I don't know if you're all aware, but in Low-A Peoria this year, 2015 draftee Ryan Helsley is 8-1 with a 1.89 ERA and 83 strikeouts in 76.1 innings. Now, if this guy were nineteen, I would be crapping my pants jumping around the room because he'd literally make Alex Reyes look like Seth Maness. But he's 21. The numbers are still astounding, no matter what age, but really, you'd think that this kind of performance would warrant a promotion to Palm Beach, maybe even Springfield. It pissed me off when we did this to Luke Weaver last year, leaving him at a level he's too old for and is going to dominate without ever really getting challenged. We can easily promote Helsley, then bring up Dakota Hudson from GCL (because as a star college pitcher I don't really see him gaining much from getting a start or two against high schoolers other than a mostly stress-free debut).

Another guy who needs to be promoted at this instant is Luke Weaver, who's 4-1 with a 0.96 (yes, you read that right) ERA and 42 strikeouts in 37.1 innings in Springfield. I really think that we should get him up to Memphis ASAP call him up as early as this September to help our god-awful bullpen.

There wasn't really supposed to be any rhyme or reason to this post, just me ranting about the idiocy of having a 21-year-old OBLITERATING guys up to two years younger than him. I know that 21 is a normal age for a player in Low-A, but it's not really a good age for a PROSPECT in Low-A. So yeah.

UPDATE: I just received word that the Cardinals promoted Junior Fernandez, a 19-year-old with a 3.33 ERA, to Palm Beach. This is a real headscratcher for me and pisses me off even more. WHY wasn't Helsley promoted, or even Jake Woodford? They've both put up better numbers than Fernandez this year.

I also wanted to share a little analogy I thought of about how the Cardinals are handling Ryan Helsley. It's like they're a taxi cab driver, driving on the highway in a 60 MPH zone, but going the minimum 40 MPH. Just seemed appropriate and somewhat humorous to me.