Building A Narrative

Matt Carpenter is back in town. Will he be able to do what they hope he can?

Thursday night, I posted a first pass on the 2024 roster for the St. Louis Cardinals. Because I have impeccable timing, two hours later James Naile was heading to Korea and the next day the 40-man roster spot was filled by a beard-wearing Texan that the fan base had more than a passing familiarity with. Suffice it to say that if I had realized I could spur action with my posts, I’d have been trying to write much earlier and much more often.

While Naile going to Korea was an interesting little twist, overall it didn’t really matter much. I didn’t have him making the Opening Day roster and while he likely would have spent some time traversing the 284 miles between AutoZone Park and Busch Stadium, he was also fairly fungible, interchangeable with a number of other middle relievers. Hopefully he has great success over in the KBO but it’s hard to imagine we’ll look at that decision as any sort of turning point.

In all honestly, Matt Carpenter joining the team is probably not going to move the needle just a whole lot either. However, it’s a slightly puzzling and completely out of the blue decision and, as such, I figured I’d try to tease it out a bit.

---

Let’s lay out the obvious first—this isn’t anything to truly get up in arms about. Carpenter was released by the Braves after being acquired from the Padres this winter and, when they couldn’t find a taker to flip him, they released him. Which means they are on the hook for $4.76 million of the $5.5 million he’ll be paid this season. The Cards get him for league minimum and while you could legitimately say they are overpaying given what they may get on the field, it’s also a rounding error in the payroll. This isn’t the reason they didn’t get Josh Hader, for instance. If they find another bullpen arm—and I continue to be skeptical on that front—they aren’t going to hesitate to sign them because they added Carpenter.

He’s also coming in on a bench role, something that everyone involved has confirmed. The last time we saw Carpenter, he was holding on to the daily slot in the lineup for dear life, thinking he had a lot left to offer. Now he’s the 26th guy on the roster, bumping Jose Fermin (most likely) to Memphis. That’s no great loss, of course. If after the spring Alec Burleson goes down while Carpenter stays up, then perhaps there’s a little more of an outcry. Right now, though, the roster spot isn’t worth getting worked up about either.

So why are we talking about it then? One, because it was a startling decision, two because it’s still a time with limited activity. Mainly, though, because there are a lot of different facets to this decision and I think it’s pretty interesting to think about them.

---

Let’s take from a strictly baseball angle first. Matt Carpenter had some great years in St. Louis, there’s no doubt about that. However, from September 1, 2018 through the end of the 2023 season, Carpenter has a slash line of .207/.333/.375 with a wRC+ of 98. His K% in that time is 27.5% (and, to his credit, the walk rate is 14%). This includes his really strong stretch as a Yankee, where he put together a hot start and slashed .360/.473/.933 in his first 92 plate appearances. (The last part of his time in New York was less stellar, with an OPS of .757 in 62 PA.)

Even with that amazing run, his line is nothing special. That’s not a small sample, either—it’s over 1400 plate appearances. There’s no doubt that Carpenter can still draw a walk but it’s fair to wonder what else he can do. If he’s going to be coming off the bench, how long is it before pitchers are challenging him and making sure he has to swing the bat? I can’t imagine there’s much fear of Carp in pitchers around the league anymore.

So when it comes to offense, he’s probably not going to really do much. Let’s imagine, though, a best case scenario where Carpenter gets some of his mojo back. Where does he play? Do they plug him into DH on the regular? He’s not playing first more than here or there, of course, and the same with third. Nolan Gorman’s got second pretty locked down and Brendan Donovan is likely to get the playing time that Gorman doesn’t. Again, John Mozeliak and Carpenter both are talking about a bench role so it probably doesn’t matter much as he’ll only get a couple hundred PA at best, but it’s hard to see a great place for those plate appearances to come from.

Assuming, of course, that all of this isn’t really lip service. We know how things have gone in the past with Carpenter (and with other players) and it’s easy to let that color our expectations. I really don’t think that Carpenter is going to be batting fourth on a daily basis but I understand why those that have past trauma might be having flashbacks.

---

We’re told that the signing of Carpenter is more about the “clubhouse culture” issue that apparently was huge last year. It’s bothersome to me exactly how much the Cardinals are focusing on this. Now, let’s be clear, I’m sitting behind a keyboard six plus hours away from St. Louis and didn’t even get to watch many games last year, so I have no insight on the clubhouse at all. I don’t think that’s going to surprise anybody reading this.

However, it’s hard for me to believe that the clubhouse was just running amuck last year. Now, granted, there was the Tyler O’Neill incident which seemed to reveal some tension and cracks. There was the Willson Contreras situation that seems to have come about when Jack Flaherty and other starters threw the catcher under the bus (in the words of Miles Mikolas). So everything was not sunshine and roses for sure.

