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St. Louis Cardinals: Matt Carpenter Is Reaching Superstardom
The St. Louis Cardinals infielder is one of the most underrated players in the game today.
Most would say this St. Louis Cardinals team is devoid of a true superstar. Most would be wrong. The Redbirds have a superstar in 2016, and his name is Matt Carpenter.
Don’t believe me? Let’s dig into the facts.
Here are Carpenter’s numbers as they stand at the beginning of play on June 30:
| Year | G | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | BA | OBP | SLG | OPS | OPS+ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 72 | 265 | 54 | 79 | 24 | 5 | 14 | 49 | .298 | .418 | .585 | 1.003 | 166 |
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Where to begin? As of June 29, Carpenter is third in all of baseball with a 1.003 OPS, fifth in slugging (.585), fifth in on base percentage (.418), fourth in walk percentage (16.3%), sixth in doubles (24) and tied for fourth in triples with five. Does that sound like a superstar?
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Carpenter is having a fantastic season and he is on pace to set career highs in batting average, OBP, SLG, OPS, triples, homers and RBI. Carpenter even has a shot to beat his own St. Louis Cardinals record of 55 doubles, which he set in 2013. The 30-year old is ascending to superstar status, and it is fun to watch.
Carpenter is coming off an absurd month of June. The third/second baseman is slashing .358/.490/.679 with a 1.169 OPS. Carpenter has pounded out 29 hits this month including nine doubles, one triple and five homers. He has also scored 18 times and knocked in 14 runs.
If that is not enough, Carpenter has only had three hit-less games this month — THREE. The guy is on a ridiculous tear. The only player who likely had a better June than Carpenter is San Diego Padres slugger Wil Myers, who had 11 homers and 33 RBI while hitting .327 in June. By the way, the St. Louis Cardinals should absolutely try and trade for Myers. I wrote about why, here.
Back to Carpenter. The St. Louis Cardinals are extremely fortunate to have a player of this caliber, and I believe he goes unnoticed at times. Just a couple of weeks ago, Carpenter was left off of Sporting News’ Top 50 Players of 2016 list.
As Bernie Miklasz wrote, it was a “fresh serving of stupid.” It’s a great column and I suggest you read it. Miklasz makes some fantastic points for Carpenter’s case, including this nugget about his merits as an elite lead-off hitter:
Since STATS LLC officially began tracking leadoff-hitter stats in 1974, only four players have a higher leadoff OBP than Carpenter’s .391. (Minimum 1,000 plate appearances at the No. 1 spot.) Their names: Mike Hargrove, Wade Boggs, Henderson, and Rod Carew. And Carpenter’s leadoff OPS (.877) ranks second to Hanley Ramirez since ’74.
There’s no question that Carpenter is beefing up his resume to superstardom, and he is getting even better offensively.
Carpenter is tearing the cover off the ball this year. The St. Louis Cardinals infielder is currently ranked second in the MLB in Hard %, which is “the percentage of balls in play that were classified as hit with hard speed” (Via FanGraphs). Carpenter is behind only David Oritz and ahead of guys like Trevor Story, Josh Donaldson and Yoenis Cespedes.
That tells you all you need to know about how hard Carpenter is hitting pitches when he barrels them up this season. Speaking of barreling the ball up on the bat, Carpenter also has an absurd, MLB-leading 7.5 Soft%, which means he is hitting the ball squarely and with solid contact 92.5 percent of the time. No, that is not a typo.
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More than that, Carpenter has many intangibles that simply can’t be quantified. Beyond being a great leader on and off the field, Carpenter is also willing to do whatever it takes for this team to win. It started back in 2013 when he was asked to take over second base (a position he’d never played). Carpenter not only excelled at the position, he went on to win a Silver Slugger, finish fourth in MVP voting and made the All-Star team that year at second base.
After manning third base for the St. Louis Cardinals the last two years, this season he was asked to go back to his old stomping grounds at second after Kolten Wong struggled and was sent back down to Triple-A Memphis. Rather than making a big deal about it, Carpenter embraced the challenge to take over second base again.
There aren’t many superstars in the league with that willingness to play really wherever their team needs them. Every player wants to win, but Carpenter’s will to win takes precedence over any notions of being pampered as a star player.
Carpenter isn’t leading any All-Star voting as of today, but if he isn’t an All-Star this year it will be a terrible snub.
Next: Cardinals' Defense a Problem Yet Again
St. Louis Cardinals fans should relish the opportunity of watching Carpenter during the prime of his career. We will see if the 30-year old can put a jolt into this team in the second half and lead them to the playoffs once again. Thanks for reading.