St. Louis Cardinals farm director Gary LaRocque talks to Redbird Rants

St. Louis Cardinals farm director Gary LaRocque took some time recently to talk with Redbird Rants.

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Daniel Solzman: Gary, thanks for joining Redbird Rants today. How are things treating you in St. Louis?

Gary LaRocque: Everything’s going well. How are you?

Daniel Solzman: I’m good. You were named as farm director prior to the 2013 season. How many minor league games do you try and attend each season?

Gary LaRocque: I schedule to see each team a couple of times, which varies sometimes because of schedules, sometimes in and out, home schedules and so forth. I do see affiliates, from the Gulf Coast League and up, twice and that includes, by the way, extended time in Extended Spring. I spend close to twenty days in the first two months in Extended Spring Training. You have the two Class A clubs and then also a trip to the Dominican Republic. That’s pretty much what I do in terms of the number of minor league games that I try and attend.

Daniel Solzman: You were considered for the General Manager position with the Arizona Diamondbacks a few months ago but decided to stay with the Cardinals. Is this a statement to the success of the Cardinals organization over the last several years?

Gary LaRocque: Well, I realized throughout the entire process that clearly I was fortunate to be here with the Cardinals and in the role I’m in, I really have enjoyed it. I went through that process. It worked its course. In the end, I made the decision to stay and clearly pleased. I’ve been here—this starts my eighth year—so I’m really pleased to be here with the history and success of the organization. It’s great to be a part of it.

Daniel Solzman: You have an impressive resume from your time with the Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Mets, and the St. Louis Cardinals. Outside of David Wright, is there another prospect that you signed who really stands out?

Gary LaRocque: I think the two that stood out the most were David and Scott Kazmir. He made it quick once he moved on and made the All-Star team. He’s set to come back, as you know. I think he and David have stood out in terms of what were prospects at the beginning that have made it the big leagues.

There’s been others. There’s been other names that we’ve added the list. There’s Heath Bell and Angel Pagan and others. But David and Scott have stood out the most.

Daniel Solzman: We touched on Stephen Piscotty back in November but what prospects could we see make their debut this year?

Gary LaRocque: Without singling out anyone, I think the idea is to be ready in the minor leagues and have players positioned. I wouldn’t single one player out. If you look back at the last few years—two years ago, we had 19 players contribute to the Major Leagues. Last year, we had about half of that contribute to the Major Leagues so without singling anyone out, it’s possible that we have players ready to contribute. That’s really the goal and we want to continue that with what we’ve done in the last two years and help where needed and have players ready for the Major Leagues.

Jun 1, 2013; Tallahassee, FL, USA; Florida State pitcher Luke Weaver (7) delivers a pitch during the Tallahassee regional of the 2013 NCAA baseball tournament at Dick Howser Stadium. Image Credit: Rob Foldy-USA TODAY Sports

Daniel Solzman: What should we expect out of Luke Weaver this year?

Gary LaRocque: He returns after being monitored in his innings last year. He returns with the opportunity to get a full season in. We’ll monitor his workload like we do all of our pitchers. What you should expect is a healthy full season in the rotation. That rotation is still to be determined because he’s going to compete for a job, obviously, like everyone else when we get to Spring Training. We look forward to that we look forward to the opportunity for him to move up through the system. Inevitably, as we say, the players determine that move and we get to evaluate it.

Daniel Solzman: How shocked were you by Rowan Wick’s power output last season?

Gary LaRocque: We were all pleased for him. Once he got there to State College, it all clicked right away so we were really pleased for him. I’m not shocked at anything our players do. You put them in a position to succeed and they do all the work. It’s a credit to the work he did to prepare himself for that. Obviously, he had a great month of June and July at State College and distinguished himself right away at that level.

Daniel Solzman: With John Vuch, you have helped to strengthen the link between the Cardinals minor league organization and the major league club. In what ways will this improve the franchise in the long-term?

Gary LaRocque: I don’t really suggest that what we did has a—I’ll let others evaluate the long-term implications because the reality is we were doing what we thought was the right thing at the moment for the benefit of our continuity in instruction. It was the thought that if we had instruction in our Major League—this is not new, by the way. It was something that the Cardinals have done for a lot of years. We just kind of re-enforced it. Everybody else did all the work. The Minor League coaches, the Major League staff. So we were very fortunate that everybody worked together to create that continuity for our instruction. In reality, we have our Minor League trying to, really each year, do exactly what the Major League club wants done as far as instruction and how we go about playing the games. If it has long-term implications, we’re glad but we realized very important it was in the short-term to continue because of things the Cardinals have done over the years and we felt the responsibility to help that.

Daniel Solzman: While I realize your first year with St. Louis came during their last but do you have any special memories of either George Kissell or Dave Ricketts?

Gary LaRocque: I met George Kissell back when I was a field manager. When I first met him, he was an instructor at the time doing what he’s always done so well. I was just so impressed and enjoyed the chance to sit and talk with him. I would see him briefly over the years in different leagues. At that time, I was with the Mets and then went to the Cardinals. I had the opportunity to sit with him occasionally whenever we were at certain games where our teams would be being playing each other and I was just always so impressed. As much with the baseball end of it but certainly as a person. He was a great person. He treated everyone with great respect. Obviously, I have great and always had great respect for all he brought to the game and to the Cardinals. I really enjoyed the opportunity to speak with him and wish it could have been a lot more back then but obviously, I was not with the Cardinals at that point.

Daniel Solzman: What about Dave?

Gary LaRocque: I didn’t have as many opportunities to meet with Dave. I just didn’t have the same opportunity as I did with George.

Feb 24, 2014; Jupiter, FL, USA; St. Louis Cardinals hall of famer Red Schoendienst during photo day at Roger Dean Stadium. Image Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports

Daniel Solzman: What about Red Schoendienst? How often does he approach you with thoughts on a prospect during Spring Training these last few years?

Gary LaRocque: With Red, great opportunities in the spring. He comes to the Minor League side and watches our players. A lot of times, I will find my way over to where Red is. He will always talk about having watched a player for the last days, weeks in spring training and say what he liked about that player and how the player went about his work. To hear and be able to listen to Red talk about it, it really means a lot. I enjoy every second of it. It’s really great and we have great respect for him in having Red out there with us. It’s a wonderful moment when he comes over to the Minor League side. We really appreciate him taking the time to do that. It’s a lot of fun to catch up with him about players and how he looks at the evaluation of a player. It’s really a great moment to experience.

Daniel Solzman: What was the biggest surprise that you saw this season?

Gary LaRocque: This past season? I wouldn’t necessarily, if you don’t mind, call it a surprise. I would rather say what I was really pleased about. Obviously, the first most important thing that we were all pleased about is we played for the National League championship again. That’s the very first thing. Then the biggest, probably most important thing at that point, is all of our Minor League teams competed right through the last weekend and actually four of them went into the playoffs. Two of them won championships. The only team that was out of it earlier than that—a week or so earlier—was the Springfield club. All of our teams competed right down until the end so we were really pleased.

From that standpoint, our domestic clubs, like I said, had four playoff teams and two championship teams. Everybody else was very close. We felt pretty good about the opportunities that occurred for our clubs and what they did. We took advantage of battling right through to the end of the year. They did a great job. Springfield, the Dominican club, our DSL club, was very, very young. Springfield was out about a week or so before the last weekend but everyone else battled right down to the end so we were pleased with that.

Daniel Solzman: Thanks again for joining us.

Gary LaRocque: Appreciate it and thanks for reaching out.

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