St. Louis Cardinals: Left Field is Tyler O’Neill’s job to lose

Tyler O’Neil has a prime opportunity with the St. Louis Cardinals this year.

When Marcell Ozuna was granted free agency this offseason he left a hole in the St. Louis Cardinals outfield. While Ozuna did hit 29 home runs and came in second on the team in runs batted in and OPS, his numbers do not suggest a gaping hole was left.

The problem is that a rather thin free agent market at left has the Cardinals looking internally to fill the void. Could this be the year Tyler O’Neill entrenches himself in the position to become a mainstay in the Cardinals outfield for years to come, or will he fall into a role of utility outfielder/pinch hitter?

A former third-round pick in the 2013 amateur draft by Seattle, and considered by many to be their best outfield prospect, O’Neill was shipped in a mid-season trade to the Cardinals for Marco Gonzales. He broke into the majors the next season and appeared in sixty-one games, hitting for a modest .254 average with an OPS slightly over .800. The power numbers are there for O’Neill in the limited number of opportunities he has had. Can these numbers surpass what Ozuna put up, given the chance to play every day?

The knock-on O’Neill is the high strikeout rate. He takes a U-turn back to the dugout 38% of the time in the two year’s worth of at bats he has had. In today’s feast or famine way of hitting, can the Cardinals afford to ride out the growing pains in his hitting stroke as they aspire to get back to the postseason?

If the team were in a position of rebuilding, then yes, O’Neill would be given the job out of spring training and be rushed to the plate four times a game to prove himself. Having won the division for the first time since 2015, however, the Cardinals margin for error is razor thin. The division title came by a narrow two games over the hard charging Milwaukee Brewers.

Let’s say the Cardinals break camp with O’Neill as the starting left fielder and he slumps early. They are going to want a veteran presence alongside Dustin Fowler and Harrison Bader when the dog days of summer hit their peak.

O’Neill is kind of caught in a hard situation. He’s going to be viewed as a stop-gap type player, even though with Ozuna leaving town he will receive a longer look. However, top prospect Dylan Carlson is waiting in the wings. He hit a combined .292 with an OPS over .900 at two levels in the minor league system last year, eventually topping out at AAA. He also strikes out at a much less rate than O’Neill. Carlson will play the entire season at age 21 though, so odds are someone will be keeping left field warm for him in St. Louis until it’s his time to shine. Even if that person is O’Neill, he’s going to have to hit to keep his name on the lineup card.

What to do with Tyler O’Neill? My guess is he earns the job out of spring training with his Palm Tree touching, powerful, home runs. He gets out of the gate hot and leads the Cardinals in runs batted in after the first three weeks of the season.

As the days get longer though, so will his swing and pitchers will start missing his bat more and more.  If the St. Louis Cardinals are in the race come mid-July, a trade deadline acquisition will bring in a more seasoned outfielder and O’Neill will be relegated to spot starts and pinch hitting roles.  If the Cardinals are not in the race, O’Neill will get his at-bats and hit his .230 for the year.