Cardinals Reduce Spring Roster to 35

CARDINALS REDUCE SPRING ROSTER TO 35

SIX PLAYERS SENT TO MINOR LEAGUE CAMP

JUPITER, Fla., March 23, 2024 – The St. Louis Cardinals announced today that the team has reduced its Spring Training roster to 35 players, sending six players to their minor league camp.

The team optioned RHP Nick Robertson, 1B Luken Baker, 1B/OF Alfonso Rivas III and 1B/OF Jared Young to the Memphis (AAA) roster, and re-assigned INF César Prieto and OF Victor Scott II to their minor league camp.

The team currently has 34 Major League roster players and one non-roster invitee remaining in its Major League camp.

— STL — 

None of the optioned players were a surprise.

Baker is probably the guy who is closest to a regular in the Majors, but being limited to first base/DH on a team with Paul Goldschmidt, Matt Carpenter, Brendan Donovan, and Nolan Gorman ahead of him limits what he can do for the team. They really should have looked at packaging him for a pitcher.

The real news is sending Prieto and Scott II down; both were making serious strides to break camp with the team, but this is the correct move.

There is a lot of infield depth on the roster, so it would have been tough for Prieto to get playing time.

Scott would have been a temporary fix until Tommy Edman and Lars Nootbaar came off the IL. The decision was easier with Dylan Carlson heating up; it may also allow the team to see what Alec Burleson can do with some regular at bats from left field.

Thomas Saggese is now the lone non-roster player in camp.