{"id":78230,"date":"2024-06-28T15:34:59","date_gmt":"2024-06-28T19:34:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=78230"},"modified":"2024-06-28T15:34:59","modified_gmt":"2024-06-28T19:34:59","slug":"st-louis-cardinals-promote-gordon-graceffo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/06\/28\/st-louis-cardinals-promote-gordon-graceffo\/","title":{"rendered":"St. Louis Cardinals Promote Intriguing Pitching Prospect"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Per a team announcement, the St. Louis Cardinals will promote starting pitching prospect\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/register\/player.fcgi?id=gracef000gor&amp;utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=www.mlbtraderumors.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-06-28_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Gordon Graceffo<\/a> on Friday. Though Graceffo has been a starter throughout his time in professional ball, <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/katiejwoo\/status\/1806535404763353171\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Katie Woo of the Athletic<\/a> reports that the Cardinals plan to use him out of the bullpen for the time being.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Roster News: RHP Gordon Graceffo has been selected from Memphis (AAA). He will be making his Major League debut and will wear #67.<\/p>\n<p>RHP Kyle Leahy has been optioned to Memphis.<\/p>\n<p>To make room on the 40-player roster, LHP Steven Matz has been transferred to the 60-day IL. <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/BwZOOqJeYj\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/BwZOOqJeYj<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; St. Louis Cardinals (@Cardinals) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Cardinals\/status\/1806765414396867025?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">June 28, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>In corresponding moves, St. Louis placed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/m\/matzst01.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Steven Matz<\/a> on the 60-day injured list to open a 40-man spot while opening a spot on the active roster by sending <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/l\/leahyky01.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kyle Leahy<\/a> to Triple-A. Matz recently <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/06\/24\/cardinals-injury-setback-trade\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">suffered a setback<\/a> in his comeback from back issues and will miss at least another 4-6 weeks.<\/p>\n<h2>St. Louis Cardinals To Promote Gordon Graceffo<\/h2>\n<p>St. Louis drafted Graceffo out of Villanova in the fifth round of the 2021 MLB draft. The 6\u20194\u2033 righty quickly made a name for himself, producing a 1.73 ERA in 26 Single-A innings in 2021.<\/p>\n<p>In 2022, Graceffo continued to impress. Split between High, Double, and Triple-A, he tossed 139 1\/3 innings and posted a 2.97 ERA in 26 starts while striking out 139. With this performance, many considered him as a candidate to emerge as a top-100 caliber prospect.<\/p>\n<p>However, his stock took a hit with an uneven showing in Triple-A in last season. In 2023, Graceffo dealt with shoulder troubles and produced a 4.92 ERA in just 86 innings of work. It was unclear whether his struggles stemmed mostly from injury or if he simply overachieved in the lower levels.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the struggles, Graceffo continued to rank among the better prospects in the Cardinals&#8217; system. MLB Pipeline currently ranks him as the organization&#8217;s fourth-best pitching prospect and eighth-best prospect overall.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Gordon Graceffo<\/p>\n<p>First 7 starts:<br \/>4.93 ERA, 10.6% K-BB%, 8.3% Brl%, .362 xDamage, 19.1% Whiff%, 25.2% CSW%, 92.2 vFA<\/p>\n<p>Last 2 starts:<br \/>1.29 ERA, 16.4% K-BB%, 0.0% Brl%, .257 xDamage, 31.3% Whiff%, 30.3% CSW%, 93.4 vFA <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/fRktm9Jk6C\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/fRktm9Jk6C<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Jacob (@JacobE_STL) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/JacobE_STL\/status\/1793304932327539128?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">May 22, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>However, the Cardinals will promote Graceffo after a rebound performance in the minors this season. The 24-year-old has produced good, not great strikeout and walk rates with a 3.84 ERA in 14 Triple-A starts. The Cardinals likely see Graceffo as a long-term starter but need him to provide multiple innings in relief for the time being.<\/p>\n<p>Ideally, the Cardinals can promote Graceffo and trade for one less arm at the deadline. Evaluators expect Graceffo&#8217;s fastball to gain a couple miles per hour due to the nature of shorter stints in the bullpen. At that point, the pitch should pair better with his already above-average to plus slider.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo Credits:<em> Dave Nelson-USA TODAY Sports<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Per a team announcement, the St. Louis Cardinals will promote starting pitching prospect\u00a0Gordon Graceffo on Friday. Though Graceffo has been a starter throughout his time in professional ball, Katie Woo of the Athletic reports that the Cardinals plan to use him out of the bullpen for the time being. Roster News: RHP Gordon Graceffo has [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4683,"featured_media":78283,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25,926,1071,35],"tags":[684],"class_list":["post-78230","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cardinals","category-milb","category-mlb","category-news","tag-steven-matz"],"modified_by":"Evan Mazza, Site Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78230","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4683"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78230"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78230\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}