St. Louis Cardinals Call Up Kolten Wong

After a seven-game stint in Triple-A Memphis, the St. Louis Cardinals turn to Kolten Wong once more.

After batting .222 in the first 49 games in which he played with the Cardinals, St. Louis decided to send down Wong. Now, after a week in the minors he is headed back up.

So he must have had a pretty good seven games, right? Wong hit .429 with a .529 on-base percentage in his 28 at-bats with four homers and eleven driven in. Certainly numbers that are worth a look at the big leagues, even if they’re only over a short period.

The kicker for the promotion may have been the added versatility that he has shown in his short stint with Memphis, according to Craig Calcaterra of NBC Sports. He lists Wong as a 2B/OF, and declares that the “OF” part may have been the key to the recall, “as Wong showed in a brief period of time that he could maybe play a serviceable center field and be a super utility player.”

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That limited time in the outfield? Three games, in which he had four defensive chances, but if the Cardinals feel alright with sticking him out in center, then this should be a fun experiment to watch. Wong has the tools to pick up the position, but those three games logged in the minors in the outfield over the past week are his only three in the outfield since he turned pro.

To make room for Wong on the 25-man roster, St Louis sent the struggling Jeremy Hazelbacker. After an impressive first month in the big leagues, Hazelbacker has combined to go 11-for-64 (.172) with two homers and six RBI in May and June. Adding fuel to the Kolten Wong in the outfield fire, Hazelbacker had played 38 games in the outfield, so in essence, Wong could take over as the team’s fourth outfielder.

It’s likely that Wong will stick in center for the time being, if only because the vantage point is still up the middle, where he has spent all of his time in the Majors, making the transition a little easier. Center would have the same vantage point on the field, only further away. The argument could be made that right field may be the easier transition in this case since he has been a second baseman, but a team’s right fielder typically has the best arm in the outfield, and the team’s second baseman usually has the worse arm of the two middle infielders, so it’s likely that if Wong’s arm were strong enough for right field, he would be playing shortstop instead of second. So center field it is!

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It’s also worth noting that the St. Louis Cardinals are having a Kolten Wong printed jersey giveaway at tonight’s game. This surely has nothing to do with the promotion (the extension he signed and his improved play in Memphis loom a bit larger here), but we’ve seen too many times where a giveaway is schedule for a player that is no longer on the 25-man roster (See: Yoenis Cespedes t-shirt giveaway the day after the 2014 trade deadline).

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