Return of the Jack: St. Louis Cardinals ace Flaherty set to start against Pittsburgh

Jack Flaherty’s first rehab start of 2022 was scheduled for three innings or 45 pitches at Double-A Springfield.

He hit the innings cap in only 30 pitches, and was throttled back so as not to tax the amount of times he would start and stop. His second start, for Triple-A Memphis, was capped at 60 pitches. To get through four innings took him 59 — no walks, six strikeouts, and only one run allowed on a solo homer.

Eventually, a pitcher runs out of minor league hitters to carve up. Flaherty has arrived at that point.

In a surprise swerve, Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol announced Tuesday morning Flaherty would start for the big league Redbirds on Wednesday at Busch Stadium, rather than the minor league Redbirds in Memphis, as originally advertised.

Andre Pallante, Wednesday’s original scheduled starter, will back Flaherty in the bullpen before returning to the rotation in the spot most recently inhabited by Zack Thompson.

“He was very adamant about a couple of things,” Marmol said in his office before Tuesday’s doubleheader. “Mainly — physically and mentally — increasing not just the workload, but the intensity of what he’s doing. And that can only happen here.”

Rather than throwing 75 pitches for Memphis, Flaherty will be capped at 60 for St. Louis, shifting the physical ramp up into neutral as the mental ramp up hits overdrive.

It was that mental build Flaherty craved, and it was the experience of having traversed a rehab path in 2021 that helped him understand where and how he would best be served to respond to the challenges of returning from bursitis in his throwing shoulder that’s had him sidelined since the second day of spring training.

“I know how it felt mentally to go out and be like, OK, I got 75 (pitches) and I knew where I was at,” Flaherty said.

“Sitting in the dugout between innings in that 75-pitch rehab start, I was kind of just like, waiting for the end. I get antsy and you start wanting to be back. And it’s really easy for your mind to start drifting and start wandering.”

Flaherty’s push to return was clear earlier this week, when he took care to point out to reporters that other pitchers had been granted the opportunity to build arm strength and pitch count in the majors.

More about Flaherty’s return

He took care to explain that he would’ve been content with whatever decision the club’s performance staff eventually made, but his position was clear — he felt ready to pitch in the big leagues, his arm felt and stuff looked better than it had at any point since the 2019 season, and he believed he was ready to be a contributor at the highest level.

After a week of discussions among a wide-ranging group of decision makers in the organization, the team came to the same conclusion, culminating in a final conversation with Flaherty before Monday’s game.

“A lot of it went into the decision, and that was part of it,” Marmol said of the ability for Flaherty to build his pitch count on the job. “Can we still get 60 out of Jack and have Pallante back him and be in a very similar spot? And the answer is yes.”

From a roster management perspective, Tuesday’s doubleheader in some ways made the pitching crunch a little easier to manage. With Matthew Liberatore recalled as the 27th man to start Tuesday’s first game, the Cardinals could use their long relievers as necessary while still keeping Pallante on the shelf, comfortable to throw what will amount to his between starts work behind Flaherty.

Flaherty ready to take the bump

It also doesn’t hurt — whether or not the Cardinals are eager to admit it — the lowly Pirates are Wednesday’s opponent, giving Flaherty perhaps a softer landing than he would receive if he made his first start of the season next week in Milwaukee against the challenging Brewers.

“His preparation in the way — just his personality — how he goes about locking in for each game, doing that here is easier than replicating that down there,” Marmol said.

“I’ve given everything I have into the rehab process and everything into getting back,” Flahery said. “And working through things and making sure everything feels right. And I’ve given everything I have to where it was just about that time.”

In Flaherty, the Cardinals will deploy a pitcher who was unquestionably the best in the National League in the second half of his last full, injury-free season, and a pitcher who was well on his way to firmly establishing himself in baseball’s elite tier prior to tearing an oblique during an at bat in Los Angeles.

‘Let’s go’

The return of an ace starting pitcher not only helps alleviate an innings crisis, but also raises the overall quality level of those innings. By upsetting the established order of the rehab process, the Cardinals hope to avoid the potential for competitive chaos.

“We’re trying to win a World Series, and you’re not gonna do that on June 13 or June 14,” Flaherty recalled Marmol explaining to him. “But you know, if you feel good, and you want to be back, well, we’ll talk about it.

“And then eventually, we came to a decision like, OK, well, let’s go.”

This story was originally published June 14, 2022 at 1:04 PM.