Springfield, MO – The St. Louis Cardinals have announced that Cardinals 1B Matt Adams will join the Springfield Cardinals on a rehab assignment this Friday through Sunday.

Springfield hosts the Tulsa Drillers at Hammons Field on Saturday and Sunday, both starting at 6:09 p.m. Click below to get your tickets right now.

Adams, 24, started the 2013 season in St. Louis and is hitting .542 (13-for-24) with three home runs and eight RBIs through eight games with the Cardinals. The Philipsburg, PA native made his Major League debut on May 20, 2012 and appeared in 27 games with the Cardinals last year.

Adams spent the entire 2011 season with the Springfield Cardinals, compiling a .300 batting average with 32 home runs and 101 RBIs through 115 games en route to being named the 2011 Texas League Player of the Year. He was originally selected by St. Louis in the 23rd round of the 2009 June Draft out of Slippery Rock University (PA).

The St. Louis Cardinals have gone through a 15-game stretch when they’ve scored more than three runs just five times, yet they’ve won eight of those games. So despite near panic that the lineup has forgotten how to hit, the team is still winning ballgames mostly because the starting pitchers have been terrific to start the season.

The starting rotation likely won’t continue to pitch with a historically low 2.15 earned-run average, which was the fourth-lowest starters ERA for April in franchise history, but there are several reasons to believe the offense will start scoring many more runs on a consistent basis.

Third baseman David Freese is currently in a horrible slump, hitting just .163 with no homeruns and three RBIs, and centerfielder Jon Jay is hitting .213 with two homeruns and eight RBIs. Those sound like great numbers compared to Freese, but the Cardinals need at least average production from both of those spots to contend in the National League Central Division.

The other aspect of this situation is the Cardinals’ opponents. The Cardinals have faced arguably four of the six toughest non-divisional opponents in April, the Arizona Diamondbacks, San Francisco Giants, Philadelphia Phillies and Washington Nationals, and every NL Central team they’ve played has a winning record.

This isn’t going to be an easy season no matter how well the Cardinals play. Sure, the Cardinals could have four or five more wins already if the bullpen hadn’t been horrible to start the season, but chances are slim the Cardinals are going to go on any long winning streaks this season. The competition is just too good.

The Pittsburgh Pirates took two of three games from the Cardinals last weekend as A.J. Burnett threw another quality start Saturday, and rookie Jeff Locke shut them down Sunday (which isn’t surprising given the Cardinals typical struggles against left-handed pitchers, especially ones they haven’t faced before).

Then the Cincinnati Reds visited Busch Stadium for a very well-pitched series in which Reds starter Homer Bailey was the only starting pitcher to give up more than two runs in the three-game series when the Cardinals scored four against him Wednesday.

Those types of games are unquestionably difficult to watch when the Cardinals lose, but they are well-played games nonetheless. The offense does need to produce more runs, but good pitching has always beaten good hitting, and thankfully the Cardinals have good pitching.

Also, several Cardinals hitters are unlikely to stay stuck in their slumps.

Freese and Jay have proven throughout their careers they are good hitters who can make significant contributions to a lineup. Freese has a career .290 batting average, including his poor start to the 2013 season, and Jay is a career .294 hitter who has shown recent signs of life at the plate with three hits in a recent series against the Pirates.

Plus, the Cardinals schedule lightens up a bit in May. They will face the Chicago Cubs, New York Mets and San Diego Padres, which are already a combined 17 games under .500, for nine games in the next month. By comparison, the Cardinals’ April opponents are a combined 10 games over .500 as they head into May.

So although it’s easy to look at the winnable games the Cardinals lost in May, they should win more of those types of games this month because the schedule will be a little easier and, based on career averages, the offense should begin to produce more runs, especially against teams with weaker pitching staffs.

That all sets up what could be a fun month of baseball so long as the Cardinals avoid injuries, which isn’t a guarantee. This is the point in the season when they lost Allen Craig, Lance Berkman and Matt Carpenter to injuries for extended time in 2012.

