Adam Wainwright Injury Leaves Innings Void for Cardinals

The St. Louis Cardinals took two of the three games from the Milwaukee Brewers over the weekend, but the wins cannot wash over the losses the team suffered. Over three games, Yadier Molina, Adam Wainwright, and Jason Heyward all left games early due to injury. Molina did not play on Saturday or Sunday, but has avoided the disabled list so far. Heyward apparently hurt his groin, and after lobbying to stay in the game, he is day-to-day. The biggest blow came on Saturday when Wainwright could not get out of the batter’s box, probably injuring his achilles. The Cardinals will likely be forced to play the season without their ace, leaving the team with options both internally and outside the organization, but no realistic option will make up for Wainwright’s absence.

There were injury concerns with Adam Wainwright heading into the season. After struggling in the summer months of 2014 and gutting through the playoffs with less than his best, an offseason surgery on his right elbow, the same part of his body that needed Tommy John surgery four seasons ago, raised questions about whether Wainwright would be able to carry the load for the Cardinals in 2015. His velocity and strikeouts were down to start the season, but so were his walks, and he’d been brilliant to start the season. Those injury concerns did not come forward as expected when he injured his ankle attempting to get out of the batter’s box, but with Wainwright likely gone for the season the Cardinals face a difficult task replacing one of the best pitchers in baseball.

Despite missing all of 2011 recovering from Tommy John surgery, Adam Wainwright’s 27 WAR since 2009 ranks sixth among Major League Baseball pitchers and is in the top 20 among all MLB players. His 16 wins since returning from surgery in 2012 sit even with Max Scherzer and David Price and trail only Clayton Kershaw and Felix Hernandez among MLB pitchers. Wainwright was incredibly effective when he pitched, but just as important for the Cardinals, he provided massive amounts of innings, preventing wear on a bullpen and a rotation trying to break in young starters.

From 2012-2014, including the playoffs, he pitched over 700 innings, with over 500 of those innings coming in the last two years. Over the last two seasons’ Wainwright’s +11 WAR have accounted for more than 40% of the Cardinals starting pitching total during the time. With Wainwright, the Cardinals’ rotation has pitched very well so far this season, with a 2.39 ERA that is the best in baseball and a 3.06 FIP that ranks fifth. Lance Lynn, Michael Wacha, John Lackey, and Carlos Martinez look to still make up a solid front four to the Cardinals’ rotation, but finding a fifth starter could leave the Cardinals’ scrambling for innings as they attempt to replace their ace. The Cardinals were already looking to manage starter innings this season, per Derrick Goold, and the loss of Wainwright only serves to amplify the difficulty of balancing starter innings with trying to preserve their rotation arms.

Last season the Cardinals used 12 starters to get through just under 1,000 innings. Injuries and inconsistency from Michael Wacha, Jaime Garcia, Joe Kelly, Shelby Miller, and Carlos Martinez left a team needing innings from its starters, and so the Cardinals made trades for Justin Masterson and John Lackey to fill that gap. Masterson struggled to fill that need while Lackey pitched adequately down the stretch. Without Wainwright, the Cardinals will need other players to step in, but with Michael Wacha coming off an injury-plagued 2014 and Carlos Martinez attempting to make the full-time transition to starter, half of the remaining rotation could be on a soft innings cap this year.

Before the season started, the Cardinals’ FanGraphs Depth Chart Projections looked like this:

That rotation ranked third on the Positional Power Rankings before the season started. These projections did not have Wainwright taking on the same load as he had the past few years, and as a result, the projections’ loss to the Cardinals’ is perhaps not as great as the actual loss currently felt by the club. The rest of the season projections for the rotation are below, along with the statistics that have already been accumulated.

