Tyler Greene – Should He Stay or Should He Go?

For the past several years, 2B has been a revolving door for the St. Louis Cardinals. Ron Belliard, Hector Luna, Felipe Lopez, Aaron Miles, Skip Schumaker, Scott Spiezio; heck even Albert Pujols and So Taguchi have played at 2B for the Cardinals. So, it was considered a gift from the heavens when the Redbirds found a player in their farm system with such promise and potential as Tyler Greene.

In 2011, his best year at AAA Memphis, Greene had eye popping stats. In 66 games, he had a robust .323 batting average along with a slugging percentage of .579. His 14 homeruns, along with 19 stolen bases, 43 rbis and an OBP or .422 had the Cardinal’s front office confident and sure Tyler would make the big league transition and be our next star infielder for years to come for the ball club.

I want to state for the record that, I am not a Tyler Greene “hater”. But, I think his time in St. Louis going to come to an end very soon. I predict the St. Louis Cardinals will either trade him or waive him when the season ends if not before. Unless he really shows he can play this game at the major league level. And frankly, I think a move would be good for Tyler. While I’m not a fan of the “…change of scenery” philosophy, I think it would work wonders for Greene’s confidence and take the pressure of being the everyday second baseman for a World Championship team.

So, while I’m neither a “hater” nor a big fan of Tyler Greene, I think he should go. And the reasons are pretty obvious statistically speaking. Let’s compare last year and this year. To my surprise, I had forgotten how many players the Redbirds used at second base. If you include Tony Cruz, who played 1 inning at 2B, the St. Louis Cardinals employed EIGHT different players. In fairness, since Tony only played one inning, I’ll disregard his stats. So, out of the seven players who played second base in 2011, Tyler Greene amassed the worst stats overall offensively and defensively.

Offensively, he had a batting average of .212 in 2011 and an OBP of .322. Add to those stats, the fact he hit 5 doubles, 1 homer, and 11 stolen bases. Only rookie Pete Kozma had worse numbers offensively as he hit .176 with 17 at bats. Defensively, Tyler Greene was average with a fielding average of .950. That fielding average was last among the players who played second base in 2011. Now we can give him some consideration to the fact he only played 50+ games. But look at this year.

Offensively, Tyler Greene is batting .229, with 4homers, 7 doubles, 2 triples, 8 stolen bases. His OBP is .288 and slugging percentage is .389. Tyler strikes out a lot but, while in the minors, his batting average and speed more than made up for his strikeout rate. Those abilities have so far, failed to materialize at the major league level.

Tyler Greene appears to be a team player and a nice guy. I just don’t think he can perform at his potential in St. Louis. If I were Manager Mike Matheny, I would make Skip Schumaker my starting second baseman and start seeking a trade for Tyler Greene.