Cardinals minor league spring training notebook: 03/24/13

On Sunday, the St. Louis Cardinals’ Memphis and Springfield clubs remained in Jupiter, while Palm Beach and Peoria again took the bus ride to Port St. Lucie, with the New York Mets their opponent as well.

The major league club also faced the Mets at Jupiter, with non-MLB camp invitees Mitch Harris, Luis Mateo and Patrick Wisdom appearing there. Though ex-Navy man Harris’ story is inspiring, his deployment in a big league game seemed premature, even before he took the Roger Dean mound.

On the other side of the coin, St. Louis outfielder Carlos Beltran had five at-bats with one hit. With which of these four minor league club(s) he played was not disclosed. The outfielder is testing a sore toe, injured before the World Baseball Classic. Keeping him out of St. Louis’ games now would enable the club to back-date his disabled list stay to open the season if need be. With his back injury, third baseman David Freese may be in a similar situation. Because DL time can be backdated nine days into spring training, they could miss as little as the first six days/five games of the regular season.

A day after Saturday brought an offensive explosion, the pitching reigned supreme on Sunday. Only 16 runs were scored in total by both organizations in the four games. The two systems split down the middle, with two wins each. Springfield and Peoria were victorious. The Cardinals’ spring record against external minor league competition is now 14-16-6.

As he has been doing the last few seasons, Cardinals farm director John Vuch is sharing game stats. As always, the raw numbers are his, but the comments and players of the day are mine.

Sunday’s Pitcher of the Day: Drafted back in 2007, Deryk Hooker’s (pictured) top prospect status has faded, but on Sunday, the right-hander threw three shutout innings for Memphis. The 23-year-old allowed no hits, walked just one and fanned two.

Sunday’s Player of the Day: The only Cardinal to score or drive in more than one run on Sunday was Springfield’s Xavier Scruggs. The first baseman repeats as our top player from Saturday by knocking in two of the Double-A club’s three runs via a home run.

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The entire system view by level and position as last season ended is available via the Roster Matrix, free, right here at The Cardinal Nation Blog.

Las Vegas 3, Memphis (6-4-1) 1

Memphis pitching IP H ER BB K Notes Memphis hitting AB R H RBI 2B 3B HR BB Notes
Richard Castillo 4 5 2 2 1 Has already put in two years at Springfield Ryan Jackson 3 1 1 Hard to find fault with a .500 OBP
Kevin Siegrist 2 2 1 1 1 Will the lefty be moved into relief? Help may be needed C.J. McElroy 1 1 Not a StL game, but still a big step up
Deryk Hooker 3 0 0 1 2 Very effective outing Mike O’Neill 2 1 1 Has hit at every level while improving
Justin Christian 3 1 Just down from big-league camp
Brock Peterson 1

Springfield (4-4-3) 3, Binghamton 2

Springfield pitching IP H ER BB K Notes Springfield hitting AB R H RBI 2B 3B HR BB Notes
Scott Gorgen 3 3 0 1 2 Healthy and making his bid James Ramsey 4 1 2 First-rounder in 2012 is in first camp
Michael Blazek 3 1 0 2 40-man roster spot is his – needs to get into StL picture Xavier Scruggs 1 1 2 1 Saturday’s Player of the Day repeats two big RBIs
Corey Baker 1.2 2 2 2 1 A big step up from Batavia, where he was in 2011-12 Audry Perez 4 2 First game since leaving St. Louis club
Anderson Gerdel 1 2 0 1 Anthony Garcia 3 1 TCN’s #10 prospect hasn’t been here in awhile
Tyler Rahmatulla 3 1 1 Was honored with an StL appearance on Saturday
Danny Stienstra 1 1
Matt Williams 1

St. Lucie 3, Palm Beach (5-3-3) 0

Palm Beach pitching IP H ER BB K Notes Palm Beach hitting AB R H RBI 2B 3B HR BB Notes
Tyrell Jenkins 3.2 2 0 4 4 May have thrown a lot of pitches, but no runs scored Jeremy Schaffer 4 2 Thin 1B position creates opening for 2012 JC bopper
Ryan Sherriff 1 2 2 Only 30 walks in 147 1/3 career innings Adam Ehrlich 2 1 1 Catcher continues to hit in camp
Brandon Creath 1.2 2 1 2 2 Matt Young 1
Norge Paredes 2 0 2 1 Sterling 0.75 ERA in 2012 Gulf Coast League Jordan Walton 1 1 Had just five doubles in 133 PAs bet. Batavia and QC

Peoria (3-7-1) 3, Savannah 1

Peoria pitching IP H ER BB K Notes Peoria hitting AB R H RBI 2B 3B HR BB Notes
Kyle Helisek 4 3 0 1 2 30th rounder last June had 3.42 ERA in NYPL rotation Michael Swinson 5 1 2 1 1 Has the wheels and is getting the hits, too
Joey Donofrio 2 0 2 31st rounder last June had 1.23 ERA bet. GCL and JC David Washington 5 3 1 A tremendous week for the first baseman
Zach Petrick 2 1 0 50:9 strikeout to walk ratio in 45 2/3 innings with JC Anthony Melchionda 1 1 1
Josh Renfro 2 3 1 1 Rowan Wick 1 1 Seems like more C 3Bs than any other pos’n. this spring
Bruce Caldwell 1
Trevor Martin 1

Monday will mark the fourth of six scheduled camp days this spring. Memphis and Springfield will meet as will Palm Beach and Peoria on the Cardinals side of the Roger Dean complex.

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