St. Louis Cardinals: Rule 5 Draft Gains and Losses

Credit: Larry Kave and the Myrtle Beach Pelicans

The Rule 5 Draft on the final day of this year’s Baseball Winter Meetings in Nashville was, as usual, buried in rumors about trades and free agents, but the St. Louis Cardinals were ready.

The St. Louis Cardinals lost 8 of its minor leaguers to the draft but picked up 3. All of the acquisitions are pitchers, while the bulk of the players taken by other teams are righthanded pitchers specifically.

Still, the three pitchers it did get represented a lot more activity than I thought, given the organizational depth and where the St. Louis Cardinals were picking — 30th, dead last. But they have to clear a roster spot for just one of the three.

The St. Louis Cardinals took soft-tossing righty Matt Bowman in the Major League phase of the draft. The team drafted the other two pitchers in the triple-A rounds, where they must stick all year to be kept in the system.

Here’s the thing about these three pitchers. They all have good backstories. Bowman is essentially a baseball nerd who, while at Princeton, wrote a paper on the mechanics of franchise building. One of the minor league guys is a gregarious type who embraces the community outreach minor league teams always ask the players to do. The other has made it back into affiliated baseball after two season in the independent leagues.

But will any of them ultimately be contributors with the St. Louis Cardinals? Let’s have a look.

Next: Major League Phase, Round 1