St. Louis Cardinals Swap Nick Greenwood, Sam Tuivailala for Mitch Harris, Xavier Scruggs
The St. Louis Cardinals made a pair of roster moves just prior to the All-Star break on Saturday, recalling relief pitchers Nick Greenwood and Sam Tuivailala from Triple-A Memphis while placing reliever Mitch Harris on the 15-day disabled list with a groin injury and optioning first baseman Xavier Scruggs to Triple-A Memphis.
This will be Greenwood’s first big-league action of 2015, and his promotion comes at a good time, as his ability to go multiple innings will hopefully give some relief to a Cardinals bullpen that has been used for 12 games in the past 11 days. Greenwood hasn’t had a strong season at Triple-A by any means, as he has a 5.42 ERA with a 1.45 WHIP and .305 opponent batting average over 22 games. However, he’s been much more successful since he moved into the Redbirds’ rotation for good on May 17, and he’s 5-2 with a 3.62 ERA in 10 starts over that period. The addition of Greenwood also marks the first time in 2015 that the Cardinals will have three lefthanded pitchers available out of the bullpen.
Though his numbers don’t necessarily show it, Greenwood was a major help to the Cardinals’ bullpen in 2014, his rookie season. Over 19 appearances, eight of which came out of the bullpen, Greenwood had a 4.75 ERA, a 1.14 WHIP, and a .259 opponent batting average. More importantly, however, he soaked up 36 innings, which was important during the middle-to-late summer, when the Cardinals had guys like Carlos Martinez and Justin Masterson in their starting rotation who consistently struggled to get beyond five innings.
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Meanwhile, this will be Tuivailala’s third big-league promotion of the season. It’s a somewhat bittersweet development for Tuivailala, along with recently-recalled starting pitcher Tim Cooney, as both were named to the Triple-A All-Star Game roster for this year but now will be unable to attend. Every player would surely bypass a min0r-league All-Star Game without a flinch for the chance to be in the majors, though Tuivailala and Cooney both loom as strong candidates to be sent back to Memphis immediately following the All-Star break.
Tuivailala, who can touch 100 MPH on the radar gun, has yet to convert his minor-league dominance to the major-league mound. Over 30 Triple-A appearances this year, he has a 1.78 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, and .178 opponent average with 12 saves in 12 opportunities. However, Tuivailala’s last big-league appearance on May 19 marked the first time that he hadn’t given up a run in five career major-league games. In three appearances with the Cardinals this year, Tuivailala has given up two hits, two walks, and two earned runs while striking out three batters in three innings.
Harris’s injury comes at an unfortunate time, as he’d thrown three perfect innings since his July 4 recall from Triple-A, displaying the previous form that had allowed him to be one of manager Mike Matheny‘s more trusted bullpen arms in late April and early May. In an incredible sign of just how much pitching depth the Cardinals have had to run through recently, Greenwood and Tuivailala will be the 15th and 16th pitchers to appear in a game this week for the Cards if they are utilized before the All-Star break.
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Though Scruggs was just 2 for his last 23 (.087) at the plate, he was still more of a victim of roster schematics than anything. Since coming back up to the majors on June 19, Scruggs had been in somewhat of a timeshare with incumbent starting first baseman Mark Reynolds. He even got the majority of the time for a short while, starting seven of 12 games at first base between June 27 and July 9.
However, with second baseman Kolten Wong going down with a concussion in Chicago this week, the Cardinals chose to fill the void by moving starting third baseman Matt Carpenter over to second and plugging Reynolds in at third. To add some extra coverage, the team recalled veteran first baseman Dan Johnson from Triple-A and plugged him right into the starting lineup on Wednesday night. The 35-year-old lefthanded hitter lived up to the challenge, collecting RBI singles in his first two at-bats as a Cardinal, and with that the slumping Scruggs instantly became expendable.
Johnson’s gone 0-for-6 in his subsequent at-bats, but the inability of the Cardinals to send him back to the minors without designating him for assignment, along with the fact that his status as a lefthanded hitter makes him a more logical platoon partner for Reynolds, meant that Scruggs was the most logical player to trim from the roster when it came time to remove a first baseman.
It should be interesting to see who gets the majority of the starts at first base going forward; Reynolds is hitting .198 since June 1, and it’s difficult to make a case for him to be an everyday player at this point. Johnson, meanwhile, is a .236/.337/.408 big-league hitter over parts of 10 seasons, and he hasn’t spent the majority of a season in the majors since 2007. It’s possible that the Cardinals could dive into the trade market rather soon to acquire a player such as the Milwaukee Brewers’ Adam Lind, or they could finally recall top prospect Stephen Piscotty, who has begun playing first base at Triple-A in preparation for a possible opening at the major-league level.