SATURDAY: Fowler won’t require surgery, but it’s still not known whether he’ll return this season, Langosch tweets. He’ll wear a boot for the next month.
FRIDAY: Cardinals outfielder Dexter Fowler left tonight’s game with what has now been diagnosed as a fractured foot, according to MLB.com’s Jenifer Langosch (via Twitter). He’s headed to the 10-day disabled list, though full details aren’t yet known.
Fowler, a 32-year-old switch-hitter, has been mired in a forgettable campaign. After putting up quality numbers last year, the first of his five-year contract, Fowler has fallen off of a cliff in 2018.
Through 329 plate appearances this season, Fowler carries only a .175/.274/.295 slash with eight home runs. While he has maintained his typically solid K/BB numbers (11.2% walk rate vs. 22.5% strikeout rate), he’s just not driving the ball like he has in the past.
Fowler’s .119 isolated slugging rate is well below his recent levels. Of course, he’s also suffering from a .203 BABIP that’s at least partially attributable to misfortune. But Statcast doesn’t suggest he has been in vintage form; he’s credited with only a .282 xwOBA though that’s much better than his actual .257 wOBA.
All told, the rest of the contract isn’t looking like a terribly appealing commitment, and the new injury doesn’t help. Fowler is also drawing poor grades for his fielding despite sliding over to right field from his customary center. He’ll earn $14.5MM apiece over the next three seasons.
Pham and Fowler both suffered fractured feet today
Mugs feets..broke
Both pham and Fowler suffered fractured feet today
This is where insurance really makes sense.
Insurance is cool and all but it’s not like that money lessens the payroll
So if..the insurance kicks in and pays the salary, that’s not better than paying the salary for an underperforming player?
Insurance only pays a portion of the salary even if it’s for the full season. If Fowler misses the rest of the season it will only pay about 750k.
it’s still a lot of money IMHO
Yeah, but we don’t know how much that insurance costs to cover an 80 million dollar contract.
Sad to say, but this actually will help the Cardinals.
The starting outfield will now be Ozuna, Bader, and Oneil.
And they will probably bring up either Garcia or Arozarena as the 4th outfielder.
Either one of Garcia or Arozarena would have to be added to 40 man. Justin Williams has one at bat in big leagues. He came over in Pham trade and is already 40 man. Another possibility could be Lane Thomas who they got from blue jays last year for a bag of peanuts. He’s been playing real well at AA where he popped 21 HR I believe and off to good start at Memphis also but he would also have to be added to 40 man but cards only have 38 on 40 man right now I believe. Maybe 39
The thing is Wong is suppose to come off the DL tomorrow, so he will be back, and Munoz will be the 4th outfielder.
All they are probably going to do is activate Wong from the DL. They have Munoz, who can play the outfield, so they don’t need another one added to the 40 man
Mozeliak on Dustin Fowler injury:
“It sort of sums up our year in a lot of ways,”
Dexter* Fowler… Whoops.
Perhaps he’ll get hurt next.
If he did, would argue family could be cursed Lol (Despite Dexter making millions to play the game we love)
That’s my thoughts too. Hate it for Dexter, but I do believe the Cardinals will have a better outfield with Bader and O’Neil in the line up. Both defensively and offensively.
He and Pham suffered same injury in about 48 hours.
They’re gonna regret trading Mercado. I said at the time, he may be the most significant player that changed uniforms July 31.
Absolute steal for the Indians……
Significant when? The Cardinals weren’t making the playoffs anyway, and this prospect wasn’t going to change that.
I think he means long-term, not just this year
Long term ok…Bader and O’Neill ahead of him…at 23 years old he wasn’t going nowhere
I think you’re right. He’s a coco crisp type trade all over again. I don’t think he’ll ever be much with the bat but they traded for juston Williams who essentially is a worse performing prospect.
Totally agree with you about the Mercado deal.
Biggest exaggeration I’ve seen.
Mercado was the task deal! That was a poor trade.
Why are so many players who have hit before doing so badly this year? The number of regulars near or below the Mendoza line is surreal…..
Shifts, aging, luck?
I don’t really want to say regression because that’s not at all their true talent level in my opinion.
Really dislike seeing all these teams add this time of the year as management let us down again this year. Hoping to see a real manager at the helm starting next season and the power to be spends some of the funds we have been hoarding for 3 years now. We do have some major talent coming up but we need some quality pieces to get back to dominating the NLC.
You may not like the signings the team has made, but they have spent money.
as a cards fan, best news of the year
As a Cub fan you are a piece of crap
As a genius, you are the opposite of a genius. As a handsome guy, you are ugly. As a guy with a respectable mom, yours is…….nevermind
As a Cards fan I agree. Saying an injury is good news is just dumb.
It allows the Redbirds to get a dead bat out of the lineup, allows some young guys a chance to earn their chops. And it gives Dexter a chance to clear his head, get healthy and work hard during the off season to be ready to rebound next year. I don’t wish him harm…..but this may turn out to be a win=win deal for both the Cards and Fowler.