The NL Central is too good this season for the Cardinals to jump out to a large lead, but St. Louis fans should be confident their team will still be at or near the top of the division by the time the calendar turns to June.

It’s been two years since the St. Louis Cardinals suddenly dealt former uber-prospect Colby Rasmus to the Toronto Blue Jays mid-season for a host of pieces in return. And in the two years since that deal, the value of what’s come of the trade is still very much undetermined. There are some that say the deal was what sealed the 2011 World Series win, while others feel it was a necessary move to salvage the remaining value of Rasmus’ quickly dipping stock at the time. Yet the truth of the matter probably lays somewhere in-between, and the absolute value of how the Cardinals have emerged is on the verge of being a potential loss in the long-term.

At the beginning of the 2011 season, Rasmus was a troubled, yet still integral part of the future of the team. He was the former top prospect of the organization as little as two years prior, and was just a year removed from a 23 home run breakout effort. Yet, that seemed like decades ago by the time the trade of him away was necessitated. The triangle of issues created between Colby/Tony Rasmus, Tony LaRussa and ultimately John Mozeliak, pushed Rasmus away from being a coveted talent, and into the problem child bin, and regardless of talent, problem children don’t get the same returns as promising talents do. So Mozeliak made a July trade to send Rasmus away in exchange for Edwin Jackson, Octavio Dotel, Corey Patterson and Marc Rzepczynski, his stock had gotten to the point where it was just good to get anything back in return for him.

Of all of the acquisitions made in that deal, the then25-year-old lefty made the biggest difference in the club’s playoff and postseason run, and set up a solid basis of what to expect coming ahead. This was of particular importance as well, because he was the only part of the deal that had any guaranteed time with the team after 2011. Regardless of what Rasmus’ actual production was, he still carried a decent amount of name value and upside perception, so to come away from that deal with only a middle relief left-hander, that pitcher better surely become among the best at what he does. However, the year and a half since Rzepczynski has been a full-time Cardinal has been perhaps less fulfilling than any part of Rasmus’ on-field run.

Since the beginning of 2012, in 79 games, Rzepczynski has posted a 1-3 record, with a 4.77 ERA in 54.2 innings. His WHIP across that time has been a robust 1.44, and he has surrendered better than a hit per inning pitched. In fairness, he shouldered an inadequate amount of the load a year ago, as the only consistently available left-handed option, as the team went through a carousel of veteran flame outs around him. Yet, this season he’s struggled more than ever, posting a 7.88 ERA and surrendering a run in four of his nine appearances, with at least two in three of those efforts in an inning or less work. Overall, batters have hit .361 against him on the season, and that will not do in the leverage of the situations he’s called upon (or really any other either, at that), and yesterday, just a year and a half after being the promise received in return for promise dealt, Rzepczynski found himself headed towards a place he hadn’t been to since 2010: the minors.

In the first move to shake some life into the team’s lifeless bullpen, the club optioned him to Memphis in exchange for the 2011 organizational pitcher of the year, Seth Maness. This is a shocking move, whereas in it didn’t seem likely that the team would put itself voluntarily down to one left-handed reliever, but it also sends a message: get it done, or you’re replaceable. There’s a chance he won’t stay down for long, just enough time to rediscover what he lost along the way. There’s also the chance that he becomes a victim of the ever-emergent depth of arms converging on the Cardinals pitching staff from the minors. This is not a team to fall behind in fortune with, because there is always somebody who is pushing for a chance. It likely isn’t a death sentence for him, but it definitely will serve notice to anybody on the staff that is struggling.

All in all, looking back it’s tough to say what is what about the absolute outcome of the Rasmus/Blue Jays deal. What is clear is that something had to be done in the moment, and that the outcome of it did improve the team at the absolutely right moment. Despite popular opinion, it’s not THE move that won the World Series for the club; seasons like that don’t hinge on one moment. However, it did play a role in that moment, and with the after effect as it is shaking out around the only remaining part of the deal so soon after it was completed, perhaps it was the ultimate all-in maneuver for the moment.

