What to expect from St. Louis Cardinals’ Jaime Garcia

We are now in a scenario where the St. Louis Cardinals are going to be relying on a hopefully relatively successful Jaime Garcia. So, with that in mind, what should be expected from the left-handed starter?

Garcia has gotten quite a bad reputation with majority of Cardinals’ fans over the course of his career and for good reason. He has been quick to hide injuries from both the media and the team and has been oft-injured throughout his career. All of this combined – the injuries and his mistrust of the team – has rubbed virtually everyone the wrong way.

Some (including myself) were quick to say good riddance at the beginning of the year when he was out with yet another setback to his shoulder injury. I even thought that when he was diagnosed with thoracic outlet syndrome last season that we had seen the last of Garcia as a starting pitcher, as it was the injury that ended Chris Carpenter and Josh Beckett‘s respective careers.

Yet, here we are awaiting another Jaime Garcia return.

Garcia, when healthy, is an absolute lights-out pitcher. In 2010 (his first full year in the league), Garcia went 13-8 with a 2.59 ERA and 1.32 WHIP. More telling was Garcia’s ERA+ that year which was 143; he had a solid season and was a welcome addition to a struggling team that failed to make the playoffs that year.

Throughout his career, Garcia has shown glimpses of being a dominant starter. In fact, he has never posted an ERA above 3.56 in his two full seasons as a starter. However, the concern for Garcia will always be health. Since 2011 he has never started over 20 games.

To start the season last year, Garcia was having a decent year (4.12 ERA through seven starts) as was the rest of the rotation, and then the injury happened. Garcia was put on the DL after his June 20 start and never returned to the team. The thing to look for with the Cardinals’ left-hander is command.

If he has command of his fastball, it will be low in the zone and will set up his dancing breaking pitches. When Garcia is on and his fastball is setting up his breaking pitches, the strikeouts will come. Throughout his career, the southpaw has a 2.74 K/BB ratio resulting in 476 strikeouts to 174 walks. Look for his changeup and sharp breaking curve to fool hitters from both sides if he is right. This will be a welcome sight to the Cardinals who have struggled through two Tyler Lyons starts and one Tim Cooney outing.

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The Cardinals are in desperate need of innings with the loss of Adam Wainwright and with Wacha and Martinez’s innings being monitored. So it is pretty important that Garcia comes in and performs and stays with the team for the remainder of the year. The next man up in this spot would be Marco Gonzales who’s not had a very good start in Triple-A so far this season despite his strong spring. If Garcia can hold down the spot, then Gonzalez can continue to improve in Memphis to prepare for the next injury or the possibility of a six-man rotation.

I think it is pretty easy to say that if Garcia is on and is healthy this team will continue their strong season and it will benefit both the starting rotation and the bullpen. One unnoticed benefit will be to the pitchers in Memphis. These pitchers will be able to develop some comfort in their spots and won’t be constantly up and down if the rotation and bullpen are consistent and not lacking performance.

My honest opinion (while guarded) is that Garcia is going to come in and pitch effectively. My hope is for at least half a season from him, if he can avoid yet-another injury. The thoracic outlet syndrome scares me – especially after what we saw happen with Carpenter, so my hope is Jaime can battle through it. If it affects him at all, he will not be effective and we will be searching yet again.

What are your expectations for Jaime?

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