I agree with you. Everyone has their struggles and I hope next year he wins comeback player of the year and shuts a lot of the cardinals fans up. I mean come on, we were all so happy to get him last year.
That would be great, but that doesn’t change the fact that he has been probably the worst regular starter in all of baseball this entire year. They still have an outside shot at the playoffs so not the improvement in both their offense and defense by not having him in the lineup is a big deal at this point in the season.
Look up Chris Davis….
Cubs 2016 World Champions….guzzle that
This is probably the best possible news for the Cardinals right now. They can remove a struggling player that they are committed to whether they like it or not with zero penalty and replace him with young guys who are performing at a much higher level. I would guess Kolten Wong coming off of the DL tomorrow takes his place and Munoz becomes the fourth outfielder, then they don’t really have to make any moves.
Does Ozuna have a shoulder injury he’s playing through?
Ozuna and The Cardinals both say no. ♂️
Yet he can’t really unload, or it looks really painful at least.
Yes Ozuna is battling a sore right shoulder. That’s why he’s wearing a sleeve. The Cardinals were aware of it when they traded for him. I blame John Mozeliak for this mess.
More and more of these players are signed by teams with big contracts and fail to preform. Dan uggla, Pablo Sandoval, fowler, Greg holland, , to an extent poujouls, I really wonder if a clause could be put into contracts where the player can be sent to the minors, outright, if preforming below replacement level, without refusal or claim for 15 days to work on their issues. They would then be called back up or released. Not allowed under the current MLB players union contract since the player can refuse the assignment, but with the nuculearwinter last off season in a slow free agent market, something’s gotta give.
Good luck getting the Player’s Union to agree to that one.
Good luck getting fans into the stands when the owner signs a bunch of free agents and the team and players underpreforms, But they raise ticket prices to justify it. A player can sign a free agent contract, underpreform, refuse a minor league assignment and is realeased. But the player is more than happy to sign a minor league deal with a new team, go figure.
There will be a hard salary cap, the DH in the National League, and names on the back of Yankees’ uniforms before that one happens.
Yelp! Not like the old days. Such as Stan Musial getting $100,000 in 1962. Had an off year and had his pay cut to $65,000 for 1963.
He was well over 40. So they probably did not expect him to return to All-Star performance. But yeah, different era.
He was also promoted to General Manager in 1967 after being named a VP after the 1963 season. Different time.
I think it’s safe to say that agreements, that we will never hear about, take place behind closed doors regularly. Greg Holland wanted to perform at the highest level for the Cardinals but could not. They tried many options to get him back on track but they could not.
As for clause in the contract for underperforming, I think when we look at the flip side of that coin there isn’t much balance. Pujols “deserved” much more than his contract paid him in the early years than now. I don’t think we also take into account the years these players work in the minors, for peanuts, just to get noticed? What a salary is (payment for past performance) versus what a salary, what some might consider, should be (merit based pay) hasn’t been the mlb model for some time. The model already leans away from the benefit of the player and more favorably to the owners and the teams.
I think teams are now adjusting to this problem by signing more players to short term deals and (for the most part) walking away if the price is too high in dollars and/or years. Fowler would not have gotten 5 years had he been on the market last winter. I never wish injury on any player, but when you have a guy making top dollar and producing below replacement level consistently, the next best thing to eating the contract is to have him on the DL just so you can get someone more productive into that spot.
I hate the injury for Fowler, but it does put Bader and O’Neil in the starting line up. Also opens the door for J. Martinez to get his bat in the line up more too.
never like to see an injury, but this should give the cards a good look at some of the younger OF’s and figure out what to do with Fowler’s contract moving forward. While he had improved lately, his performance was still subpar.
i never hope for player injuries but this might be the break both sides needs the cards can look at what they have in the kids and dex can step back heal (i haven’t been convinced he’s been playing healthy i excepted regression at 32 but not fall off a cliff bad) hopefully a restful good off season and new manegment revives him
It won’t. We’ve seen this a number of times. Player x gets big contract and begins to underperform immediately after. This is the player that Fowler is now and the Cards will have to live with it
Sucks he got hurt but I love the opportunity for O’Neill. I’m a Cubs fan but I have a feeling this kid is going to do well with the Cards
Dead money anyway. DFA and move on.
I don’t know about that tbh. I’m not the biggest Fowler fan, admittedly, but I’d like to see what he can do for with a full year of a new regime instead of what he did under Matheny.
Reading these comments from Cardinals fan Im wording if they need to hire Jeff Gillooly, yikes.
I hate to say this about an injured player, but this is good news for the Cardinals’ play-off chances.
Shildt may be an improvement over Matheny in most areas, but Matheny was better at limiting Fowler’s playing time, while Schildt was stupidly still starting Fowler in most games when it’s become clear that it’s too late to get Fowler going and so he needs to sit if the Cardinals are going to have the best chance to win ballgames.