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The Cardinals introduced Friday that they’ve signed right-handed reliever Josh James to a minor league contract. The 30-year-old hasn’t pitched within the Majors for 2 seasons and was non-tendered by the Astros after present process season-ending surgery to repair his right flexor tendon in 2022. He’s represented by CAA.
Previous to that damage, James spent elements of 4 seasons within the Houston ’pen as a hard-throwing however command-challenged center reliever who may miss bats in droves. He’s pitched 106 1/3 innings within the majors and carries a 4.64 ERA with an enormous 34.3% strikeout fee however an unsightly 13.2% stroll fee. James averaged 97.1 mph on his heater from 2018-20 however noticed that mark tumble to 94.8 mph in 2021. Accidents restricted him to simply 25 2/3 innings between Triple-A and the massive leagues in ’21, and he managed solely 27 2/3 frames within the minors the next yr earlier than requiring surgical procedure.
Between his accidents and his historical past of command troubles, James is a mission for the Cardinals and little greater than a roll of the cube at this level. If he can get again to full energy and again on observe within the higher minors, he may finally be referred to as up when accidents and/or poor efficiency create a gap in supervisor Oli Marmol’s reduction corps.
Because it stands, nonetheless, the St. Louis bullpen figures to incorporate Ryan Helsley, Giovanny Gallegos, JoJo Romero, Andrew Kittredge, Andre Pallante and Zack Thompson, with a handful of candidates for the ultimate two spots (John King, Nick Robertson, Riley O’Brien, Rule 5 decide Ryan Fernandez and non-roster invitee Wilking Rodriguez amongst them).
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