Things have taken a turn for the worse at the hot corner. I wrote on the dilemma at third base twice before, when a lot of people were more concerned about what was going on at second base with Skip Schumaker. First, it looked as though Joe Mather was the go-to guy until Troy Glaus was able to come back around the first of May. Mather even led the Grapefruit League in RBI briefly. Then, Mather came down with a viral infection or flu, and that sapped his strength and his chance at winning the third base job outright. Mather never looked quite the same, went into a slump the rest of the Spring and ended up in Memphis before the regular season started.
Then the Cardinal brass looked at David Freese, who seemed to be getting over his Achilles heel injury from a January car accident. The accident had slowed down his prospects for winning the third base job earlier in the Spring. Yet, when the season started, Joe Thurston was the Opening Day starter, and the next day too. Freese got finally a start later in the week, but choices had been made that left David Freese the odd man out, and as soon as the schedule and injuries dictated an extra pitcher, Freese was sent down to AAA Memphis to get more at-bats instead of being a bench player with one position.
Meanwhile, Joe Mather went into an evenworse slump in Memphis, and onlookers there said that he had lost a good deal of weight and could not drive the ball. Finally, he succumbed to wrist surgery to remove a cyst. This was the same wrist that Joe injured late last summer that ended his debut in the Major Leagues. Recovery from cyst surgery is about 3-5 days, yet Joe has been out two weeks now. It appears that Joe needs to get completely healthy from the viral infection and the troublesome wrist before he can effectively play again.
David Freese went down to Memphis, but could not get much going much either with his bat, and now he has been placed on the Memphis disabled list. Freese continues to experience residual soreness from his Achilles heel related to his car accident that limited his playing time early in spring training. I had written about this earlier, as Achilles heel injuries are difficult to come back from in any abbreviated manner.
The twin tandem of Joe Thurston and Brian Barden has seemed to peak. Both are getting “overexposed,” as one scout stated. Barden started very hot, hitting .385 in April, but has now slumped by going 2-21 and hitting an abysmal .095 so far in May. Thurston finished April at .278, but has also slowed by hitting .195 in May. Both are piling up more than a few strikeouts, about a K in every six at bats. Thus, Cardinal production at third since the start of May is a .161 batting average and a horrible .167 slugging percentage. It doesn’t take long with injuries to Ludwick and Ankiel, to expose that third base is a sore spot, in what seemed to be a position of depth going into 2009.
With Freese on the disabled list, the Cardinals promoted Bret Wallace to AAA. Bret did real well in Springfield in a brief sample late last year, hitting .367. But this time around, he struggled in comparison, and was hitting .281 when he was called up to Memphis. Not real impressive... though he did put up a .840 OPS. But the Cardinals seem to have little choice. The injury to Troy Glaus has not responded well to surgery and treatment and he has stopped all baseball activities and now is not scheduled to see a doctor until next month. This kind of looks like Glaus, even optimistically, will not return until after the All-Star break. His season could be written off completely if he is not back by then. Mather and Freese are out for perhaps an indefinite time period. Thurston and Barden are not treading water anymore... hence the urgency to force Bret Wallace to rise to the challenge.
Wallace has improved defensively, a factor that Tony LaRussa found issue with this past spring. In 30 games at third base in Springfield, Bret has made only two errors, had a .975 fielding percentage and a range factor per game of 2.63. Although, this is not a lot to go on, it is not bad and an improvement over last season. Bret moves well charging in on the ball, but seems inflexible physically moving side to side. But despite his build, he is more athletic than initially thought. He has a good throwing arm, but will need an above average shortstop, in range, arm, and glove to play alongside of him. This increasingly looks a lot less like Khalil Greene to be his partner on the left side if Bret gets the call to MLB (Khalil is another subject though).
Bret may turn things around in Memphis. For one thing, he will get more pitches to hit, instead of borderline offerings. Wallace has apparently been frustrated with AA pitching this time around. Bret needs to learn to be more patient, and more selective at the plate instead of trying to drive marginal pitches, and take a walk, like Colby Rasmus before him. In Bret’s first start in Memphis, he went 3-4. Maybe Bret can respond to the challenge and resemble the phenom of last year. Let’s hope so, as the opportunity is now there for Bret more than it ever has been. Chone or Oliver projected Bret to be major league ready, hitting wise, before the season. They projected him to be a .299 hitter in 479 AB’s with 20 HR and 86 RBI, with a .489 SLG. ZIPS projected Bret to be a .275 hitter with 16 HR, 69 RBI with a .424 SLG. The Cardinals will gladly take either production now, as Wallace projects to be the “impact” bat sooner or later behind Albert Pujols. It may be much sooner, if Wallace can gain traction in Memphis, and then he may be up anyway as the Cards need something...pending a trade stopgap and revisiting a Joe Inglett deal.
We’ll see... the month of May is getting more interesting.
--Allan
