NEW YORK – The Cardinals made it official on Tuesday, optioning outfielder Victor Scott II to Triple-A Memphis and activating outfielder Nathan Church from the 10-day injured list.
With Church back in the fold, he will become the everyday center fielder, replacing Scott. Church was in Tuesday’s starting lineup hitting ninth against the Mets. Before missing 15 games because of a left shoulder strain, Church had a slash line of .247/.282/.390 with five home runs and 18 RBIs.
“I’m definitely excited [to be back]. The boys have been playing good ball. I’m just glad to be a part of it,” Church said. “The focus was to get healthy. I’m healthy now. I’m excited to play.”
Church is at his best with the glove. He can play all three outfield spots without much difficulty. In fact, entering Tuesday's action, his six defensive runs saved ranked third among National League outfielders behind Pete Crow-Armstrong and Andy Pages.
In his first game back, Church went 3-for-4 and showed in the fourth inning of Tuesday’s 7-0 victory over the Mets how phenomenal he is with the glove. With right-hander Dustin May on the mound, New York had runners on first and second with two outs. Mets second baseman Marcus Semien was in the batter’s box when he hit a deep fly ball to center. It looked like Church didn’t have a chance to catch the ball. He turned around a few times, but was able to make a sensational basket catch.
“Off the bat, I knew [Church] had to go back,” May said. “When he was running towards the wall, it was like, this is [a home run]. Then when he looked left and looked right, he turned around and made a basket catch. I didn’t know how to react to that because that was kind of insane.”
Church was warned before the game by outfield coach Jon Jay that the wind would be a problem when attempting to catch a fly ball.
“Jay told me it was windy and told me to spin around, so when I went [back], did the exact same thing, I turned around and made a basket catch,” Church said.
As for Scott, he is just as good as Church defensively, but his offense is the reason for his Minor League demotion. Scott was hitting just .194 with a .534 OPS this season. For Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol, it was a “tough conversation” with Scott. Marmol made it clear that the demotion was not because of lack of effort.
While with Memphis, Scott must work on his mechanics and approach at the plate. The skipper said Scott must get better with pitch recognition. He is 22-for-86 (.256) against the fastball and a combined 8-for-69 (.116) against breaking balls and offspeed pitches.
“We want to make sure we put him in an environment where he can work on [his hitting skills] – lower pressure environment,” Marmol said. “[We want him to] start understanding how he is being pitched to, how to combat it and how to solve [what the pitcher is trying to do]. He handled it well. It lined up with Church being healthy, so we made the move.”