St. Louis Cardinals Player Projections: Tyler O’Neill

The youngest member of the St. Louis Cardinals’ “Big 3” in right field, Tyler O’Neill has been a pleasant surprise since his arrival from Seattle in 2017. Can he continue to improve in 2019 with limited at-bats.

Of the three right fielders the St. Louis Cardinals currently have slated to open the season on the 25-man roster, I believe that Tyler O’Neill will have the hardest time adjusting to the sporadic playing time that he will receive in 2019, simply because he’s only had one season to adjust to the major league level.

Consistency is one of the most important facets of taking the step from Triple-A to the Show, and it will be difficult for O’Neill to build off of last year because he won’t be given the time to establish that consistency.

Considering one of O’Neill’s biggest flaws is putting the bat on the ball on major league level pitches, not being able to see them consistently and having to wait to apply what you have learned from game to game can muddy one’s development

Sure he might be prepared for inconsistency for the season as a whole, but it’s hard to prepare yourself for the daily grind while not knowing whether or not you will play most of the time.

ZiPS actually has O’Neill floating around pretty similar numbers to what he had last season, which is honestly somewhat surprising to me.

Something noteworthy that I didn’t mention is that O’Neill is actually designated as a left fielder for these projections, and gets 450+ AB’s behind Marcell Ozuna this year. This would be an interesting proposition, as it would assume either Ozuna is dealing with more injury issues, struggles in general, or is traded.

Tyler O’Neill admitted himself that at-bats would be harder to come by this year, so I am not sure how much faith I put into that projection. The rest of the numbers seem relatively stagnant, which would be somewhat discouraging, but understandable. However, I foresee a few hiccups in the horizon playing behind Dexter Fowler and Jose Martinez.

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One area I do expect him to make progress in is his K rate. I guess this is more of a personal thing, but I don’t feel like his approach at the plate is as poor as his 40% K% reflected last season. There aren’t too many stats that reflect this, so I won’t really bother to try and argue it. All I can say is that we can wait and see.

Unfortunately, I don’t think the logjam in the outfield will help very much. As I mentioned above and with the other right fielders, not getting the consistent at-bats will stagnate his development somewhat, and the numbers this year will show it.

Of the three guys, it will probably be O’Neill that gets the lowest number of at-bats, and that might not be the best thing for the St. Louis Cardinals now or in the future. O’Neill will make baby steps, but the blocks around him will make it difficult for him to truly emerge in the majors in 2019.

My Projection: .244/.309/.479, 17 HR, 7.15% BB%, 28.7% K%, 1.1 WAR

Tyler O’Neill is probably the most powerful hitter in the St. Louis Cardinals organization at the moment, and hopefully he will be treated like it in 2019. If Fowler, Martinez, or Ozuna gets hurt or struggles, then who knows, it could be the year of Tyler O’Neill.