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Minor MLB Transactions: 9/12/21

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Some minor moves from around the league:

  • The Marlins have released left-hander Ross Detwiler, according to the MLB.com transactions page. Detwiler had been designated for assignment on Tuesday. The release is largely a formality, as Detwiler had the ability to reject an outright assignment. The 35-year-old will now see if there are any offers available for him on the open market. He would not be eligible to appear in the playoffs with any new club, since it is after the August 31st deadline. But he could potentially help a team absorb some innings down the stretch. In 45 1/3 innings this year, he has an elevated ERA of 4.96. However, his 28% strikeout rate is a career high, though that’s also come with a career-low ground ball rate of 39.7%.
  • The Cardinals reinstated minor-league righty Johan Quezada from the 60-day injured list, according to a team announcement. Right-hander Junior Fernandez is going the other direction, landing himself on the 60-day injured list, according to Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat. Quezada was acquired from the Phillies in the offseason but hasn’t been able to pitch much this year due to injuries. The 27-year-old has thrown 16 2/3 innings between the Florida Complex League and Double-A. As for Fernandez, this IL placement will end his season. He racked up a lot of mileage shuttling between Triple-A and MLB this year, being recalled and optioned five times. He’ll finish the season with an ERA of 5.66 over 20 2/3 innings in the big leagues, along with identical strikeout and walk rates of 15.5%. In 14 1/3 Triple-A innings, his ERA is higher, 6.28, but with much better strikeout and walk rates of 33.3% and 7.6%, respectively.

NL Central Notes: Cardinals, Lester, Flaherty, Pirates, Brault

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Jon Lester is one of the most decorated active players in Major League Baseball, but his career could be nearing its end, per MLB.com’s Jeff Jones (via Twitter). Lester was evasive when asked about potentially returning to the Cardinals in 2022, implying that he could even consider hanging up his spikes. The five-time All-Star and three-time World Series champion has 198 career wins and a 3.65 ERA/3.77 FIP in 2,218 innings across 16 seasons, but he’s been little more than a back-end starter for the past three seasons for the Cubs, Nationals, and Cardinals. The 37-year-old southpaw has a 4.75 ERA/5.41 FIP in 119 1/3 innings this year.

  • In other Cardinals news, Jack Flaherty’s status remains up in the air as he tries to make his way back to the Majors before the end of the season. If he does make it back, it’s likely to be in a relief role, per The Athletic’s Katie Woo (via Twitter). That’s been the story for some time now, though it’s especially true as time runs out on the 2021 season. The Triple-A season runs longer than usual this year, Woo notes, which does give Flaherty slightly more time for a rehab assignment, should he be ready.
  • Steven Brault left his start yesterday after just two innings due to what’s being described as “tightness” in his throwing ar, per Mike Persak of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (via Twitter). The 29-year-old has made just seven starts on the year with a 5.86 ERA/4.60 FIP in 27 2/3 innings.

Should The Cardinals Reunite With Albert Pujols?

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The idea of Albert Pujols playing one final season in a Cardinals uniform always seemed a bit fanciful, considering that Paul Goldschmidt now occupies first base in St. Louis, and that Pujols’ dropoff in production created doubt that he would even play beyond the 2021 season.  However, Pujols has had a bit of a revival as a specialist against left-handed pitching, crushing southpaws to the tune of a .302/.336/.635 slash line and 13 home runs over 134 plate appearances this season.

As Benjamin Hochman of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch writes, signing Pujols in 2022 has some baseball value to a Cardinals team that may have a DH spot to work with in next year’s lineup.  That is on top of the natural symbolism of bringing Pujols back for what would be his 22nd — and quite possibly final — MLB season in what Yadier Molina has already announced will be his own final season.  If Adam Wainwright also re-signs with the team and decides to hang it up next winter (which is no sure thing given how well Wainwright continues to pitch), the 2022 season will carry a storybook feel for an entire era of Cardinals baseball, as well as a renewed charge towards another title.

Wade LeBlanc To Undergo Elbow Procedure

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The Cardinals have shut left-hander Wade LeBlanc down for the remainder of the season, manager Mike Shildt announced to reporters Thursday (Twitter link via Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat). He’s expected to undergo some type of procedure to address the elbow pain that has sidelined him, though Shildt was not able to provide specifics. Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch tweets that LeBlanc is still exploring options. Shildt noted that LeBlanc, a pending free agent, is expected to be ready for Spring Training.

