Nelson

Velazquez

Although Velázquez was the star of the game, the Cardinals still had Alec Burleson hit for him in the eighth. Burleson wound up striking out against Ian Hamilton. Starting almost exclusively against lefties, Velázquez is 12-for-38 with three homers since being brought up on May 29. It doesn’t seem destined to lead to an expanded role, but the Cardinals will keep rotating out Burleson, Lars Nootbaar or Nathan Church to make room for him against southpaws.

With left-hander Noah Cameron toeing the slab for the Royals, Nootbaar will get a breather. Fellow left-handed hitters Jimmy Crooks and Nathan Church are also out of the Cardinals’ lineup on Thursday. Nelson Velazquez will start in Nootbaar’s place in left field and will bat cleanup for the Cardinals on Thursday night in Kansas City.

The Cardinals aren’t going to push Nootbaar from a workload standpoint by throwing him out there for an afternoon contest following a night game. It’ll be Victor Scott II in center field with Nelson Velázquez patrolling left field. The 28-year-old corner outfielder went 2-for-6 with an RBI on Friday night in his season debut.

Velásquez took Shota Imanaga deep in his very first major league at-bat this season and later added a single. He was promoted primarily to play against lefties after hitting a modest .232/.344/.420 for Triple-A Memphis, but perhaps the strong showing tonight will keep him in the lineup against Ben Brown on Saturday.

It’s unclear if Velázquez will actually hold a major role with the Cardinals, but with Nathan Church and Lars Nootbar both still on the injured list, he may have some short-term value in deeper leagues. He’s batting cleanup tonight in his Cardinals debut against LHP Shota Imanaga. Velázquez was hitting .232/.344/.420 with Triple-A Memphis, with seven homers and four stolen bases.

Nootbaar has yet to appear in a spring training contest for the Cardinals as he works his way back from offseason surgery on both heels. The 28-year-old corner outfielder’s absence creates a pathway for Nelson Velàzquez to open the year in the big leagues as a temporary stopgap.

The 27-year-old slugger started the scoring with a bang, crushing a 419-foot (109.4 mph EV) three-run blast off of Miles Mikolas in the opening inning. He also tacked on a run-scoring single in the fifth that increased the Cardinals’ edge to 5-3. He’s doing everything in his power to earn a spot on the Cardinals’ Opening Day roster this spring, hitting .333 (11-for-33) with four long balls and nine RBI.

Velázquez is 5-for-17 with just one strikeout. He has a realistic shot at a spot on the Cardinals’ bench as a platoon guy against lefties, though it doesn’t help his case that he doesn’t really have much of a positive split against lefties in his career. He’s hit .211/.306/.428 with a 30% strikeout rate versus lefties and .212/.276/.435 with a 28% strikeout rate against righties in his 615 major league plate appearances.

Velázquez, who hit .212/.286/.433 with 31 homers in 615 plate appearances for the Cubs and Royals from 2022-24, bounced around all over the place last year. The Royals released him from their Triple-A roster in May, at which point he went to Mexico and hit .357/.444/.658 in 49 games. That earned him a minor league contract from the Pirates, and he hit .284/.349/.554 in 18 games at the end of the year for Triple-A Indianapolis. Since then, he’s spent time in both the Dominican and Puerto Rican Winter Leagues. He should have some chance of making the Cardinals as a right-handed platoon option in the outfield corners and at DH, assuming the team doesn’t bring in a veteran option for that role.

A classic change of scenery candidate, Velázquez was a notable prospect just a couple years ago. He failed to carve out an everyday role in Kansas City, batting .212/.286/.433 with 31 homers and seven steals in 194 games at the major-league level since 2022. Still only 26 years old, he represents a worthwhile dice roll for the rebuilding Pirates as a no-risk lottery ticket.