Could always send him back down when Beltran is ready to go. It's about service days, not when you come up. If he spent April in St. Louis, as long as he spent all of May down in Memphis, it would be the same as leaving him down for all of April, in terms of his arbitration clock.

Of course, I think Taveras is going to hit so well that it would be almost impossible to demote him again once he's in the bigs.

The other risk is that Taveras gets hurt and has to spend some time on the DL while he's on the big club... in that case, all the time he spends on the DL counts towards his clock.

Taveras absolutely cannot be a bench player - period. Not even a '4th OFer'.

He has to play every day. Moreover, his defensive instincts aren't great, so he needs to be playing every day where we intend to play him in the future. He can't be a guy that shifts around in the OF to cover for days off.

If the kid's going to be the superstar we hope he can be, then he needs to be playing his position every day and getting regular ABs against guys with quality breaking pitches and an understanding of when to use them. Sure, when Beltran's hurt that could be in St. Louis - but as soon as Beltran's back, I don't care if he's batting 1.000 - he's probably not a CFer, Beltran' certainly isn't a CFer and I'm fairly sure we won't be benching Carlos. As such, he'll need to go back down.

Why put him on the Memphis shuttle at that point? Play Adams at 1b and Craig in RF and call it a day.

Carpenter in the OF is no longer an option, however, as Freese was placed on the DL today.

The maturity issues are overblown. Same thing was said about Pujols in 2001 when they didn't want him in the bigs yet, then Bonilla got hurt and the hand was forced.

I'm not convinced the maturity issues are overblow. I suspect your response to this question is the same as it would've been had we asked it about Rasmus - nobody ever wants to accept the fact that a kid is acting like a kid until it bites them in the ass.

That said, even assuming they are overblown - why are we so quick to state that he's the best option for this team right now?

Sure, he had a great season in AA. Fantastic - when Matt Adams was in AA, his was just as good. More critically, Matt Adams then went to AAA and got even better last season. 18 bombs in 258 ABs to go with a .986 OPS and a .329 BA is filthy. That's world-class power paired with outstanding bat control.

Additionally, as Adams has already started his service clock, there's no loss of team control by brining him north to start the year and playing him every day.

Next, compare their respective springs. Matt Adams has had a better one and against better pitching (pitcher quality index of 8.3 for Taveras, 8.8 for Adams). Better OBP, better SLG%, better at driving runs in - he's just flat been a better hitter than Taveras.

Finally - we aren't trading Taveras but we might trade Adams. If we hope to really get a haul for him, we need to establish his value against major league hitters - we can't do that from the bench.

This organization is better served in both the near term and long term to start Matt Adams at 1b and Allen Craig in RF to begin the year. It's helps a great deal financially by retaining the year of team control. It helps from a trade-value perspective by pumping up Adams value a bit. It helps from a pure production standpoint by putting the more polished and powerful hitter on the field to make up for the loss of Beltran and Freese. And all of that sets aside any ounce of 'maturity' concerns, though I would be very reticent to so quickly dismiss them.

It's just the right move to make.

By the way, Beltran's playing today, so it seems pretty likely that the Cards are going to try to 'rest' Beltran through his toe injury. That's not how I want Taveras breaking into the majors.

If they were going to DL him, they wouldn't be playing him so they could back-date the DL stint. They must have liked what they saw in the minor league games.

What's wrong with Freese?

Sore tailbone.

Seriously?

:shake:

Cards-Mets on ESPN right now,Wainright on the mound.

KOLR10 KOZL ‏@kolr10kozl
Freese to Begin Season on the DL http://dlvr.it/37sjy2 #sgf #mo #ozarks

He fell into the dugout chasing a foul ball in spring training. It was our dugout. Why didn't anyone catch the guy? Anyone see the play?

If they start Taveras this year its highly likely they are going to trade him. No way they give up a year of control for a couple of months of baseball.

Kozma settled under him but thought the infield fly rule would bail him out again and whiffed on the catch.

By all means - explain to me what makes you think that Matt Adams isn't presently a better major league hitter than Taveras.

Adams is a masher. If he started this year he'd hit 30 HRs and bat .280. Taveras won't do that (likely a higher average but 15-20 HR power).

He will someday, sure, but he doesn't have raw power that Adams does and his greatest strength - the ability to make steady hard contact while being aggressive, is also a strength that Adams has. And for their careers, Taveras will certainly be much better as Adams' body type will dictate that his swing slows down sooner than Oscar's.

But that's not the question - the question is what you see in Oscar Taveras that would make him a better hitter than Matt Adams today.