Nolan Gorman avoids complete disaster in 1st appearance since Cardinals demotion

Nolan Gorman just appeared in his first game with the Cardinals' organization since his demotion on June 12th, and he managed to lessen the blow of what was a terrible day at the plate in an extra-innings clutch hit.

In Gorman's first four at-bats for the Memphis Redbirds, the struggling slugger struck out all four times, wearing the Golden Sombrero and looking completely lost at the plate. But Gorman did step up to the plate one more time for Memphis in the top of the 10th inning, and laced a single to right field to give the Redbirds a 4-3 lead.

Overall, it was still a pretty bad day for Gorman, all things considered, but it was nice to see him go ahead and put together a really positive result in his final at-bat in what is likely going to be a long process for Gorman to find himself again.

The Cardinals fixed other struggling sluggers with similar program that Nolan Gorman is on

Since Gorman's demotion, the president of baseball operations, Chaim Bloom, has been open about the Cardinals' plan to help Gorman get right involving something very similar to what other struggling prospects and big league bats have experienced in the last year.

Upon Gorman's demotion, he reported to the Cardinals' complex down in Jupiter, Florida to rework his swing. This is something the Cardinals have done with Jordan Walker, who went from one of the worst hitters in baseball to an MVP candidate, Joshua Baez, who almost lost his spot in the organization a few years ago and now is one of the best prospects in baseball, and Tre Richardson, who has recently gone on a power binge for the Cardinals and received a promotion to Double-A Springfield.

The Cardinals believed that a full reset was needed for Gorman and an opportunity for him to get his swing to a "less steep plane" in a controlled environment.

While Gorman's first game action since those shifts was rough prior to that RBI single, no one should be panicking about the hitting lab work not producing instant results. Back in spring training, the Cardinals had Walker take a few days off and spend time in the lab like Gorman just did, and when he returned to game action, it still looked bad. But then, something clicked, and Walker has been transformed since then. The same has been true for both Baez and Richardson as prospects.

This is the first time the Cardinals have done this with a Major Leaguer in the middle of the season, so that is definitely a unique situation for Gorman, but one the Cardinals are hoping can help him regain his form as one of the more intriguing young sluggers in the game.

With Blaze Jordan impressing so far in St. Louis, it is unlikely that we will see Gorman soon, but if he does experience the kind of turnaround we've seen from other young Cardinals, that could change rather quickly.

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