With Pham waived and Walker recalled, Cardinals insist they’re still in playoff hunt
Manager Oli Marmol said that the St. Louis Cardinals don’t view moving on from Tommy Pham and turning back to Jordan Walker as a repudiation of their belief that they can still contend for a postseason spot, but the team is committing to giving one of its most important young hitters “a run of games here” in the season’s final month.
Walker was recalled on Friday afternoon to take Pham’s roster spot after the latter was designated for assignment a month after being acquired from the Chicago White Sox at the trade deadline. The Cardinals initially placed Pham on waivers on Thursday in order to allow him to be claimed by a team with championship aspirations within the requisite 48-hour window before Sept. t, the date by which a player must be under contract with an organization to be postseason-eligible.
“In talking to Tommy, we had a couple conversations, and during those conversations, he felt like it would be better for his career for this move to be made, so we granted it,” Marmol explained.
The recall of Walker is his second this month, though the first was under unusual circumstances.
Set to face a run of left-handed starters against the Cincinnati Reds and Los Angeles Dodgers, the Cardinals attempted to arrest their fall in the standings by turning to Walker’s power potential. He went just 1-for-11 in his week-long return with the one hit coming against Reds righty reliever Fernando Cruz.
Now, with slugging first baseman Luken Baker up from Memphis and on the bench as a potential righty pinch hitting threat for late in games, Walker can be freed from that role and given an opportunity to get into a real rhythm in the majors and continue the work which has seen what might have been a mostly lost season find some traction and productivity in the minors.
“Development takes time,” Marmol said. “There’s phases to it, and there’s ups and downs to development. But as long as you’re headed in the right direction as far as the adjustments that need to be made and the intentionality of those. Whether they carry over immediately in the game, that’s the unpredictability of what we do. But the work is headed in that direction.”
Coming and already created roster flexibility also make it easier for the Cardinals to commit to Walker, even as they insist that their goal is to reach the playoffs. Rosters expand by one pitcher and one position player on Sunday and the pending return of Michael Siani from an oblique strain will give the Cardinals yet another glove-first option that can take over in the outfield if Baker is used as a pinch hitter for a lefty like Siani himself, Lars Nootbaar, or Victor Scott II.
Brendan Donovan, who leads the team in starts in left field with 85, has taken over full-time residency at second base since Nolan Gorman’s demotion to the minors on August 21. That opens up an outfield slot which the Cardinals intend for Walker to ably fill.
Entering play on Friday against the Yankees, the Cardinals were in third place in the NL Central, 11 games behind the Milwaukee Brewers and one game behind the Chicago Cubs. They were trailing by six games in the race for the final NL Wild Card spot, chasing the Cubs, New York Mets, and Atlanta Braves, who currently hold the slot.
Pham is the second player the Cardinals acquired at the trade deadline to be moved off the active and 40-player rosters within the last week. The other, reliever Shawn Armstrong, was claimed by the Cubs on Friday in a move that both helps fortify their bullpen and also prevents competitors from placing their own claim on the righty.
MLB’s elimination of the Aug. 31 waiver trade deadline in the newest collective bargaining agreement has given teams an incentive to flood the waiver wire with veterans who might be claimed for a postseason run, allowing the waiving teams to get out of a month of salary payments while also providing players with a chance to play for a championship.
Still, Marmol and the Cardinals insist that their white flags remain defiantly stowed.
In contrast to 2023, where playing out the string took on a new meaning in St. Louis, this year’s intent is to remain competitive until the instant of their mathematical elimination. If moving on from Armstrong and Pham read from the outside like a team willing to capitulate, the Cardinals remain publicly defiant of that stance.
Whether or not they can actually make up enough ground for the games to matter in the standings, they do remain determined for them to matter from a development perspective, and this most recent commitment to Walker is a demonstration of that.
“I want to be super clear when I say this,” Marmol insisted, “I think Jordan Walker has a chance to be a real game-changing impact player for a very long time for this organization. In order to do that, he’s going to need the at-bats, but he’s also going to need some real adjustments throughout those at-bats for him to become that player, and I do have confidence in his ability to do that.”
Over the next 28 games, the Cardinals are committed to removing any and all barriers to Walker’s ability to justify that confidence.