St. Louis Cardinals: Memphis Power On Display

Having sat through all nine innings of the St. Louis Cardinals 1-0 victory against the Braves on Friday night, I found myself needing to find some power.  I needed to look no farther than to my very own Memphis Redbirds.

The St. Louis Cardinals have sent many players down interstate 55 this season: Kolten Wong, Jeremy Hazelbaker, and- most recently- Randal Grichuk.  These moves have played well for the birds on the bat with players having returned to the majors with additional pop.

That said, Friday night’s low-hit, low-score St. Louis Cardinals victory against the Braves failed to show much of this power.  In contrast to this, the Memphis Redbirds have experienced some majorly explosive offense in the past ten games.

Before diving into the update stats, let us look at the demotion of Randal Grichuk (who has contributed nicely for the offensive outburst for Memphis).  When demoted, it was reported that Grichuk smiled and took the reassignment in stride.  A good thing, too, as Grichuk surely knew that Memphis’ hitting coach would certainly help him as he has helped in the past.

See my coaches post for more information on this sort of help for the St. Louis Cardinals and why I believe that Memphis houses the greater coaches than those housed in St. Louis.

Now then, on to the recent game stats: I’ll spend this post sharing with you the individual player stats who have shined in the past ten games.

First up, Breyvic Valera leads the team in batting average in the past ten games having collected twelve hits in his thirty at-bats for a .400 average.  Included in these twelve hits are six RBI.

On the power side of things, David Washington leads the team in overall home runs having collected a total of twenty-two this season for Memphis and a total of four in the past ten games.  His batting average isn’t anything to shake your head at either sitting comfortably at .303 in the past ten games with ten hits in his thirty-three at-bats.

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Jose Martinez, the team’s hit-leader with ninety-seven season hits, has somewhat cooled of late only collecting eight hits in his thirty-six at-bats in these past ten games.  That said, these eight hits accounted for eight RBI and two home runs.  One other season stat of interest for Martinez is the fact that he is leading the team in doubles at twenty-three.

How about Grichuk?  Since arriving with Memphis, Grichuk has simply glowed.  In the past ten games, Randal has collected fifteen hits in his forty-one at-bats for a batting average of .366.  In his first game after being reassigned from the St. Louis Cardinals, Grichuk smashed a home run and has hit four home runs in these past ten games (collecting seven RBI as well).

While these batters have done well for Memphis, I don’t see any of them (Grichuk included) riding the I-55 shuttle to the St. Louis Cardinals anytime soon.  That said, should Tommy Pham struggle, I wouldn’t mind seeing Martinez tossed up over Grichuk at this point.

Next: Piscotty's Power Adjustment a Teaching Tool

As the season progresses toward its close, we should keep our eyes on these players in Memphis in anticipation of the roster expansions in September.  I will do my best to keep you updated here at Redbird Rants so that we can all cheer on our St. Louis Cardinals to the finish line.  Thanks for reading!