The Cardinals announced Wednesday that they’ve recalled right-hander Matt Svanson from Triple-A Memphis. His first appearance will be the first of his big league career. Right-hander Roddery Muñoz was optioned to Memphis in his place.
Svanson, 26, was the Blue Jays’ 13th-round pick in 2021. He joined the Cardinals by way of the 2023 Paul DeJong trade and entered the season ranked 22nd among St. Louis farmhands, per Baseball America. Their scouting report praises Svanson’s mid-90s sinker and above-average slider, both of which have helped the righty pile up grounders throughout his minor league career. Svanson has regularly sat north of 60% in that regard, though he dipped to “only” 52.7% last year in Double-A (still about 10 percentage points north of average).
Svanson opened the 2025 season in Triple-A Memphis — his first experience at that level. He’s started the season by holding opponents to one run on five hits and a pair of walks with four punchouts. Nearly two-thirds of the batted balls against him have been grounders in the season’s first couple weeks.
In parts of five minor league seasons, the 6’5″ righty has pitched to a 2.98 earned run average with a 25% strikeout rate and 7.9% walk rate. Svanson’s strikeout rate dipped to 20.8% last year, but he’s been better than average in terms of strikeout, walk and ground-ball rate in every other season of his young professional career. He’ll hope to cement himself in the bullpen alongside Ryan Helsley, Ryan Fernandez, JoJo Romero and Phil Maton. Svanson was just added to the 40-man roster back in November, so he has a full slate of minor league option years remaining.
Lehigh legend
The next Rick Ankiel!
26 years old, ranked 22nd in the Cardinals meh minor league system. Not picking him up yet for my fantasy team.
Rick Ankiel was promoted at age 19 and had his first big league season at 20, Svanson is 26 and a right hander
Sveet News. I’ll bet he’s a svell guy. Is his best pitch a sveeper?
His slider is indeed of the sveeper variety! It is his primary sving-and-miss offering.
Is he related to Erik Svanson?
Steve, please explain how someone who has never been in the major leagues can be REcalled?
It’s the official term for bringing someone up who is on the 40-man roster, regardless of prior major league service.
Svanson was in major league camp (as all 40-man players are), was optioned to Triple-A Memphis prior to Opening Day, and has now been recalled.
If he weren’t on the 40-man roster, the terminology would be “selected the contract of Matt Svanson” (to the 40-man roster).
Why do they call it “recalled” when it’s his 1st time? Seems “called up” would be used for the 1st and recalled for subsequent call ups.
When they added him to the 40 man roster, the first transaction was to designate him to AAA. I believe that it is technically correct to state that he is being recalled to the major league roster.
Would an instance where a player was called up and didn’t play also create this situation?
Yup.
Optioned, not designated — but otherwise, yes. Since he’s technically been in major league camp and optioned to a minor league affiliate, he’s now being recalled to the big league club.
Teams that figure out how to weaponize extreme groundball guys like Svanson in middle relief will suppress runs more efficiently than those relying solely on K-heavy, high-velo arms.