St. Louis Cardinals Looking for Relief Help Via Trade Market
Add the St. Louis Cardinals to the growing list of teams seeking late-inning relief help via the trade market.
According to Jon Heyman of Today’s Knuckleball, due to the rapid decline of former Cardinals closer Trevor Rosenthal, the St. Louis Cardinals are now in the hunt to acquire a late-inning reliever to pair alongside the newly appointed closer Seung-hwan Oh.
Behind Oh, the Cardinals bullpen consists of Matt Bowman, Seth Maness, Kevin Siegrist, Tyler Lyons and former lights-out closer Jonathan Broxton.
Surprisingly, the Cardinals’ collection of bullpen arms ranks fourth in the National League in bullpen ERA (3.34), according to ESPN.com, but given their recent struggles and fatigue, an added bullpen arm is now their top priority as the August 1st non-waiver trade deadline approaches.
According to Heyman, however, the quality of the arm the Cardinals are looking for is unknown. Due to the astronomical asking price on both Andrew Miller and Wade Davis following the Cubs-Yankees Aroldis Chapman trade on Monday, it’s tough to see the Cardinals dipping into their prospect pool to meet the demands of Brian Cashman and/or Dayton Moore.
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Instead, Heyman reported that the Cardinals have looked into the hard-throwing Angels right-hander Joe Smith out in Southern California and other pitchers of that caliber.
While the Cardinals certainly have the minor league depth to look in-house for late-inning relief help, they might be seeking a major league reliever with experience under his belt.
After all, the most appealing in-house option to bolster the Cardinals bullpen is 21-year-old North Jersey native Alex Reyes. The right-hander and his electric 100+ mph fastball has developed into one of the game’s top prospects, but his past six starts in Triple-A with the Memphis Red Birds haven’t been all that impressive.
It is interesting to note however, that Reyes was pulled from his most recent start in Memphis after three innings. Some Cardinal fans have speculated that Reyes will soon be called up to make his major league debut while others think the Cardinals want to keep him protected as the trade deadline approaches.
Next: Time for Nats to Overspend on a Reliever
While these are all unknowns, one thing we all know for certain is that if Alex Reyes is included in a trade package, it’ll be for a guy like Andrew Miller or Wade Davis.
Stay tuned.