should have been released a couple of years ago and are still with the organization. Personally I would have rather seen them just DFA Wacha since he’s gone, better be gone, this off season. I have a feeling Mejia will be one of those guys that sticks with a team and we look back on and say damn too bad we didn’t keep him.
“RANDY A UP TODAY RANDY A UP TODAY RANDY A UP TODAY RANDY A UP TODAY“
Mo said on the radio this morning that there is nowhere to play him with Martinez, Ozuna, and Fowler. He is September expansion material right now.
He can replace Fowler and Martinez at any time as far as I care.
Whoever is running this site, do you care to explain this ridiculous warning that pops up? “Your comment is awaiting moderation.”