Cardinals news and notes: Spring Training, Waino, and Austin Jackson

Here is what happened on VEB for February 23, 2016.

Adam Wainwright's projections

• Joe Schwarz covered yesterday's player of the day in Viva El Birdos projections: Adam Wainwright. Waino is a somewhat difficult player to project. On one hand, he missed most of 2015 with an injury, and although baseball projections have become sadly accustomed to adjusting for season-long pitcher injuries, they are usually of the arm variety. Additionally, Wainwright is entering his mid-30s and it is becoming increasingly difficult to know just what he is today. I fully expect a wide range of projection submissions. This is only implicitly a dare.

Spring Training happenings

• Craig Edwards wrote about the Cardinals' Spring Training roster. Eventually, there will be a final, 25-man roster, but in the meantime, the Cardinals have 62 players in Spring Training. Several of the players have little-to-no chance to make the 2016 Cardinals big league roster, but each represents some chance, however small, to crack the big club. Some of the players are extreme long shots but they may be worth a quick glance or two as Spring Training continues.
• Lil Scooter summarized Bradley Woodrum's recent analysis of the likelihoods of MLB pitchers to require Tommy John surgery. For the full version, obviously just go ahead and click the link, but here is my executive summary of it: no Cardinal will ever get hurt and everybody will be fine and if anything, a Cardinal pitcher needing TJ will lead to him throwing harder than ever immediately. Basically, it's Rookie of the Year except the Cubs don't win the World Series.
• On Monday, Mike Matheny told Rick Hummel that he would consider a eleven pitcher setup in 2016, and I don't like this idea. The Cardinals have tremendous depth in the bullpen and have fewer unique options for the bench, and my preference would be for the Cardinals to have as many good relievers in the majors as is realistically possible so as to preserve the bullpen arms for as long as possible.

An idea for outfield depth

• While it looks increasingly unlikely that the Cardinals will make another big splash in free agency, Ben Markham explored another potential acquisition: Austin Jackson. While Jackson was a hair above average in 2015 and was below average in 2014, he has had flashes of brilliance in the past and has largely avoided injury to this point in his career. He is an intriguing option when considering the injury histories of Matt Holliday, Randal Grichuk, and Tommy Pham. The cost may be a bit rich for the Cardinals' blood and perhaps the addition of Jackson would be superfluous, but the idea is certainly interesting.