Per lots of outlets on Twitter and elsewhere, sorry I don’t have the person who had it first.
To me, this makes no sense. There should be at least 5 guys ahead of Cleto on the path to the majors regardless of what kind of stuff he throws. Cleto was not above A ball before this season. Mitchell Boggs was JUST in the majors last week. Broderick and Jess Todd have been in the majors this year as well. Raul Valdes can probably give you a few replacement level innings in a pinch.
Sometimes, I have no idea what the Cardinals are doing and what their plan is. This is one of those times.
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I have really enjoyed Chris Duncan’s analysis on 101.1
He called this move yesterday (both moves in fact).
Well done little Dunc.
On the move itself—-definitely interesting. I guess we have decided that this will be a power armed pen henceforth….or Clato may be attractive for a trade in the near future.
I have been pleasantly pleasantly surprised by Chris Duncan’s work as well. He comes in prepared with numbers and doesn’t just give you conventional wisdom/talking points. As for calling both moves, it is almost as if he has access to a contact with the team that is providing inside information…
okay, so i saw something about this being mentioned yesterday but I guess I was just figuring it was a different Chris Duncan. Not so, I see. Interesting.
If he’s “predicting” moves like these then he’s obviously using some sort of inside knowledge. Why would Dave and Tony do or allow this? Or, possibly, are they giving him special inside info (which is also fairly harmless information) just to make him a valuable radio commodity?
Seems out of character for two guys who virtually never let inside information leak unless done in a controlled, and controlling, way.
Come on. Does everything have to be a conspiracy?
The guy is doing a great job. Correctly predicting who is going to come up — especially with all these injuries and a limited group of possibilities on the 40-man roster — doesn’t mean there’s any espionage.
I wasn’t aware Cleto was previously on the 40-man. If he was, sorry. Didn’t realize. If he wasn’t, I’d still think it to be a stretch to promote him.
I think this is a showcase for a future trade at the deadline. To SD for Bell?
Why do we need Bell? I still fail to see the attraction in a right-handed reliever when we have four such players with sub-4.00 FIPs (and four with sub-4.00 ERAs, if that’s your poison).
My thoughts are these:
1) Todd and Broderick already struggled at the majors this year and there is no sign yet that they have figured out the flaw and changed it. Might as well give Cleto a shot.
2) Boggs is being stretched back into the starter role so he can be a swing man in the bullpen. He is not ready yet. It is more important for him to get stretched out and improve before returning than leaving Cleto at AA.
3) They are shopping him.
4) Franklin and Batista have outlived their usefulness with this team. I appreciate Franklin for what he did over the last 3-4 years. He was fantactic, even if not dominating. But we should not have 13 arms in the pen simply because we cannot rely on those two to get any useful innings. Odd moves are not necessary if the bullpen is filled with quality guys. I understand trying to allow guys to get right, but we are in June and neither is showing many signs.
1) So you immediately jump to the freshly promoted high A (up to AA) guy who is known for control issues and has never pitched higher than A ball?
2) Boggs is the best option. And he’s not being stretched into a starters role. And you don’t go down to stretch out into a swing man or long man position. The cardinals virtually never use those types of pitchers so why would you prepare someone for that role? By the time you used them, they’d be back out of “swing man” shape, or whatever.
And for what it’s worth, i have virtually no idea behind the thinking of the move to AAA.
3) Very possible, but I’m not 100% sure moving him up to face mlb hitters is the best way to “showcase” him.
4) Yes, which is why we ask, “why are they on the team?” Honestly, if they just dfa’d Franklin, I could live with Batista for a little while longer. He’s at least been successful at times this year despite himself.
Or, just to play the cynic, because Brendan Ryan has shown success in his northwest outpost, the Cards brass plans on taking a low risk chance to quiet the message boards. Mister Cleto has been pitching reasonably well this season and if he has a brief cameo where he does not implode, management can say look what we got for a light-hitting shortstop.
Had the same thoughts.
Guess we can call it an implosion. I think he’s just amped up that or the hitters at Palm Beach swing at absolutely everything because I have no clue how he could throw like this in High A ball and only walk 1 or 2 hitters per 9 innings. The HR’s weren’t that bad because they were over the plate and he was obviously just trying to throw any strike on them. Either way he rebounded well. Guess we are going to see him for 3 innings and he can show he can hold his velocity.
Az actually posted several good reasons for this move in the comments on Viva El Birdos. Won’t copy ‘em here, but (there is too much, let me sum up) the facts that (1) Cleto is on the 40-man, (2) Lynn’s on 3-days rest and the bullpen already has been used, and (3) the team doesn’t want to yo-yo Boggs are all factors.
Totally agree…. I think the 40 man has everything to do with this.
1)Todd… the guy has nice off speed stuff… but needs to show he can return to form
2) Broderick…. at this point he needs to pitch at AAA… he already struggled with Washington..that was a big gamble that Washington took trying to take a guy from AA and have him last all year on the 25 man roster.
3) I think this move of bringing Cleto up is a short move… it is very possible that he is up for today as back up insurance and then gets sent back to AA and Mark Hamilton gets promoted again to STL to replace him
(I suspect the Cleto move is a short move… there will be a secondary move after today’s game)
Anyway, Cleto needs to continue to work at AA and AAA at leats for the rest of this season to hone his pitches.
Yup. Just a short term solution and insurance for Lynn. If Lynn scuffles then Cleto will fall on the grenade for a few innings and the Cardinals get to gauge him against MLB hitters (albeit the nameless Giants’ hitters). I agree that this move was made only because Cleto was on the 40 man. I’m kind of excited to see how far he has progressed and how far he has to go.
I will be watching tonight’s game closely… very interested to see these two pitch to ML hitters… 2 hrs 50 mins till game time!!!
