As most of you know, I was lucky enough to be invited to attend Winter Warmup as a reporter. Last year, I used that experience to write several season previews. Due to the late start of the top 20 prospect series (caused by waiting for Brendan Donovan to be traded), my Winter Warmup stories have been pushed to now instead of at the beginning of spring training. Thus technically, these could also be called season previews, but there’s a good chance I write a couple of these after the season has already started. I’ll try to pick stories that are not outdated for the ones during the season.
There is a maxim in baseball that you can never have enough pitching. The Cardinals tested that last year. They had a starting five backed up by Steven Matz and Michael McGreevy. It was an extremely reasonable assumption that Matz would be needed in the rotation on Opening Day and McGreevy would be in the rotation for good in May.
But then, awkwardly, nobody got hurt. The Cardinals never got the opportunity to put Matz back in the rotation, who ended up throwing the second most innings of his Cardinals tenure despite both being in the bullpen and only being in St. Louis for four months. The Cardinals squeezed every doubleheader start they could out of McGreevy and then it took Erick Fedde performing his best Todd Wellemeyer impression for a spot to be cleared for him.
It probably won’t go that way again. The Cardinals don’t think so, or at least, the way they’ve constructed their pitching depth certainly tells us they aren’t counting on it. They acquired Hunter Dobbins and Richard Fitts in separate trades, both of whom would absolutely be starting big league games on day one if they were needed. Right behind them is Quinn Mathews with a year of experience at AAA that did not go the way he wanted it to go.
“Last year was definitely not what I had anticipated or expected,” Mathews said. “A lot of things did not pan out and didn’t happen the way I would have loved to. At times it was like watching a movie where I’ve been given bits and pieces of advice that I probably should have paid more attention to early in the year even before the season started, in the spring.”
That advice probably came from Sonny Gray. Mathews called himself Sonny Gray’s dog in last year’s spring training and at various points in his season, Gray’s words would ring in his head suddenly. But mostly his problem was a matter of health. It was his first time dealing with a lingering injury, an injury that was still there when he woke up the next day.
“For the first time in my career, I couldn’t take my health for granted,” Mathews said. “I had never missed a game at any sport ever – that I’ve ever played.”
You can see how that might throw a player off, just assuming you’ll always be healthy and then getting hit with the stark reality that you’re going to have to worry about injuries. He was what he referred to as “out of whack.” And as a consequence, he had trouble with control.
“With where I was at physically, I really didn’t know where the baseball was going whatsoever,” Mathews said. “It was just kind of a fight against myself for most of an outing to be completely honest.”
He’s trying to handle failure better, but I’m honestly not sure what he considers a success. If he were more well-known, I would call him a notoriously harsh critic of himself. He says he likes to think of himself a realist but he probably trends towards a pessimist and well, I’ll just share a quote of his and let you decide.
“I don’t think I really had a good outing all year last year to be completely honest with you,” Mathews said. “I was pretty out of whack from day one unfortunately.”
He had two starts with 9 strikeouts and one walk. In one of them, he did not allow a run and in the other he allowed two earned runs in 6.2 IP. Hopefully his good buddy Michael McGreevy can be a voice of reason.
“I try to be that voice of reason for him, because I don’t think he’s thinking logically,” McGreevy said. “As smart as he is, he’s like ‘oh dude McGreevy I suck.’ I’m like Quinn ‘You just struck out 12 guys;’ He says yeah but I walked two.’ I’m like whaaat? Are you kidding me?” This season is so long, this game is so hard, I think just giving himself some grace here and there will help him a lot.”
It seems like one of those objectively unhealthy attitudes that…. might really work for sports. I mean in a sport like baseball, there’s certainly a danger when failure comes so easily. But there are a number of some of the very best players in all kinds of sports who were famously never satisfied and it kept them driven despite success. I can virtually guarantee that if Quinn Mathews becomes a great pitcher, he will still feel like he needs to be a better pitcher.
Mathews isn’t the only extra depth behind the MLB ready guys. Behind Mathews on the depth chart, at least for now, is Brycen Mautz, who probably has his work cut out for him to get more than a spot start this season. For one thing, he made his first two starts in AAA this year, so he’s behind two guys with MLB experience and another guy who has an entire season in AAA. For another, a couple guys should be getting healthy right around the time a spot might open up. But if he can keep his momentum from his breakout 2025, we should see him in an MLB game this year.
Despite pitching at a higher level, Mautz struck out more, walked less, and induced more groundballs at Springfield than he had in Peoria. Thanks to some mechanical changes, he managed to drop his ERA more than two runs.
“Initially, I was super upper-half focused with my mechanics, it had been something that had been an issue with me for a while, but in chasing that for so long, I got into some bad habits with my legs as a little pushy to the first base side, losing my direction,” Mautz said.