Originally signed back in June with the rotation in shambles, LeBlanc was viewed as little more than a flier on a veteran stopgap at the time. However, he emerged as much more than that, not only providing steady innings but giving the Cardinals his best work since the 2018 season.

LeBlanc, 37, appeared in a dozen games for St. Louis — four relief outings and eight starts — and put together 42 1/3 innings of 3.61 ERA ball. A middling 12.2 percent strikeout rate and 8.5 percent walk rate didn’t inspire much confidence in his ability to sustain that pace, but the innings he provided are in the books and came at a desperately needed time for the Cards.

Shaky strikeout-to-walk profile notwithstanding, LeBlanc’s solid showing in St. Louis ought to earn him another opportunity in 2022, even with some uncertainty regarding his health. An exact timeline on his recovery won’t be known until LeBlanc and the doctors he’s consulting pin down the extent of the procedure he’ll need, but if he’s expected to be ready come Spring Training, it’s easy to envision multiple clubs showing interest on a minor league pact. He’d be a fine depth option for the Cardinals in that regard, and he’s clearly already made a nice impression on the organization.

With LeBlanc out for the remainder of the season and Jack Flaherty again on the shelf with a shoulder strain, the Cardinals will continue relying on Adam Wainwright, Miles Mikolas, Jon Lester and J.A. Happ atop the rotation. Lefty Kwang Hyun Kim and right-handers Jake Woodford and Daniel Ponce de Leon are among the other options to start games down the stretch for a Cardinals club that is buried in the NL Central but sits just three and a half games back of the second Wild Card spot in the National League.

Adam Wainwright Intends To Pitch In 2022

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The Cardinals have gotten fantastic work from Adam Wainwright for the bulk of his career, and that’s again been the case in 2021. Despite having just turned 40 years old, the veteran right-hander has been one of the better pitchers in the National League. With no signs of diminishing effectiveness, Wainwright intends to return for the 2022 season, he tells Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat (Twitter link).

Wainwright was a multi-time All-Star and Cy Young award contender at his peak from 2009-14, but he looked to have lost some effectiveness in the immediate aftermath of an April 2015 Achilles tear. The veteran had his worst four seasons from 2016-19, looking as if he’d settled in as more a competent back-of-the-rotation arm than the ace-caliber hurler he’d been earlier in his career.

That changed last season, when Wainwright posted a 3.15 ERA over 65 2/3 innings. Because of the truncated nature of the 2020 campaign, it seemed easy to write that level of performance off as a sample size blip and expect Wainwright to return to something closer to the cumulative 4.58 ERA he’d managed over the prior four seasons. Even the Cardinals seemed a bit apprehensive about buying completely into Wainwright’s 2020 resurgence, as he re-signed on a lower-cost $8MM guarantee last winter.

It’s impossible to dismiss Wainwright now, though, as he’s been excellent over a full season’s worth of work. He owns a 2.91 ERA across 176 innings, the sixteenth-lowest mark among the 104 pitchers with 100+ innings pitched. Wainwright’s 22.6% strikeout rate and 6.1% walk percentage aren’t far off his best marks in those regards, and he’s induced ground-balls at a solid 46.8% clip. While he doesn’t have overpowering raw stuff, Wainwright has generally succeeded at avoiding damaging contact with pinpoint command of his sinker and more liberal usage of his signature curveball, as Ben Clemens of FanGraphs recently explored.

Wainwright is again scheduled to reach free agency this offseason, although it’s hard to envision him landing anywhere other than St. Louis. Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported last week that the club intended to present a one-year extension offer to Wainwright in the near future. And after bringing back franchise catcher Yadier Molina for one final run in 2022, it stands to reason the St. Louis front office is equally motivated to work out an agreement to keep Wainwright in the fold for the seventeenth consecutive season.

Cardinals Designate Brandon Dickson For Assignment

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The Cardinals announced Monday that they’ve designated right-hander Brandon Dickson for assignment in order to open a spot on the roster for lefty Andrew Miller, who has been reinstated from the 10-day injured list.

It was a brief big league return for Dickson, who was selected to the Cardinals’ roster last week and made his first Major League appearance since 2012. The Cardinals are the only Major League organization Dickson has ever known, but he was away from the club for nearly a decade, as he spent the 2013-20 seasons pitching for the Orix Buffaloes in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball. He also won a Silver Medal pitching for Team USA in the Olympics earlier this summer.

