St. Louis Cardinals: On keeping or dealing Luke Weaver

The St. Louis Cardinals have so many decisions to make this winter, and one is very clearly to evaluate what their starting pitching will look like.  As part of this process, they will examine the future of  bright young starter, Luke Weaver, and whether his true value to the club is as a rotation member or a trade chip.

If the team retains Luke Weaver, he will be entering his third year with the St. Louis Cardinals.  Weaver showed a marked progression from his first showing in 2016 to his more substantial one in 2017.  Despite only starting two more games this season than the previous one, he almost doubled his innings and lowered his ERA by almost two runs per game.

Notwithstanding a couple of blowups in his last two starts which raised his ERA from the low 2s to the high 3s, the Cards were notably impressed by the overall performance of the young Weaver.  Many pundits believe he will join Carlos Martinez, Michael Wacha and possibly Adam Wainwright as part of the rotation if he remains here.

But should he? Our contributors Dan Campbell and Larry Levin have different perspectives about where Weaver’s value best lies, and about his upside potential as a starter. Dan makes the argument for maximizing Weaver’s potential worth to other clubs by including him in a trade package if it gets something more valuable for the team’s 2018 success.

Larry, on the other hand, thinks that the Cardinals would do well to secure Weaver as part of the upcoming season’s climb back to the playoffs.  After reading their dialogue, feel free to weigh in on your views about Weaver’s true value.

LARRY: Dan, you and I have some different views about how the St. Louis Cardinals should maximize Luke Weaver’s talent.  Why don’t we start with your take on who Weaver is as a pitcher — what do you think of his performance to date, where is he in his growth curve, and how does he compare to other pitchers you’ve seen in a Cardinals uniform over the years?

DAN:  Thanks, Larry.  Will the real Luke Weaver please stand up?  We are gonna have a problem here.  Larry acts like he’s never seen this pitcher before, but the St. Louis Cardinals had a dynamic young pitcher just like Luke Weaver.

Larry and Dan debate the value of St. Louis Cardinals young arm, Luke Weaver.

Dan (continued): The team sold high on that pitcher, and at the right time to add a slugging young outfielder.  That pitcher is Shelby Miller.  That narrative rings familiar this offseason.  Perhaps the St. Louis Cardinals should do the same with Luke Weaver himself?

But, sticking to Larry’s question, let us first review Weaver’s performance and scouting grades to date.  As referenced by Larry above, Weaver only has two cups of coffee on his major league resume:  eight games started in 2016 and 10 games started this past season.

Weaver struggled mightily in 2016, to the tune of a 5.70 ERA while allowing seven home runs and 23 earned runs in 36 innings pitched.  He improved, markedly, in 2017.  In ten games started for the St. Louis Cardinals, Weaver posted a 3.88 ERA – but that number was largely buoyed by two horrific starts late in the season.

The young righty allowed the same seven home runs and 26 earned runs in almost twice the innings pitched.  Being a year removed from a wrist injury suffered shagging balls in batting practice clearly assisted in Luke Weaver’s major league makeover.

To his credit, there is an additional peripheral stat that remained constant in the major leagues, and that is Weaver’s average of 11 strikeouts per nine innings pitched.  That is a phenomenal number.  Not only is that number phenomenal, but that number represents an increase over Weaver’s average strikeouts per nine innings pitched in the minor leagues:  8.8.

Speaking of the minors, all Weaver has done in the minors is perform at a high level.  In 15 starts with AAA Memphis, Weaver posted a 2.55 ERA over 77 innings pitched.  Additionally, Weaver only allowed three home runs in those 77 innings.

For background information, the St. Louis Cardinals drafted Luke Weaver in the first round of the 2014 draft with the 27th overall pick.  He was a proven college starter for Florida State University, and scouts praise his strong control, his deadly change-up, and a promising slider.  Weaver’s fastball velocity increased as a Cardinal and he sat, consistently, in the 94-97 mph range, at times touching 98.