While the rotation overperformed expectations over the first three weeks of the season, those results count and have greatly contributed to the Cardinals’ 12-5 record. While the projections only show a loss of about half a win, there is still a 20 inning deficit and the potential replacements all come with question marks. The Cardinals might be able to coax a few more innings out of Lance Lynn and John Lackey, but the 330 total innings from Carlos Martinez and Michael Wacha likely represent pretty close to what the Cardinals will let their young pair of 23-year-olds pitch during the regular season.

Jaime Garcia is good when he can play, but injuries have limited him to under 100 innings over the past two seasons combined and he is currently rehabbing from shoulder discomfort that sidelined him as he attempted to ramp up his pitch count during Spring Training. If he can pitch, the Cardinals will give him every opportunity to do so.

After losing a battle with Carlos Martinez for the fifth starter role, Marco Gonzales went down to Memphis with the presumed sixth starter role. Gonzales, another 23-year old and Kiley McDaniel’s 83rd ranked prospect, got to the majors last season after beginning the year in High-A Palm Beach. A fastball-change pitcher, Gonzales has worked to add a cutter and a curve and he planned to continue to develop those pitches as a starter down in Memphis as opposed to as a reliever on the big league team like his role in the playoffs a year ago. Unfortunately, Gonzales is currently on the minor league 7-day disabled list as the Cardinals planned to skip a start as a precautionary measure after experiencing left shoulder tightness after his third start in Memphis.

If the move is only precautionary, the Cardinals could be looking for a starter to pitch just one or perhaps two games before Gonzales gets the call. Tyler Lyons and Tim Cooney are the most likely candidates for Thursday although Carlos Villanueva does have experience starting and could make a spot start if needed. Cooney is not on the 40-man roster, but a spot could be made available by transferring Wainwright to the 60-day disabled list. Before the season started, Kiley McDaniel ranked Cooney the 10th best Cardinals’ prospect.

Cooney works 89-92 mph with good life, a fringy to average curveball, a below average slider and an above average changeup. His control and command are both above average and the life on his heater along with plane from being 6’3/195 help his ground ball rate, with hopes to reach his 4th starter upside in 2016.

Over the past two seasons, Tyler Lyons has made 12 starts in the majors and was serviceable, putting up a 3.99 FIP with an ugly 5.89 ERA over 65 2/3 innings as a starter. The Cardinals are fortunate that even with Wainwright down and their preferred sixth and seventh starters down in Garcia and Gonzales, they can still call on Lyons or Cooney as replacements. The names that have been bandied about as options in John Danks and Kyle Lohse are unappealing. If the team finds itself short on innings and the replacements cannot pitch six innings, an innings-eater could be what the Cardinals need to save the bullpen as the rest of the rotation picks up the slack performance-wise. That is not likely the first option as they tried all available internal options last year before turning to the trade market.

The obvious replacement and likely only match for Wainwright’s production currently on the market is Cole Hamels, but the Philadelphia Phillies might not be a match with St. Louis. In the offseason, the Cardinals reportedly refused to part with Carlos Martinez, holding up any possible deal and Martinez’s inclusion in the current rotation is not likely to make the Cardinals increase their offer as moving Martinez would still leave a hole for St. Louis. The Cardinals’ top pitching prospect, Alex Reyes, is still pitching in High-A, and based on the Phillies’ demands, he might not be close enough to the majors for the Phillies to headline a deal, regardless of whether the Cardinals would be willing to part with him.

The loss of Wainwright is a big blow for the Cardinals and brings them closer to the pack in the National League Central, but the FanGraphs Depth Chart Projections for the rest of the season still have the Cardinals as the third best team in MLB even with Wainwright out for the season. Only the Dodgers and Nationals are currently projected higher and the pitching staffs 14 wins is still in the upper third of baseball. With the Cardinals front four pitching well, the team is in good shape, but with innings questions coming with the Cardinals’ young starters, the biggest loss for the Cardinals will be the bulk provided by Wainwright over the last few years. The team has internal options, and we can expect that those options will be exhausted before the team looks to the trade market.