The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 9-1 Friday, but they had to survive another bad performance from reliever Mitchell Boggs while Joe Kelly once again proved he should be used more often.

Cardinals manager Mike Matheny didn’t give Boggs a chance to completely blow the 5-1 lead he had when he entered the game to start the eighth inning, but he did load the bases while recording just one out.

Left-handed specialist Randy Choate bailed him out by forcing Pirates third baseman Pedro Alvarez to hit into an inning-ending double play, but the Cardinals could have avoided the entire situation if they’d used Joe Kelly to start the inning.

In fact, the Cardinals might not have had to suffer through nearly as many lousy bullpen outings if they had used Kelly more in the first three weeks of the season. Matheny has instead used him in situations such as Friday’s ninth inning when the Cardinals had already opened an eight-run lead.

The bullpen has been the Achilles’ heel of the team so far this season. It had a collective 4.84 earned-run average through 22 games and blew four leads for a starting rotation that has a 2.12 ERA and has kept the team in all but one game so far this season.

Part of the problem is the Cardinals lost their regular closer, Jason Motte, to an elbow injury during spring training and had to scramble to fill his spot right before the regular season started.

Boggs was a logical choice to open the season as the Cardinals’ closer after a great 2012 season when he was the eighth-inning setup reliever. He had career-best 2.21 ERA while pitching in 78 games and earning 34 holds.

But he was a completely different pitcher as the closer. He has allowed 12 runs with eight walks and two blown saves in 11 appearances through the team’s first 22 games. Meanwhile, Kelly has pitched in seven games and allowed four runs with no walks. However, he hasn’t pitched in many high-leverage situations.

Now, that’s not to say Kelly should be the Cardinals closer. Edward Mujica stepped into that role nicely by earning two saves each on recent road series in Philadelphia and Washington.

That move has settled the bullpen, for now, but Kelly must have a larger role in the late innings if the Cardinals are going to consistently keep teams from completing late-inning comebacks.

Matheny recently referred to Kelly as “a Ferrari” that is a nice luxury to have in the bullpen, but that resource is nearly useless if it only sits in the garage.

Instead, Boggs and rookie reliever Trevor Rosenthal have come out of the bullpen seemingly every single day. Rosenthal has pitched in 12 games already, the most of any pitcher on the team despite also being the youngest.

That’s a lot of pressure to put on a young pitcher and his arm so early into his first full big-league season. Yes, Rosenthal throws really hard and can be an effective weapon out of the bullpen, but flamethrowers don’t always last that long.

For example, the Detroit Tigers had a bullpen that included 100 mph-plus throwers Joel Zumaya Fernando Rodney, but both suffered injuries within two years.

The Cardinals have excellent pitching depth in the minor leagues, but Rosenthal is a prized possession and should be treated as such. Kelly also throws really hard and has enormous potential, but he pitched in the starting rotation much of 2012 and is more accustomed to the demands of a Major League Baseball season.

However, Matheny continues to bring in Rosenthal nearly every night, and Boggs pitches in game after game as the team waits for him to fix his motion while Kelly sits out in the bullpen.

And that type of bullpen management could continue to cost the Cardinals ballgames before Mujica ever reaches the mound until Kelly receives a larger role in the late innings.

The St. Louis Cardinals were dealt a blow as they broke spring training camp in 2013. Their closer, Jason Motte, was injured. The early weeks of the season unveiled that the injury was not getting better and, pending a re-evaluation, Motte may require season ending surgery.

Compounding the issue, Mitchell Boggs proved to be ineffective after inheriting the role and showcased an inability to nail down the all-important 27th out. The bullpen in St. Louis has proven to be loaded with outstanding arms leading up to the 9th inning but decidedly bare of arms capable of truly closing games.

There are options, some of which have been explored, some of which have been rumored, and some of which are a bit outside the box.

Edward Mujica - The obvious option, primarily because of his recent success in the role for the team. Mujica successfully closed down all three games in the recent series against the Washington Nationals and seems to be settling into the role quite well. His success in that role could calm the bullpen inefficiencies and keep the Cardinals from reaching for answers in other locations.