Weaver is very early in his growth curve, and his early success in St. Louis is incredibly promising.  Weaver reminds me, however, of promising young pitcher Shelby Miller.  They have similar offerings – both throwing a fastball, a slider, and an off-speed pitch (curveball and changeup), and both throw in the mid-90s.

Miller flashed a similar ability to strike batters out, but as he progressed in his major league career he decided (a la Carlos Martinez) to pitch to contact more frequently, to lengthen his outings.

Weaver has not yet shown the ability to do that.  You can count on Weaver for five or six innings, but that’s all right now.  Shelby Miller never won the trust of the St. Louis Cardinals’ front office, I’m afraid, and he was shipped to Atlanta for Jason Heyward and Jordan Walden.

Before we discuss the best value of Luke Weaver, Larry, do you agree that Miller and Weaver are similar?  Do you think Weaver ever has a year as good as Miller’s best year with the St. Louis Cardinals (2013) or with the Atlanta Braves (2015)?

Larry and Dan debate the value of St. Louis Cardinals young arm, Luke Weaver.

LARRY: Dan, one of the great things about prospects and early-career major leaguers is our ability to fairly debate who they are and who they’ll become.  So your comparison of Weaver to Shelby Miller is a great place to start, even if I find it somewhat misplaced.

First, the players joined professional baseball at very different ages, almost four years apart.  The year Miller joined the big league club he was already in his third year of throwing over 100 innings at the professional level.

Despite his great college prowess, Weaver still hasn’t gotten to that point. So as Dan notes, his pro growth curve is still exceptionally fresh, making his prediction curve something far from certain.

Second, the only expectations that Miller really left short for the Cardinals was whether he would or could be an ace, not whether he could be an effective mid-rotation major league pitcher.

Despite the reduced strikeout totals in 2014, there was nothing wrong with his overall performance; it was essentially major-league average. His FIP had risen, to be sure, but there was no indication he couldn’t once again demonstrate the very dominant pitching he flashed in 2013.

And remember, Dan, the primary reason he was dealt was because of the tragic death of Oscar Taveras. That hole left the Cardinals shocked and in a quandary about how to fill out their everyday lineup in 2015.

The move for Heyward was a necessity, and it was only by surrendering the then-prized Miller that they landed both one year of Heyward and the seemingly capable Walden, whose mysterious arm ailment cut his career short to the Cards’ great disappointment.

It must also be noted that Miller, despite his bizarre 6-17 record in 2015, was a National League All-Star, and he actually recovered his strikeout touch to some degree.

Though certainly not at the K-per-inning clip of 2013, Miller had 44 more strikeouts in his first year with the Braves than in his last year with the Cards, in only 22 more innings. Interestingly, his hits per nine innings never varied from 2013-2015: It was either 7.9 or 8.0 each of the three years.

But even before his swoon-plus-injuries in these last two Arizona years, Miller never accomplished what Weaver has done in his combined minor and major league career, which is to blend extremely high strikeout rates with low walk totals.

Despite superficial similarities in their pitches, Weaver’s K/BB ratio is one that all but the most accomplished major leaguers never realize.

The worst result in this category for Weaver in the minors was 3.0, and most of his years have been in the high 3s or 4s. By contrast, Miller’s major-league K/BB is a rather pedestrian 2.2. To be fair, some of that derived from the last two ugly seasons, but he’s never topped 3.0.

Guess who else has never topped 3.0? Ok, 3.06, to be exact? Carlos Martinez. Michael Wacha achieved a 3.42 in his first season of 2013, but has never topped 3.0 again.

What does this all mean? A few things. Since his inning totals are still growing, there’s no need for Weaver to try to change to a contact guy yet. He’s not yet tested whether he can grow his innings while maintaining one of the best K/BB ratios in the majors.

At his 4.03 ratio over the last two partial seasons, guess where he stands among active pitchers? Behind Chris Sale, Corey Kluber, Steven Strasburg, Madison Bumgarner, and Clayton Kershaw, and right above Max Scherzer.

Now, no one here is claiming he’ll be those guys, but given his power and command, he COULD be. Miller even with his strikeout prowess didn’t have that combo.

