As clock ticks, new St. Louis Cardinals manager, players anxiously await start of season
In an ordinary year, this weekend would see a ramping up of activities and arrivals at the St. Louis Cardinals’ complex in Jupiter, Florida.
Players making their first appearances of the season would fairly be classified as somewhere between early and normal arrivals, and the constant hum of activity which accompanies the onset of spring training would come to a crescendo in preparation for Wednesday’s scheduled official report date for pitchers and catchers.
Among those at the complex greeting the players would be Oli Marmol, the youngest manager in the majors, getting ready for his first season as the man in charge on the field. After a decade and a half of having different responsibilities, Marmol now has among the most of anyone on campus, and he’ll be eager to prove the sudden winter shift in the manager’s seat will pay off.
This is not, however, a normal year, and the extension of baseball’s lockout means players on the 40-man roster aren’t permitted past the wrought iron gates of the parking lot. It means the new manager isn’t quite able to craft his team. It remains to be seen whether and what the impacts on regular season performance will be.
The Cardinals have issued a blanket interview prohibition for team employees, making Marmol unavailable for comment on this story.
Were he able to freely discuss his plans for spring, there would be a chance to divine the differences that may exist between him and predecessor. Under Mike Shildt, the organization focused heavily on a return to fundamentals. New players frequently commented on the structure of an average day and the repetition of tasks that might seem simplistic but had the net effect of significantly improving the team’s defense, in turn providing support to the pitching staff.
The romance and excitement of spring carry their own meaning, and fans who have an opportunity to travel to see camp in action should seize it when possible. There remains, however, an important, practical purpose to the workout sessions, and those are only enhanced with a new hand on the wheel.
One variable which should benefit the Cardinals is the relatively small amount of turnover on the big league staff. Marmol, obviously, is a very familiar voice to the returning players, and even new bench coach Skip Schumaker has significant history with some of the team’s most important leaders.
Credibility is important
New assistant hitting coach Turner Ward also comes in with personal as well as professional bonafides; he has a long relationship with first baseman Paul Goldschmidt that should provide him instant credibility throughout the clubhouse.
That credibility is important, because to some extent, it was what the club’s decision makers believed was most missing from last year’s dugout. There was a persistent concern that hitting coach Jeff Albert’s philosophies, even if ultimately sound and productive, hadn’t been effectively communicated. Neither of 2021’s hitting coaches had played in the big leagues, and there was a belief in some circles that players were skeptical on that basis.
Both Schumaker and Ward, with their wealth of playing experience, should help fill that gap. So too would whatever work Albert did this winter to adjust his own approach, seeking to meet more hitters where they are. With a full spring, some of those bridges could be built stronger, and the offensive anchor which has weighed on the team for the past several years might be more easily wrenched up.
Hear the clock ticking
Instead, the clock ticks, and players work out in small groups at facilities scattered around the country.
Minor league camp is set to open the first week of March, and when it does, the major league staff will be able to be involved even if the lockout hasn’t yet been settled. On Wednesday, the Cardinals announced their minor league and player development staffs for the 2022 season, and newly minted Coordinator of Instruction José Oquendo is once again officially atop the organizational chart in the minors.
Oquendo resumed that role on a de facto basis in 2020 as he ran the team’s alternate site, and again took it on in 2021 as a heavily empowered roving instructor. Now he again has a title befitting his duties, and he will in part be responsible for maintaining the continuity which served as another sore spot as the club downsized following the pandemic. Cardinal alums Ryan Ludwick and Jason Isringhausen have been officially re-added as Special Advisors, supplementing and supporting Oquendo’s work at all levels.
Yet, we wait
Still, that work all flows through Marmol at its nexus, the highest ranking on-field individual in the organization. He’s more than prepared for the challenge and more than ready to lead the team on the field once the season starts, but the true value of spring training is in watching all levels move as one. It’s there that messages and lessons are refined, and there, on the back fields in Jupiter, where we will see collectively how Marmol plans to imprint himself into one of baseball’s most storied histories.
And yet we wait, reporting of all sorts in suspended animation, the fields behind Roger Dean Stadium lacking their traditional buzz. There’s still no such thing as a typical year.