Read about the other options available to the Cardinals over at Yahoo.

 ST. LOUIS, MO (April 24, 2013) – The St. Louis Cardinals announced that fans can now enjoy Cardinals Magazine as an electronic publication on a variety of computer and mobile device platforms.

“While we’ve enjoyed tremendous loyalty and continued growth in circulation among our print readers, we also want to meet the demands of fans that prefer to read about the Cardinals on their electronic devices,” said Steve Zesch, Director of Publications and publisher of Cardinals Magazine. “Our goal each issue is to provide the widest variety of content on all-things-Cardinal, and our ability to now deliver it via a downloadable edition that can be enjoyed on a range of electronic devices makes perfect sense.”

Cardinals Magazine, which marked its 21^st anniversary this spring, may be downloaded on Mac and PC computers, as well as a variety of popular mobile device platforms including Android-based tablets and smart phones, and Apple’s iPhone and iPad devices. The Cardinals are just the fifth team in Major League Baseball to offer a digital publication. The Yankees, Dodgers and Rockies have electronic magazines that complement their print editions, with the Braves publishing a digital-only magazine.

“One thing that’s made Cardinals Magazine so popular is the substance you get with each issue – we load it up with one-of-a-kind content so that each issue feels like a keepsake souvenir,” Zesch said. “Our mission is simple: provide the definitive word on each story we cover, with the highest-quality presentation possible. As the electronic edition evolves, we’ll be adding extras that take advantage of the digital platform, such as bonus video and audio, picture galleries and a wealth of other material drawn from the extensive resources the Cardinals have to offer.”

Cardinals Magazine has provided fans behind-the-scenes access and the most authoritative, comprehensive look at team history since its first issue in April 1992. Published monthly during the baseball season and once during the offseason, the magazine is available via a digital subscription for $25 (seven issues), with single copies $5 each. Fans can learn more about subscribing to the magazine at cardinals.com/publications.  Join the conversation with #CardsMag.

This is the Adam Wainwright the St. Louis Cardinals think is worth $97.5 million for the next five years.

In his second season after Tommy John surgery to repair a torn elbow ligament, Wainwright has returned to the Cy Young award-caliber pitcher he was before the injury.

He simply dominated the Washington Nationals on Tuesday and now has a 4-1 record and a 1.93 earned-run average with 37 strikeouts against one walk in five starts. He’s established himself once again as the Cardinals’ ace, and that’s a huge relief for everybody involved.

Wainwright had put together a 64-34 record with a 2.99 earned-run average in four seasons as a starter before he suffered the elbow injury at the beginning of spring training in 2011. He also possessed a fastball that reached 96 mph and one of the most devastating curveballs in Major League Baseball.

But that was gone for much of 2012. Wainwright had a winning record, 14-13, but he also had the highest ERA of his career, 3.94, and rarely had the dominating games he did before the injury. His fastball wasn’t as fast, his curveball didn’t break as sharply and too many of his pitches were up in the strike zone, which allowed hitters to often drive balls they hit for extra base hits.

He did have a few standout games, including a four-hit, complete-game shutout May 22 against the San Diego Padres, but he also had several poor stretches such as back-to-back games against the Nationals and New York Mets in late August and early September when he gave up a combined 11 runs in just 7.2 innings.

Wainwright said he was sure his good stuff would come back, but he hadn’t proved it until that complete game against the Padres.

“It’s a huge sense of relief; it’s a huge sense of feeling blessed,” he said after the shutout against San Diego. “Mentally, tonight, I was so much better than I had been. I’ve worked very hard to get back to where I am.”

However, not every game went so well, and the Cardinals had an important decision to make as the 2013 season approached. Wainwright was about to enter the final year of his contract, and the Cardinals had to figure out if they were going to keep him beyond this season.

Overall, his career track showed he could be as good a pitcher as there is the game, but his performances after the injury caused plenty of concern.