And that, Dan, is why he’s different than Shelby, and the main reason why I wouldn’t trade him now. But before I get to that, let’s get back to your view on including Luke in a trade…

Larry and Dan debate the value of St. Louis Cardinals young arm, Luke Weaver.

LARRY: Dan, thanks for recognizing Weaver’s enormous upside potential. Of course I agree that it’s way too soon to know if Luke’s small major-league sample size portends an exceptional career.  We do know that his minor-league stats teased who he’d be and his early efforts in St. Louis back that up.

But yes, I think there is a reasonable chance that his upside exceeds that of the very fine work Shelby Miller was able to turn in prior to his injuries the past two years.

So that leads to the question of whether there are trades in which I’d include him if I were John Mozeliak or Mike Girsch. So let me go through the deals you speculate about and then address whether there are any others I’d recommend.

I am not going to even speculate about Manny Machado. If there’s any chance at all that he’s dealt in this, his walk year, I believe it will happen at the July trade deadline, to a contender. So I don’t see this as a reasonable possibility (and watch me get that wrong!).

Chris Archer? Nah. He’s a great pitcher and any MLB team would be happy to have him. But would I surrender Weaver-plus and his upside, good for another six years of control, for a $33M, four-year commitment?

I might if I didn’t have a Carlos Martinez and an Alex Reyes coming up right behind him. But right now, I’m comfy enough with the impressive pitching talent of the Cardinals to not go dealing for a multi-million dollar pitcher.

Is Archer a bargain in the context of free agent starters? Of course. But that’s not enough for me, given the talent we already possess on the mound.

And while Colome might be a nice add as a powerful bullpen arm, by no means am I surrendering Weaver, another power arm in Hudson AND one of the best catcher prospects in the majors, Carson Kelly, for the Tampa pair. If the Cards want a closer, there are options out there to plain old buy one in the free agent market with no prospect relinquishment.

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Which brings me to Donaldson and Stroman. This is the closest call, and given Stroman is a proven, established version of Weaver at three years of cheap control, I’d at least consider a deal. But I don’t think that the Cards would include the package you suggest, and neither would I. If St. Louis goes free agent for a closer, then it’s my belief that we trade for a hitter than can benefit the team more than a year.

Why do I say that? Because while a Donaldson type will always make your team better, the Cards are in the process of building a team that can be competitive for multiple years. There’s no Donaldson that I know of in the Cards organization, so we’d likely be back at square one after 2018 looking for another bopper. That’s why the Stanton/Yellich/Ozuna type options are more appealing to me.

While I’m not sure I agree with you on whether good prospects will be required for a Stanton deal, I don’t think Weaver needs to be part of it. There are others, like the ones you’ve mentioned — Hudson, Alcantara etc (but apparently not Jordan Hicks, who the team seems unwilling to part with) — who could fill the bill.

It’s not that I think Weaver is some sort of baseball god, far from it. It’s just that the logic of the moment doesn’t require dealing a guy who holds the promise of slotting into the top three slots in the Cards’ rotation for a half dozen years to come. And that’s not an asset I trade lightly.

That’s all I got, Dan. Any final words before we sign out?

DAN: Larry, excellent insight as usual.  One thing to add, as we conclude this debate, is that the type of conversation that Larry and I just engaged in is exactly what the St. Louis Cardinals are doing internally.  Whether we like it or not, Luke Weaver IS available to other teams in the right deal.

There is no untouchable (other than Yadier Molina) on this roster.  Thus, while some may take issue with our polite discourse as speculative, debating players and their fits with this team or in trades is precisely the type of conversation that the St. Louis Cardinals must have to transform this roster.

Lastly, the one thing Larry and I clearly agree on is that Luke Weaver is incredibly valuable.  My main point continues to be that the extreme value we see in Luke Weaver is redundant in the face of an Alex Reyes, Sandy Alcantara and Jordan Hicks, and Luke Weaver is more valuable to other teams in need of young pitching as a result.

I only hope that the front office values Luke as highly as Larry and I do – otherwise, a trade partner will steal an incredible talent from the St. Louis Cardinals.

Next: Blockbuster deal from Seattle

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