Yeah I also agree with this analysis. And even if Lynn is pitching decently, I reckon we’ll see Cleto at some point tonight–(I would hope) that a minor-leaguer on super short rest will be on a strict pitch count in his MLB debut during a relatively meaningless game.
I have an inexplicable prospect crush on Maikel Cleto. There I said it.
Me too. It’s a one game strategy. Rest the bullpen and throw two guys that the opposition’s never seen before. Cleto goes back to AA pretty quick if not tomorrow.
Cleto has done nothing but impress. Given on 40 man, I see no downside here. Who’s to say it has to be short term? Probably is, but it isn’t like a hot rookie can’t fit in anywhere……..
When there is a call up it has to fall within the starting pitcher’s pitching day, Cleto and Lynn are they closest they would get to those days, Cleto on the 40 man and well lets face it, Lynn was bound to be there soon. He deserves that for sure.
And after using Batista, Franklin and Salas, last night (?) they need them. They most likely didn’t get in their pens this week, so even on short rest for both, they could each put in 100 innings between them.
I am not so sure about Boggs getting called up, he may have to be the guy to take over for McClellan and I am not sure he is ready. The problem is that, as you see with what has happened to McClellan there are pitfalls going from reliever to starter.
Also a good time to show them off, if they do well, it works out for everyone.
Is Boggs even eligible? I think there is a requirement that they stay in the minors for a period of time (15 days?) before they can be brought back. Although I think that is waived in the case of an injury?
There is nothing about promoting Cleto that makes any sense to me. No matter how you swing it or try to justify it I can’t see one good reason to promote him over others. I took some time before commenting on this thread just to try to get my hands around it.
40 man roster, he was the sacrifical lamb this time in case Lynn got shelled early. Boggs is working on stretching out his arm and working on his pitches. They would rather him continue to get his work in then call him back up thinking he might have to pitch and send him back down and work on what he neesd to again. It makes perfect sense.
I get that he was on the 40 man but we have flexibility on our 40 man as we had 2 or 3 open spots on the 40 man. 1 was used for Lynn so we at least had 1 more. I am also quite baffled by what they are doing with Boggs. Like I said – no way that you swing it does it make sense to bring up a guy with 5 appearances above A level that only consistently throws one good pitch, the FB. Control is an issue which doesn’t bode well for someone that will be nervous and amped up to make his MLB debut. This is one of the biggest head scratchers I have seen in some time from a callup perspective.
He was the sacrificial lamb that’s all. Why add someone to the 40 man roster? Our pen in Memphis sucks. I guess we could have sent Todd or Brodrieck up for mop up duties. But I think we wantead to showcase Cleto’s arm.
Well I hate to disagree with you but he looked pretty good in his 2nd inning tonight after he quit trying to over throw pitches. His off speed stuff in the 2nd inning looked pretty good in fact. Looks to me like his whole problem is when he tries to throw 98 & 99 mph fb’s. When he slows down to 96 he is able to control himself a lot better on his follow through and not spin his body to the right side thus opening up his left side to the batter. When he gets this under control he will be an outstanding pitcher.
It was 1 outing and more times than not his control looked subpar as it has most of his career. You can disagree and thats fine…we all have our opinions on things but I am beyond baffled of the premature promotion for Cleto. They talk all the time about not rushing prospects to the bigs and then they do this. 5 total appears above High A. 5.
Horrid defense behind him and he’s basically put into an impossible situation – not that different from Lynn – I hope Cards fans watched and saw what happened. Cleto actually impressed me
The defense tonight was absurd. Theriot is a total joke at SS. And TLR said the double play ball was a bullet at him and that he deserved credit for staying in front of the ball. Please!!! You can add that play to RT’s fielding ratings. On a side note can Rasmus please take charge in the OF and call the balls instead of looking at the LF’dr who has no chance of catching the ball.
Ouch… that was fun. Wouldn’t be surprised if he heads back to Springfield.
I’m fine with the Cleto move if it was just meant as a short term thing to give the team protection against a Lynn meltdown on 3 days rest. Why bring back Boggs to the show only to turn around and demote him? Would mess with his head even more than it already has been. However, Dan McG said during the broadcast that they intend to keep Cleto up “to see what he can do”. That took me by surprise. Boggs has been jobbed if the organization is giving a real and sustained shot to a kid who has thrown 25 innings above A. Crazy. As CardinalJim suggested, one has to wonder if the shadow of Brendan Ryan hangs over this promotion. I hate to think this is the case … but can’t dismiss it either.
The promotion had everything to do with Cleto being the only pitcher who is both on the 40-man and stretched out. This was actually one of the least head-scratching moves I’ve ever seen the Cardinals make. Don’t over think this.
Don’t under think it Azru. Boggs is on the 40 man roster. 6/2 was his scheduled day to pitch. We DL’ed a pitcher so he could have been promoted. I’m not buying the stretched out argument. A starter in Batvia is stretched out also but one has to take into account professional experience when trying to project how many innings you can get out of the pitcher at the MLB level. If Lynn could only go 3 innings and the team needed at least 3 innings from the guy brought up, who has the best chance of delivering 3 quality innings against MLB hitters: Boggs or a guy with 26 innings pitched above A? Wasn’t it a very good possibility that Cleto, given his lack of experience, would be so amped up that he couldn’t throw strikes? I can see arguing for Cleto (the not yoyo’ing Boggs argument) but you jumped the shark by arguing it’s a no brainer. Way too dismissive.
If Boggs pitched in the majors on 6/2, then who would consume his innings at Memphis?
The job the Cards wanted was a pitcher to back up Lynn for one evening. They considered who was on the 40 man already, the pitching schedules at AA and AAA, and chose Cleto to make a guest appearance.
Its good Cleto gave up HRs or people would be clamoring for him to stay with the big club.