Yes, most pitchers come back from Tommy John surgery and pitch as well as they did beforehand, but successful surgery is never a guarantee, and Wainwright’s 2012 season offered no certainties that he would ever be the type of pitcher he was beforehand.

But the Cardinals signed him to the long-term deal March 28, just days before the season started. Now, it is a fairly big risk to give a five-year contract to a 31-year-old pitcher who had major elbow surgery, but so far Wainwright has made the Cardinals’ management look pretty smart.

And the best could be yet to come. Wainwright sliced through the Nationals on Tuesday for 8.1 shutout innings with nine strikeouts and his first walk of the season after 34.2 innings, which was fewer than six innings from the franchise record.

He threw a fastball at 94 mph, his curveball buckled Nationals hitters’ knees throughout the night and his control was as precise as ever.

Wainwright is back to the form Cardinals officials hoped they would see when they signed him to the contract extension, and now they can sit back and watch their investment dominate opposing hitters as if its 2010 again.

Through the first three weeks of the 2013 Major League Baseball season, the St. Louis Cardinals have discovered some young talent in their pitching rotation. Shelby Miller, who had to fight his way into the rotation during spring training, has looked borderline dominant in his first four starts. The rookie hurler might be establishing an early case for the Rookie Of The Year Award.

The National League has a few rookies putting up notable numbers but few have shown the clear-cut edge of Miller. The right-hander has compiled an impressive 26 strikeouts, walked only seven batters, surrendered just one home run and six earned runs, over 25 innings pitched while winning three of his first four starts. His wins, earned run average, runs allowed, and home runs allowed rank first among all rookie starting pitchers.

His competition from rookie-level pitchers in the National League is sparse, but there are a few challengers that are not exactly falling flat to start the season.

To read about the competition for Rookie Of The Year in the National League, follow this link to the Yahoo Article.

St. Louis Cardinals starting pitcher Jaime Garcia is one of the most dominating pitchers on the team when everything around him is satisfactory. When it’s not, a team such as the Philadelphia Phillies can tag him for eight runs in three innings, as they did Friday in Philadelphia.

Garcia has struggled on the road throughout his career. He has a 15-12 record with a 4.40 earned-run average in road games, but he is 20-11 with a 2.45 ERA in his career at Busch Stadium where he is more familiar with the surroundings and can comfortably prepare for a game the same way every time.

But one more change might have factored into Friday’s poor performance. Regular catcher Yadier Molina had a day off for the first time all season. Tony Cruz got the start instead.

So without his regular home routine and normal catcher, Garcia gave up eight runs on nine hits and two walks. Sure, third baseman Ty Wigginton made a throwing error in the first inning to make four of their eight runs unearned, but four of the Phillies hits went for extra bases, so Garcia got hit around regardless.

Unfortunately, Garcia has too many of those nights, and that keeps him from being one of the better pitchers on not only the Cardinals, but in Major League Baseball.

He has the stuff. He throws his fastball in the low 90s with movement, he has a knee-buckling curveball and owns a changeup that is as good as any top-tier left-handed starter in the game. And when he has those pitches working correctly, he has the potential to throw a no-hitter.

But he also has nights when he can’t command those pitches and simply gets crushed.

That has been the main problem Garcia has fought throughout his five-year career. He looks like a pitcher who can dominate, and at times he does, but mind games tend to get in the way of him being a consistent pitcher who can fill a spot near the top of the rotation.

The problem is Garcia now has five years of big-league experience, and he hasn’t been able to get over those issues.

The Cardinals are aware of these issues. They’ve even manipulated the rotation in recent years to try to minimize the times Garcia has to pitch on the road.

And while it’s great his team is trying to help him out, Garcia has to get past those concentration issues at some point or he is going to become the next Oliver Perez, a left-handed starter who came up with the San Diego Padres in 2002.

Perez, who is now a reliever for the Seattle Mariners, had electric stuff when he debuted and even posted a 2.98 ERA with 12 wins for the Pittsburgh Pirates in 2004, but his inconsistency kept him from being Johan Santana or any number of other great left-handed starters.

