All it took was one compliment for Cardinals first baseman Luken Baker to know his offseason work was being noticed.
“I can convince myself I look skinnier in the mirror, but it's nice to hear from someone else,†Baker joked Saturday during Day 1 of Cardinals Winter Warm-up at Busch Stadium. “Honestly, the best way whenever I get into getting myself in better shape is I really try not to look at the scale. I couldn't really tell you what it's been like. The mirror is my best friend at that point.â€
Throughout an offseason that is his first with 40-man roster status, the 26-year-old has put his body composition at the forefront.
The goal: to be ready for the course of an entire big league season.
“I've tried to make myself more, I don't know the right adjectives … but just more agile and limber,†Baker said. “One-hundred and sixty-two games is a long season. Every year that I've been in professional baseball, I've found a better way each year to make sure that I'm healthy and as close to 100% healthy as I can be in the last game of the season as I am the first.â€
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Some of that process this winter has included a “strict routine†with what he is putting in his body and at what times he is doing so. Baker believes more mindfulness in that area will translate over to the regular season considering that routine is one he will have been on for three-to-four months by that point.
“I don't have to think about it. It's just common practice,†the Houston native said. “And now I feel like carrying that into the season will just help me feel better every day than I ever have.â€
This past season — Baker’s sixth of professional baseball — the right-handed hitter led the Cardinals farm system in homers with 33 and in RBIs with 98 — both those figures led all Cardinals minor leaguers. He slugged .720 and had an OPS of 1.159, but did not qualify for those statistical categories since his 380 plate appearances were not enough to do so.
The career year from Baker at the Class AAA level earned the former 75th overall pick his first call-up to the majors in early June. He ended the regular season with ºüÀêÊÓƵ but had sparse playing time and finished his first MLB season with a .209 average, a .627 OPS and two home runs in 33 games.
The brief showing gave him a plan.
"My goal has been to get as repetitive and consistent as possible," he said. "A lot of what was tough for me last year up here was the inconsistency of playing and trying to figure out how to keep myself in the best position to perform whenever I did get the opportunity to play. It really put into perspective how important it is for me to be able to repeat what I do every single day no matter what the situation is."
This offseason is Baker’s first with 40-man roster status. He was left vulnerable to the Rule 5 draft last winter but went unselected. He would have been unprotected from the Rule 5 draft in December 2021, as well. Coming off a 26-homer season in Double-A, he would have been a candidate for NL teams looking for a DH option, but Major League Baseball’s lockout postponed the Rule 5 draft that winter.
Along with the off-the-field benefits of having 40-man status over the course of a winter, the roster spot gives Baker a more attainable vision for spring.
“It created a lot more, I'll say, sense of security, but also a little bit more motivation,†Baker said. “There's more of a clear goal instead of just I'm going to go to spring training and hopefully get to do this, hopefully get to do that. Now, it's all right, I have the opportunity to go win a job. To go perform. To go show what I've been working on all offseason. It's been a lot better. This is the first time I've gotten to do the Winter Warm-up. It's been pretty awesome too.â€
Edman, Donovan, Carlson all progressing
Cardinals general manager John Mozeliak said Tommy Edman, Brendan Donovan and Dylan Carlson have shown positive signs in their returns from respective surgeries.
Edman (right wrist) had surgery early this offseason despite ending the year healthy. The utility man who was a finalist for the NL utility Gold Glove award dealt with inflammation in his right wrist over the summer that forced him to spend 25 days on the injured list from early July through the start of August.
Donovan is recovering from elbow surgery on his throwing arm. In his second year, Donovan was limited to 95 games after his season was cut short at the start of August. The injury limited the 26-year-old to only hitting in his final 19 games of the year. The utility man and former utility Gold Glove winner is not expected to have limitations once spring training begins.
Carlson’s season was cut short in the middle of September because of a left ankle injury originally sustained in May when the Cardinals were in Boston. Carlson, who also dealt with an oblique injury, attempted to come back from the ankle injury but was shut down.
Mozeliak described the feedback on Carlson’s injury as positive.
Naile 'still standing,' feels better prepared for 2024
Coming off his second season playing in the major leagues, right-handed reliever James Naile understands the pressures that come with playing at baseball’s highest level. He offers this past year as an example of that.
"In my second year, I feel like I've been through a lot,†Naile said. “I've had a little bit of success. I've had some failures. I've been on the team, off the team, up, down, you name it. I think now it's just about performing.â€
While in the minors for most of the 2023 season, Naile posted a 3.66 ERA with 66 strikeouts in 59 innings all with Class AAA Memphis. The righty from Cape Girardeau, Missouri kept hitters to a .267 average — the lowest he’s allowed since 2017 — and struck out the most batters he’s had in a season since 2019 when he was a starter in the Oakland Athletics’ system. A new breaking ball he developed over the 2023 offseason became a “tremendous pitch†for the righty.
But while in the majors, Naile posted an 8.80 ERA in 15 1/3 innings and was regularly shuttled between Class AAA and the big leagues when innings were needed. The breaking ball that worked to his advantage in Memphis was one he didn’t throw “all that well†when pitching for ºüÀêÊÓƵ.
In 2024, he’s eyeing to put those hurdles behind him.
“I think a lot of it was mental, to be honest,†Naile said on Saturday. “I think that the product I was putting out in Memphis was not the same product I was putting out here in Busch Stadium. That's mental when you think about it. The mound is the same distance there as it is here. I think that's a tough fix, but that is something that I've been through now. Like I said, I've had success, I've failed, and I'm still standing.â€Â
Cardinals baseball exec John Mozeliak talks moves, plus more Winter Warm-up videos
Hear from Cardinals executive John Mozeliak and players, who spoke to fans and the press on Saturday at the team's annual Winter Warm-up.
Cardinals president of baseball operations John Mozeliak opening comments at Winter Warm-up on Saturday before taking questions from the media.Â
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