Future Redbirds

From Bird Land:

The Cardinals promoted lefthanded pitcher Troy Cate and center fielder Skip Schumaker to the major-league club Monday and both are expected to be on hand and available for tonight’s game against the Kansas City Royals, the Cardinals’ Triple-A affiliate confirmed Monday.

I think that this move puts Cate in the bullpen although I suppose they could bump the miserable Wells to the pen (Wellemeyer too if Looper is ok after leaving with a strained shoulder). 

Cate has been dreadful as a starter rarely lasting more than 5 innings with an ERA over 5 as a starter.  He dazzled in the Mexican Winter league this past offseason and took over for Matt Ginter in the rotation early at Triple AAA but Cate is a long shot to stick as a major league starter.  He could be a quality middle relief pitcher and for a pen that’s been as taxed as STL’s has been as of late, that’s pretty dang useful.

 erik was prophetic in his Daily Prospect Report for yesterday:

Don’t look now, but it looks like Skip Schumaker’s hitting lessons with Mark McGwire and Chris Duncan this summer may be starting to pay off. He’s hitting .314/.379/.500. That’s right, folks. Skip Schumaker has a .500 slugging %. Xanadu.

We’ll see if Skippy can keep it up in the bigs.