St. Louis Cardinals: Jedd Gyorko to DL, Luke Voit recalled

The St. Louis Cardinals released news on Sunday morning that their injured third baseman will be headed to the DL and they are returning their first base prospect slugger as his replacement.

The St. Louis Cardinals suffered yet another injury on Saturday as Jedd Gyorko pulled his right hamstring. While news on Saturday night was inconclusive, Mike Matheny was reported as saying that the injury was not good hinting to a potential disabled list stay for Gyorko.

Fast-forward to mere moments ago (as of the time of this writing) when the Cardinals organization released news of Gyorko’s departure to the disabled list. Gyorko will hit the 10-day DL today, Sunday, August 27 which means that his first potential day to return will be Thursday, September 7.

To take his place, the St. Louis Cardinals recalled slugger Luke Voit from Memphis. Voit was with the big club for a stretch of time this season and was only sent down to Memphis when the Cardinals activated Stephen Piscotty from the disabled list.

For the record, I was not in favor of optioning Voit at that time so I’m really glad to see him return today.

Before his injury, Gyorko was playing well but not up to his outstanding offensive play shown earlier this season. Gyorko has hit only four home runs in the month of August which is well under his season-high of 11 smashed during his hot month of May.

In May, Gyorko commanded a batting average as high as .369 with a slugging percentage as high as .754. August, however, recorded a .277-best batting average and a .471-best slugging percentage. Perhaps the 10-day stint will serve to rest the partially-paid-by-San-Diego third baseman.

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Gyorko has appeared in 114 games this season. He set his career-high appearances of 128 in 2015 with the Padres which was followed-up in 2016 with the same number of appearances set with the St. Louis Cardinals.

Taking his place, Voit returns to the St. Louis Cardinals after appearing in 43 games between June 25 and August 19. In these 87 at-bats, Voit secured a batting average of .253 behind 22 hits (9 doubles and three home runs).

On the downside for Voit is his number of strikeouts: he has a frustrating 23 Ks to his 22 hits. Perhaps this call-up, these 10 days, will allow Voit to show that he can reduce those strikeout numbers and increase his hit counts.

Voit has appeared in 269 at-bats with the AAA Memphis Redbirds this season and his numbers there eclipse his MLB numbers. In these at-bats, Voit has produced a slash line of .327/.407/.565. If he can work to secure these numbers with the Cardinals, he will be an amazing addition at this time of the season.

Next: Time to replace Matheny

The real question will be what happens when Gyorko returns: will Voit remain? It seems very likely that Voit will remain thanks to the expanded rosters of September.