For the most part, Garcia has had a good start to his 2013 season. He pitched well in spring training after recovering from a shoulder injury and started this season well in his first start on the road. He held the Arizona Diamondbacks to one run in 5.2 innings April 2 in Phoenix and then made two solid starts at home before the Phillies shelled him Friday.

Maybe Molina’s absence had more to do with the poor outing than anything, or perhaps he simply had an off night. All pitchers do. But Garcia is going to have to get beyond those relatively minor differences in each start if he is going to not only help the Cardinals in 2013, but also live up to his long-term potential.

A big thunderstorm helped the St. Louis Cardinals avoid a possible loss Tuesday when they trailed the Pittsburgh Pirates 4-2 after two innings in Pittsburgh, but they got an even bigger break by not having to play a doubleheader the following day.

The Cardinals and Pirates left the schedule unchanged and played just a single game Wednesday evening. They certainly had time to play another game that afternoon, but that would’ve been a minor disaster for the Cardinals pitching staff.

They wouldn’t have been able to bring Jake Westbrook back because he had already thrown the two innings Tuesday, so they would’ve had to find a replacement starter at the worst possible time.

See, the Cardinals are currently on a 10-day roadtrip and a 13-game stretch without an off day. They didn’t play April 11 before a three-game set with the Milwaukee Brewers, and they won’t have another scheduled off day until April 25 as they travel home from Washington to face the Pirates for three games.

So the Cardinals are already in a tough part of their schedule, especially with good teams in the Philadelphia Phillies and the Washington Nationals up next, and a doubleheader Wednesday would’ve really hampered their pitching staff heading into those games.

Shelby Miller was going to be the Cardinals starter for Wednesday’s regularly scheduled game regardless, but the Cardinals would’ve had to scramble to find someone to start the make-up game.

Joe Kelly might have been an option, but he pitched two innings Monday, and the Cardinals probably wouldn’t have let him pitch very deep into the game since he is now supposed to be a full-time relief pitcher.

If not Kelly, the Cardinals would’ve had to bring somebody up from the minor leagues to make an emergency start, and that wouldn’t have been good for anybody. Sure, Michael Wacha or Seth Maness could fill in if necessary, provided they didn’t just pitch a day or two before for the Triple-A Memphis Redbirds, but the Cardinals would’ve had to make corresponding roster moves to make space for a one-day appearance by a minor-league pitcher.

Plus, the bullpen would almost certainly be strained because of a doubleheader early in the roadtrip.

Cardinals starters let the bullpen rest throughout the weekend against the Brewers, as the team needed just five innings from relievers in the three games against Milwaukee, but their workload would’ve changed instantly with a doubleheader.

None of the Cardinals’ options to start the make-up game would’ve been allowed to go deep into the game no matter how well the starter pitched, so the bullpen would have to cover significant portions of at least one game while still providing normal support in the nightcap.

All of a sudden the relievers would have racked up innings heading into four games against the Phillies. That, in turn, would put pressure on the starters to again pitch deep into games to try and save the bullpen from an overwhelming workload.

A major-league bullpen requires a delicate balance between not enough work and too much work, and the Cardinals bullpen almost certainly would’ve struggled to maintain that balance because the team simply had so many games in a relatively short period of time.

This wasn’t going to be an easy roadtrip in any case, but a doubleheader on the third day of the trip would’ve really made this part of the schedule difficult to survive. It certainly would’ve been difficult for the Cardinals to thrive in that situation and run off several wins against the Phillies and Nationials.

But as it stands, the Cardinals were given a respite Tuesday. They were already down two runs just two innings into the game, and Westbrook looked anything but sharp.

Of course, the game will have to be made up at some point, likely during a four-game series in late July when the Cardinals are scheduled to play in Pittsburgh.

A five-game series would surely create issues at that point in the season, but for now the Cardinals can attack the rest of the roadtrip without that potential loss on their record, and everyone got another day of rest leading into some important games on the road.