Cardinals make their bad start even worse with latest demotion

The St. Louis Cardinals have gotten off to a horrendous start to 2023 but their latest roster demotion only makes matters worse.

Remember the preseason when everyone had the St. Louis Cardinals ready to run away with the NL Central? That seems like it could’ve been a million years ago after the start the club has gotten off to in the 2023 season.

After a walk-off loss to the Giants on Tuesday night, the Redbirds are a dismal 9-15 to begin the year, in last place in the division, even behind the Cincinnati Reds by a half-game. This definitely isn’t the Cardinals team that fans were hoping to see.

And now they’re just making things worse.

On Wednesday, the team optioned top prospect — and one of the few exciting parts of the start of the season for St. Louis — Jordan Walker back to Triple-A after claiming Taylor Motter after he cleared waivers from the Giants.

STL Cardinals news: Jordan Walker demotion is salt in wound of awful start

I mean, what are we even doing here?

This wasn’t a performance issue for Walker, who has frankly lived up to the billing as one of baseball’s best young prospects since starting the season in the majors. The outfielder slashed .274/.321/.397 at the plate in 20 games and, while he has a negative dWAR, he made zero errors in the field. He’s been as good as you could hope for a 20-year-old getting his first taste of big-league action.

Meanwhile, the team is keeping up a player like outfielder Dylan Carlson who, though he might be a better glove, has just a .592 OPS on the season (a full .100+ less than Walker) and has been quite bad overall at the dish.

It’s beginning to feel like the Cardinals under Oli Marmol, who has been tirelessly making excuses about why the team isn’t winning, are a bit of a rudderless ship. They are throwing things at the wall and hoping that they stick — and they aren’t sticking.

Demoting Walker to pick up a veteran bouncing around just makes little to no sense for the current Cardinals roster and especially the future of the team. He’s a star in the making and taking him off the field when the team is six games below .500 doesn’t do anything to help that situation.