When Bud Norris was harassing Jordan Hicks a half-decade ago, though, we didn’t hear much about clubhouse culture. Indeed, Norris was supposed to be one of the leaders. There have been incidents here and there for years and it’s never required an influx of “leadership” like we’ve seen this winter.

True, you had Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright through most of that, trying to keep the waters settled. You had folks like Matt Holliday also on the roster showing how things should be done. So maybe that section of the roster that could get people to shape up and fly right and follow the Cardinal way really has been so depleted that the club needs to build it back up.

Yet all this veteran leadership… is on one year contracts. Do we expect Lance Lynn, Kyle Gibson, Carpenter to turn the ship around completely in six months? The manager is also on the last year of his contract and there’s no guarantee he completes it. Isn’t there at least the temptation for some younger players, if they are in the mindset, to say “all I have to do is wait it out and these guys will be gone?”

---

There’s also been a little bit of qualifying what Adam Wainwright could do last year with the thinking that it’s hard to really be able to be that leader and that example when you are stinking it up on the field. Even with that, though, he was able to help defuse the Contreras situation and make an impact on the younger players.

However, if that’s the case, how much leadership is Carpenter going to show? We’ve already gone through the numbers. They aren’t inspiring by any means. If someone like Wainwright, who had major league success just one year ago, found his leadership hampered in his final year, how much can Carpenter really do?

I’m also wondering just how much cache Carp has in that clubhouse. Obviously when Albert Pujols returned to St. Louis, it meant something to people like Donovan, even if they had no personal experience with him beforehand. Pujols was a legend, one of the best to ever do it, and that aura came with him as he got back to where he once belonged. People like Yadi and Waino had pull because they’d done it for a long time in one spot and had Hall of Fame (or close) careers. If you were a rookie in the organization, you listened to those guys because you could easily respect what they had done in the uniform you were currently wearing.

What does Carpenter bring to the table for people like Masyn Winn and Jordan Walker? Both of these guys were in high school the last time Carpenter was good, so do they remember him as “wow, he was really good” or do they think he’s a washed up player given his last five years? Or do they not really think of him at all?

---

You can’t really force leadership on people. You can encourage, you can give them opportunities, you can help them learn, but you can’t just assume that a player that has been in the league 10 years or so is automatically a veteran presence and a leader for your club. Again, I refer you to Bud Norris.

That being said, it seems like Carpenter is a kind of player that likes to share his experience and help people get in line with the expectations of the club and fellow teammates. He’ll be able to enforce “The Cardinal Way”, as it were. John Mozeliak noted that there was a need for a Carpenter-type player so they went out and got the genuine article.

Yet from the bits of news coming out of Winter Warmup, it really sounds like Donovan is well on his way to being that sort of leader that you want on your team. He was in contact with people over the winter, he’s been straight and honest with his teammates, been anointed by Wainwright, and is getting everyone focused on being better in 2024. He’s doing everything that you expect a leader to do and doing it with two years of major league experience. History helps, but it’s not everything.

If Donovan is already filling that void, did they really need to bring Carpenter in? Is this a case of the front office over-correcting on an issue that might not be an issue anymore? After all, Flaherty and O’Neill are in different organizations now, which should have helped a lot of the problem.

Carpenter seems to be in the organization to take the burden off of Paul Goldschimidt and Nolan Arenado. Hopefully he’ll be able to do that but I bet by the end of the year Donovan has done more of that than Carp has. After all, the last time Carp was in St. Louis he was resistant to make modifications and listen to the analytics department, which isn’t exactly a huge testament to servant leadership. Of course, a lot of things have changed since then and he may be able to show the error of his ways to the next generation.

---

There are a lot of veteran guys out there on the market. The Cardinals, however, love their history. Lynn and Carpenter return. Daniel Descalso takes over as bench coach. Molina comes back as a coach/special assistant. It’s almost like the inverse of the Field of Dreams mantra. If you bring them, success with come. After all, it did when they were all here last time, right?

I know that some are saying that it’s possible that Carpenter won’t make it out of spring. It’s true that the club could let him go there, eat the $740,000, and not really notice. However, all the comments from John Mozeliak and others point toward Matt Carpenter being on the roster for at least a portion of the season. Which is fair enough. We know how often spring results are somewhat overblown. Taylor Motter made the roster last year, didn’t he? So even if Carpenter was bad in 30 or so spring training plate appearances it probably doesn’t mean much, even with his history. In for a penny, in for a pound, right?

We get another chance to cheer Matt Carpenter on Opening Day at Busch, surrounded with all the trappings that come with it. At least there’s no high expectations that he’ll be good, so any positive performance will be a nice surprise. With a throwback focus for the third straight year, though, you start wondering when the organization will start looking forward instead of looking back.

---

Had a great chat with Matt Pauley last night on Meet Me at Musial. You can check that out here or anywhere else you get your podcasts. Katie Woo is scheduled to join me next week.

Also was fortunate enough this morning to be the first guest Jake and Adam have had on their Rambling Redbirds podcast. You can find that over here.