Zack

Thompson

The first batch of cuts from Cardinals camp includes one of the more unique talents in Cijnte, a switch-pitching prospect acquired from the Mariners in the Brendan Donovan trade over the offseason. The 22-year-old ambidextrous phenom is significantly better from the right side where his fastball sits in the mid-to-upper 90’s with a plus sider. The fact that he can still operate from the left side is a nice wrinkle to have at his disposal but he’s probably going to wind up pitching exclusively from the right side at the highest level.

Both elected free agency instead of accepting the outright assignments. Thompson missed all of last season recovering from a torn lat muscle. Veneziano made a pair of relief appearances for the Cardinals after being claimed off waivers from the Marlins in early August.

Thompson suffered a torn lat muscle five weeks ago, and he’s now out through at least late May. The 27-year-old spent most of last year as a Triple-A starter and was expected to compete for a bullpen this spring.

Thompson was shut down 3-4 weeks earlier this month after suffering a tear in his left lat muscle. The 27-year-old lefty will be sidelined until some point in early April and will need several weeks, if not longer, to build up his arm strength and pitch count. He might be an option for the Cardinals at some point in mid-to-late May.

Thompson will be shut down completely for that timetable before being re-evaluated. Even if he’s cleared to resume throwing at that point, it’s going to take Thompson a while before he’s built back up and ready to contribute, so don’t be surprised if he misses at least the first month of the regular season as well.

Marmol told reporters that Thompson was not in consideration for Sunday’s start as they want the 26-year-old to continue to work on things. Matthew Liberatore is getting the start Sunday, but depending on how things go, St. Louis may not have a choice but to go with Thompson over the weekend.

Thompson will head back to the minors after making five appearances (two starts) for St. Louis this season. The 26-year-old posted a 9.53 ERA, 1.88 WHIP with a 20/8 K/BB ratio across his 17 innings of work.

Thompson averaged just 90 mph with his fastball today, which isn’t great. He still wasn’t hit particularly hard, but he walked four and gave up a homer to Kyle Higashioka. Thompson has a 6.97 ERA in two starts. Expectations were that he would have made the Cardinals as a swingman if Sonny Gray were healthy to start the year, but with the way he’s performed thus far, he might be sent down when Gray is activated.

Thompson got off to a rough start from the jump, as Mookie Betts connected on a solo homer to leadoff the game. He’d allow two more homers in the contest, both of them to Teoscar Hernández in the second and fourth inning, respectively. This was a tough opener for the 27-year-old lefty against one of the best teams in baseball, but fantasy managers saw plenty of these types of starts from Thompson in 2024. He’ll try to rebound next week against the Padres.

Thompson will take the ball after Opening Day starter Miles Mikolas faces the Dodgers on Thursday. It’ll be Lance Lynn, Steven Matz and Kyle Gibson following him to open the season. There’s zero appeal here for fantasy managers, unless you’re considering a DFS lineup stack with the Dodgers in this matchup.