Thunder and Lightning: Prospects Walker and Winn represent the Cardinals’ future
.jpg "St. Louis Cardinals shortstop Masyn Winn takes up his position during the first inning of a spring training baseball game against the Houston Astros Thursday, March 2, 2023, in Jupiter, Fla. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)")
They have been opponents, members of the same draft class, teammates, roommates, best friends, fiercest challengers, strongest support systems, and countless things more.
Their professional careers, compacted into the last three years and two months, have unfolded nearly in parallel, one trailing slightly behind the other.
Now, again, they’re an undeniable tandem. Jordan Walker and Masyn Winn, thunder and lightning, number 18 and number 0, representative of a 180-degree turn of the doldrums of a lost season.
One of them has been in the big leagues for three months. One is on his first day. Together, if all unfolds as they hope, they represent perhaps the next 10 years of Cardinals baseball. No pressure, but no denying it.
“I don’t know if you can call it sleep. I didn’t get too much,” Winn said of his last night before making his debut. “I feel like I was a little bit more nervous yesterday than I was today. I feel pretty good right now, a little relaxed. I’m sure that’ll change when the game starts, but just overwhelmed with emotions, for sure.”
Two months and one day older than Walker, Winn was selected from Triple-A Memphis ahead of Friday’s matchup with the Mets. The move was announced late Thursday but filed officially the next morning with exactly 45 days remaining in the season’s calendar.
That’s no accident; by not exceeding that number of days on the roster (or recording more than 130 at bats), Winn remains eligible to compete for rookie of the year in 2024. If he were to win or finish second, he would receive a cash reward; the Cardinals, should he make the team on opening day and be so honored, would receive a draft pick at the end of the first round.
“I just didn’t think they were going to call me up at some point this year,” Winn admitted. “I thought it was going to be [on] 2024 Opening Day. When I got told yesterday, I almost started crying. It’s something definitely, definitely surreal. I just didn’t expect it to come so soon.”
In a corresponding move to make room for Winn on the active roster, Lars Nootbaar was placed on the 10-day injured list after suffering a testicular contusion on Wednesday night.
Winn will take over shortstop in the short term as Tommy Edman returns to centerfield. Drafted as a two-way player, his outrageous athleticism and unparalleled throwing arm in the infield were always leading edge indicators of his push to the big leagues. The challenge, as the Cardinals saw it, was whether his bat would follow along at pace.
This season, played entirely at Triple-A Memphis, Winn is hitting a career-best .288 with 18 home runs and 17 stolen bases. That offensive breakout has been accompanied by a 15 point jump in fielding percentage. In the 2022 MLB Futures Game, he memorably uncorked a throw from short which registered in excess of 100 miles per hour.
It’s difficult to turn a routine grounder to short into a headline play in a game full of the sport’s top prospects. That it happened is a measure not only of his tools, but also a testament to the excitement and athleticism that follows him between the lines.
After all, if your middle name is Blaze, you’d be best served to be pretty fast.
Once Walker spent sufficient time in the majors to no longer qualify as a prospect, Winn became the Cardinals’ top ranked up and comer. MLB Pipeline lists him as the 32nd-best prospect in the sport; they also estimate that he’ll arrive in 2024.
Over the last three weeks, it’s been clear that the Cardinals intended to beat that prediction. President of Baseball Operations John Mozeliak conceded in the days approaching the trade deadline that Winn’s arrival was inevitable, if not exactly imminent. Mozeliak feigned ignorance then of the 45-day mark, but it has been clear for weeks that there was no other impediment to Winn’s arrival.
All gas, very little brakes. Everything around Winn happens quickly. It’s hardly a surprise that he accelerated around yet another learning curve and beat the best timing guesses.
This is a moment that Winn and Walker have been anticipating in tandem since first arriving together at the team’s alternate site in Springfield late in the summer of 2020. They talked about arriving, but also about staying, and about winning. The plan, for years, has been to win a World Series in St. Louis. That path is open to them starting Friday night.
“This is all throughout the minor leagues,” an animated Walker said. “We just kept talking about, ‘wait ‘til we get to the big leagues, wait ‘til we get to the big leagues.’ I’m really excited to be here with him.”
“We want to be here for a while,” Winn said. “We want to win. We want to win a lot of games. This organization historically is a very winning organization. That’s something we want to be a part of – go to the playoffs, have that experience, win a World Series.”
That is, in large part, now in their hands.
