St. Louis Cardinals: Carlos Martinez returns to the DL

The assumed ACE of the St. Louis Cardinals pitching staff is once again sent to visit the disabled list. This news was just one piece of several news pieces the team shared on Saturday.

Prior to the doubleheader on Saturday in Chicago (barf), the St. Louis Cardinals released a series of news blurbs related to the team. At the top of this list was the news that the organization was sending Carlos Martinez back to the disabled list with an oblique injury.

For anyone who missed the news earlier this season, Martinez has already spent some time on the disabled list with an injury to his throwing side. In fact, he was sent to the DL the first time with a right lat injury on May 10, 2018 and spent time on the DL until May 31 when he started his rehab in Springfield.

One game into his rehab, Martinez was called up to the St. Louis Cardinals and activated on June 5, 2018. Everything seemed to be in line and fine, or so we all thought. To me, I worried that only one rehab start was not enough but I’m no medical doctor nor am I able to speak with Carlos on a daily basis.

In Martinez’s defense, the St. Louis Cardinals were at a stage where they needed him to return. The team was struggling. The offense was lackluster. And the pitching was struggling having recently lost Michael Wacha to injury as well. Thus, Martinez “rushed” back.

Since his return from the DL, his command and power haven’t been what the St. Louis Cardinals have come to know from CMart. Many of us were left scratching our heads. Now, on Saturday, July 21, the St. Louis Cardinals announced his return to the DL but this time with the oblique strain.

To me, this says that he was indeed rushed back too quickly, that the lat may not be completely healed, and that Carlos made some adjustments (perhaps subconsciously or unintentionally) to lessen the load on his lat but, in turn, exhausting his oblique.

The Carlos Martinez news was not the only item shared by the organization before the start of play in game one of the doubleheader. The additional news was:

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• Recently-returned Matthew Bowman has been optioned back to Memphis.
• John Brebbia was recalled from Memphis in the wake of the Martinez news.
• Miles Mikolas has been activated from the paternity list. Congratulations are in order for the Mikolas family on the healthy birth of their twins.
• Luke Weaver has been activated from Memphis to serve as the 26th man for the doubleheader. I somehow had missed the news of the St. Louis Cardinals sending Weaver to Memphis at the All-Star break but it was there. I assume the club intended for him to work on mechanics facing off against lesser hitters.

The Mikolas news is not surprising and is expected. The pull-up of Weaver is a bit unexpected since he was just recently sent to Memphis. I look for him to stay with the St. Louis Cardinals as long as Martinez is on the DL. The question for him will be what to do once Martinez returns (which I believe will take longer than 10 days).

The big piece here- to me- is placing CMart on the 10-day DL. I wonder if this might even be a bit of gamesmanship on the part of the St. Louis Cardinals in response to teams’ kicking-the-tires on him. While, yes, he may have some small underlying medical issue, the team might be protecting the investment by dissuading interest via injury.

Next: Cardinal reset

What do you think of the Martinez news? How about the Weaver news? Let us know on Twitter and thanks for reading!