Cishek joins Cardinals, ready for anything

Reliever Steve Cishek might be even more versatile than the St. Louis Cardinals envisioned.

“Whenever my spot comes up,” the 29-year-old Cishek said Saturday afternoon of what his role will be with St. Louis. “We have a great bullpen here. I’m just here to do whatever.

“I’m a relatively quiet guy. I like to just follow along with whatever Skipper (Mike Matheny) says. If he wants me to pitch the sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, 10th, play right field if we run out of position players, sure enough, I’ll do it. I just want to do anything to help the team win. That’s all I’m concerned about.”

Cishek, who was 2-6 with a 4.50 ERA in 32 games with the Miami Marlins, was traded to the Cardinals on Friday for Class AA Springfield reliever Kyle Barraclough.

Cishek said he couldn’t have been traded to a better organization. He recently became aware that the Cardinals were one of the teams interested in him.

“D.J. is great at informing the players that trade talks have popped up amongst guys on the team,” Cishek said of Marlins manager Dan Jennings. “He would pull us aside and ask us if we wanted to know what was going on. I said, ‘Yeah, sure.’ I’m not typically one to read too much or look into things, but he told me there’s a chance the Cardinals were looking and a couple of other teams. So I had that in the back of my mind.

“I remember telling my wife, ‘If I were to be traded to the Cardinals, it would be the best situation possible. We could move to Jupiter.’ Spring training’s in Jupiter and this is a winning organization.”

News of the trade landed in Cishek’s lap Friday morning while the Marlins were in San Diego.

“I pitched (Thursday) night and (Friday) morning I woke up and had breakfast with a couple of teammates,” Cishek said. “We were talking about possible trades, just messing around like we always do. Sure enough, when I got back to the room, Mike Hill (the Marlins’ president of baseball operations) and Dan Jennings called and let me know what was going on.

“I’ve been with the Marlins since ’07, so it was hard to say good-bye to a lot of those guys. And I respect Mike Hill and D.J. to the fullest. I’m thankful to the organization. They made my dream come true to be a big-league pitcher, but I’m thrilled to be here.”

Since the Cardinals and Marlins both train at the Roger Dean Stadium complex, Cishek became familiar with the success in St. Louis.

“It’s incredible,” he said. “Even in spring training when you see all the championships up there, you kind of get jealous. The Marlins have a pretty decent track record, having two, but when you see everything that goes on with the Cardinals, you just know when you play this team, it’s going to be a battle. Everyone’s out to beat the Cardinals. I like being a part of that action.”

Cishek knows several Cardinals, which he expects will make for an easy transition.

“Yeah, we do a lot of Bible studies together in Jupiter during spring training, so I got to know Adam (Wainwright) a little bit, (Matt) Holliday. And (Randy) Choate, obviously, playing with him (in Miami),” Cishek said. “I’ve talked to (Trevor) Rosenthal a little bit in the past. I got to meet him this spring. So it’s not like I’m coming into a bunch of strangers. These guys have welcomed me with open arms and I’m thankful for that.”

Cishek got off to a rocky start this season. He had a 6.98 ERA on May 31, then was optioned to Class AA Jacksonville to iron out some mechanical issues.

Since June 14, the side-arming Cishek is 1-1 with a 0.71 ERA in 13 games.

“When you’re not feeling right mechanically after a while and you’re not getting the results, it can mess you up mentally a little bit,” Cishek said. “I was kind of going through that early on in the year. I was just throwing a little lower than I typically did. I felt like I got my arm slot where it needed to be, but I wasn’t getting results.

“So they sent me down to Double-A, and rightfully so. I wasn’t performing like I’m capable of performing. I was able to fine-tune some things there and get back on the right track. ... I was just getting underneath my pitches. It took away some velocity and my sinker flattened out. Especially to lefties, I had a really hard time locating a down-and-away strike. It would just take off. All they would do is sit on my slider and they were just knocking it around.”

This story was originally published July 25, 2015 at 5:58 PM with the headline "Cishek joins Cardinals, ready for anything."