Jedd Gyorko missed much of camp with a hamstring injury and minor leaguer Justin Williams sat out for what became months due to a hand broken in the off-season. Oliver Marmol moved from first base to bench coach and Ron “Pop” Warner shifted from bench coach to third base.įive Cardinals opened the regular season on the injured list. In other shifts, George Greer and Jose Oquendo returned to their prior minor league coaching duties. New hires were hitting coach Jeff Albert, a former Cardinals minor league coach who came from Houston, and first base coach Stubby Clapp, two-time Pacific Coast League Manager of the Year and title winner. Multiple changes were made in the coaching staff from the interim staff assembled when Shildt was promoted into the top job last July. Carpenter put together his worst season as a major leaguer and eventually lost his starting job to rookie Tommy Edman. The April 10 deal was struck a year earlier than necessary, and because of the third baseman’s struggles in 2019, it looked bad almost from the very start. In a surprise to most, the Cardinals agreed to a two-year extension plus a third-year vesting option with Matt Carpenter, guaranteeing him $39 million. In a rash of multi-year extensions that swept across MLB this spring, apparently the Cardinals felt they had to join in. His five-year deal was announced on March 23. First, 2018 NL All-Star pitcher Miles Mikolas agreed to terms on a four-year extension covering 2020-2023, then in a major surprise, Goldschmidt agreed to remain with the Cardinals from 2020-2024 before ever playing a home game at Busch. There seems to be at least one major contract announcement each spring and so it was in 2019. However, Francisco Pena was not added to the big-league roster at the end of spring training as had been expected when a more experienced backstop, Matt Wieters, was signed in late February. 16 days later, they signed free agent lefty reliever Andrew Miller.įor the fourth consecutive year, the Cardinals added a journeyman free agent catcher on a minor league contract. On December 5, the Cardinals announced the acquisition of all-star first baseman Paul Goldschmidt from Arizona for pitcher Luke Weaver, catcher Carson Kelly, minor league second baseman Andy Young and a draft pick. After declaring free agency, the latter immediately re-signed a much-reduced, incentive-laden contract to return to St. Last fall, the club said goodbye to six players – first baseman Matt Adams, relievers Bud Norris, Matt Bowman and Tyson Ross, infielder Greg Garcia and starter Adam Wainwright. The Cardinals were pushed to the final day of the regular season before clinching the division, ending at 91-71 and a two-game edge over the Wild-Card Brewers. A huge four-game sweep in Chicago ending on September 22 nd helped to put the Cubs away and in the process, the Cards clinched a Wild Card.īut Milwaukee, even without injured reigning MVP Christian Yelich, would not go away. Louis opened up its season-best 4.5-game lead. Even including the aforementioned West Coast trip, St. In the midst of a six-game winning streak, on August 23, the Cardinals took over first place for the final time. Louis back into third place, four games out. A disastrous 0-6 road trip to Oakland and Los Angeles knocked St. At the July All-Star break, the Cards were still treading water at 44-44.Ī post-break spurt enabled the Cards to re-capture the division lead for a week starting on July 25. 500 and were in fourth place, five games back. It was short-lived, however, as the club went into a tailspin in May. Unlike in recent seasons, the Cardinals played extremely well in April, going 20-10 (through May 1) while opening up a three-game division lead. Mike Shildt (Steve Mitchell/Imagn)Īfter securing Paul Goldschmidt in trade and signing left-handed pitcher Andrew Miller, manager Mike Shildt’s Cardinals were plagued by an inconsistent offense in the spring as they suffered their first losing spring since 2016. The Cardinals reported to spring training with a new star first baseman and a manager running his first camp with a resolve to break a three-year playoff drought. Central title and their first since 2015. Louis Cardinals concluded their 128th season of play by winning their 12th N.L. Part 2 of this annual recap will take a deep dive into the Cardinals’ regular season numbers followed by Part 3, a post-season review, with the latter being offered after a three-year hiatus. Part 1 begins with a quick summary, before we go into significant detail on off-season moves, spring training and the regular season, month by month. This is the first installment of our three-part annual series recapping the recently-completed season for the St. Photo: Cardinals clinch playoffs, 09/22/19 (St.
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