With those more cleaned up, his velocity was harder, more consistent, and more sustainable throughout the season. There has been a difference in the way he was coached to help spur his changes.
“I think the communication’s just way better,” Mautz said. “I think some of the ideas were right before, it just wasn’t necessarily talked about to the degree it is now. In the past, it might have been like “we see this, it’s kind of like an off-hand comment in passing,” but now it’s “okay this is it, we’re gonna lay it out for you, we’re gonna give out multiple options of how you can get there, so now ball is in your court.”
He believes the improved communication comes from the direction of Matt Pierpoint, Director of Pitching. He had a hand in the Mariners’ pitching success, so there’s no reason to doubt Mautz. So it seems like the real value of the coaching emphasis is simply communication, which sounds so simple but is so important.
“If there’s ever a question of why we’re doing something, they’re always available to talk and actually make you understand why you’re doing what you’re doing,” Mautz said.
Another huge advantage the young pitchers will have in Memphis: having two MLB quality defensive catchers in their corner. I had not actually thought of this advantage until writing this, but the defensive reputation of both Jimmy Crooks and Leonardo Bernal has to be a significant advantage for a young pitcher.
“You try to be in a good relationship with those guys because you’re going to go war with them,” Crooks said. “They have a high stressful job, we try to make it less stressful than it already is. It all starts from us, watching videos from past outings and what works best for them and also just communicating with them on a daily basis to figure out how they work and how they operate.”
For Crooks, he’s still in Memphis because of offense, not defense. Which is why his main goals were centered around offense.
“Just the tempo and the rhythm of my swing,” Crooks said. “And then obviously using my core and lower half, which I unlocked a little bit this offseason. Definitely controlling the plate like how I used to by taking more walks and not trying to go after every pitch.”
Well results-wise, it’s hard to argue with, although his swing decisions have still not been very good and he’s 8th percentile in whiff% among AAA hitters. But when he makes contact, boy is it good contact. In the offseason, he was trying to be more explosive, and the ball is sure exploding off his bat.
I wouldn’t expect him to be promoted just because I think they (and Crooks himself) wants those lower numbers to be better, mostly because it is extremely difficult to maintain the great batted ball data if you have those lower numbers. And obviously, this is a very small sample. Nonetheless, a very encouraging start to his season.
He’s not the only catcher in Memphis and on the 40 man. And the other man won a Gold Glove himself last season while at Springfield. But he’s still trying to get better defensively.
“I will try to be better on my receiving side,” Bernal said. “I know I can throw some guys out, but (I’ll) put some extra effort and try to be better at framing.”
Kind of seems like neither of these guys have a problem throwing out runners. Out of 69 attempts, Bernal caught 27 runners for a 39% caught stealing rate, which very easily is in the territory of being an extremely dumb decision to steal for a baserunner. In Memphis last year, Crooks had a respectable 29.4% caught stealing rate, but his goal to be more explosive was more than just for offense.
“It translates to everything,” Crooks said. “With the throwing down obviously and on the hitting side, being more explosive with your lower half. It all starts from the ground up.”
So far, four attempts, and he’s got two stealing. That’s a 50% success rate. Bernal, if you’re wondering, has caught one runner stealing and allowed two stolen bases. Crooks was added to the 40 man roster when he was promoted to the big leagues last season, but Bernal got the call over the offseason.
”I was so happy, because you know the 40 man roster, you’re almost there,” Bernal said. “But we got work to do.”
Coming up with Bernal was frequent battery mate Mautz, who has gotten to see his growth up close. They were teammates in Palm Beach, Peoria, and Springfield.
“He’s still so young, but the growth he’s had with having seized the game, the conversations we now have in the dugout between innings has been really cool to see,” Mautz said. “He’s become more of a student of the game. He’s always had the raw talent, so now that those things are coming together, it’s going to be special for him.”
And it doesn’t stop there. Coming soon behind these two is Rainiel Rodriguez, someone who Bernal is kind of taking under his wing. Bernal credits the culture of catching in the organization, citing both the past and present examples. Crooks would assuredly concur.
“We have a good core group with the catchers,” Crooks said. “We’re all good buddies. We talk all the time. Me coming up, I was always a sponge to those guys (Pages, Herrera). They’ve been up for a while so I kind of learn from those guys and try to figure out and pick their brains on how they handle a game, how they handle a staff, etc. Those guys know what they’re doing.”
I have no idea how the catching situation will resolve itself, there’s going to be trades because there has to be trades, but I do feel secure in the knowledge that however it shakes out, the important thing is that the Cardinals will have two good catchers in the big leagues.