Dickson, 36, pitched a total of two innings with the Cards in his return effort and has only 16 2/3 Major League innings to his name. He has a solid 3.72 ERA in parts of four career seasons in Triple-A and was a rock-solid arm in Japan, pitching to a combined 3.32 earned run average in just shy of 900 innings with the Buffaloes, for whom he started 94 games and also made 121 relief appearances. The Cardinals can now either place Dickson on outright waivers or release him within the next few days.

Latest On Flaherty, Hudson

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  • Cardinals manager Mike Shildt told The Athletic’s Katie Woo and other reporters that Jack Flaherty will take the “huge step” of beginning to play catch within the next day or two.  Flaherty’s season seemed to be in jeopardy when he was placed on the IL on August 25 due to a shoulder strain, though there is some optimism that the right-hander may be able to return as either a reliever or as a piggyback starter.  In other Cardinals pitching news, Shildt said that Dakota Hudson will throw at least three more rehab starts as the righty continues to work his way back from Tommy John surgery.  The timing will be somewhat tight, but there is some hope that Hudson can return to a big league mound this season, which would mark a tremendous recovery considering that Hudson underwent his surgery in late September 2020.

Cardinals Notes: Wainwright, Flaherty, Fernandez

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The Cardinals just keep playing the Cardinal Way. They haven’t been as good as the Brewers, as dramatic as the Cubs, or as divisive as the Reds, but after trouncing Milwaukee last night, the Cardinals are just 1.5 games out of the second wild card spot. It was a familiar pair leading the way as Adam Wainwright and Yadier Molina synced up as the starting battery for the 300th time. They are now the fourth most-prolific duo of all-time, and if they make 25 more starts together, they’ll be at the top of the all-time list.

Unsurprisingly, the Cardinals are planning a one-year extension offer for their longtime ace, whenever he’s ready, writes Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Molina is already locked in for 2022 — his final season before retirement. There are not sufficient superlatives to quantify Wainwright’s standing in baseball, but even isolating his contributions this year, he’s one of the most reliable starters in the game: 27 starts, 176 innings, 2.91 ERA, 3.6 fWAR. The 40-year-old amazingly ranks third in the Majors in innings pitched, behind only Zack Wheeler and Walker Buehler.

In terms of the Cardinals’ other ace, Jack Flaherty could return this season in a bullpen/piggyback role, notes Goold. Just a few weeks ago it seemed that the prudent call would be to shut Flaherty down for the year, but with a wild card spot very much in play, Flaherty could still make an impact. An oblique injury put Flaherty on the 60-day injured list earlier, but after a brief return, he went back on the shelf with a shoulder strain. His return could be a huge boon to the Cardinals in September if he’s able to come back firing on all cylinders.

Junior Fernandez, however, has been shut down for the year with a Grade 2 right lat strain, per MLB.com’s Zachary Silver (via Twitter). The injury will not require surgery, and Fernandez should have no problem getting ready for 2022. The 24-year-old has made 18 appearances out of the pen, tossed 20 2/3 innings, and logged a 5.66 ERA/5.14 FIP.

Every Team’s Initial September Callups

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The limit on active roster players expanded from 26 to 28 today, as the calendar flipped to September. Every team announced at least two additions to the big league club (some teams made three or more due to injured list placements). Here’s a recap of today’s spate of transactions:

Cardinals To Select Brandon Dickson

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The Cardinals are planning to select reliever Brandon Dickson to the big league roster, manager Mike Shildt tells reporters (including Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat). Active rosters will expand from 26 to 28 tomorrow, but St. Louis will need to make a 40-man roster move to accommodate Dickson’s official promotion.

It’s the culmination of one of the most remarkable journeys in recent memory. Dickson was a starting pitcher early in his career, and he reached the majors with St. Louis in 2011. He made eight big league appearances between the next two seasons, allowing ten runs in 14 2/3 innings. After the 2012 campaign, the Cardinals released Dickson so he could pursue an opportunity with the Orix Buffaloes of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball.

Dickson would spend the next eight seasons in NPB. After beginning his time with the Buffaloes as a starter, the right-hander was eventually transitioned into the closer’s role. Between 2019-20, Dickson pitched to a 3.15 ERA and returned to the U.S. this winter. He signed a minor league deal with the Cardinals in mid-June and earned a spot on the U.S. national team’s Olympic roster.

St. Louis assigned Dickson to Triple-A Memphis, where he’s made eleven appearances. He’s struggled in that hitter-friendly environment, serving up thirteen runs (eleven earned) over 10 1/3 frames. Nevertheless, the 36-year-old has sufficiently impressed St. Louis brass with his current form to earn his first big league look in nearly a decade.

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