Cardinals news and notes: Pham, Waino, and Oakland

This week, an athletic but very raw baseball pseudo-prospect will be conducting a demonstration workout for Major League Baseball teams. MLB.com’s Jenifer Langosch has confirmed on Twitter that the St. Louis Cardinals, along with the rest of baseball, will be sending a representative to the workout. Normally, this would be a non-story, but Tim Tebow has never been known for his ability to fly under the radar.

Tebow, in case you are somewhat unfamiliar (I suppose if you have not lived in the United States in the last decade or so, this is plausible, but otherwise I would be genuinely amazed), was a semi-notable baseball prospect in the high school Class of 2006 (this part of Tebow’s biography might be new to you). However, he was a far more notable football prospect. He went to the University of Florida, was a part of two national championship teams in 2006 and 2008, and won the Heisman Trophy as the best player in college football as the starting quarterback of the Gators in 2007 while being a finalist for the award against in 2008 and 2009.

In 2011, when receiving his first glimpse of starting in the National Football League, Tebow “led” the Denver Broncos to the playoffs and a postseason victory of the Pittsburgh Steelers. I put led in quotes because while they were a winning team under Tebow, they were an even better team the next season with Peyton Manning. Now, I think Tebow gets a bad rap—if it weren’t for the overwhelming media attention that comes with him, I believe he could survive as a mediocre backup quarterback—but his terrific record was largely a matter of circumstance.

With that said, in the global sense, Tim Tebow is a world-class athlete. He is certainly not as good of a quarterback as Cam Newton or Russell Wilson, but if Newton or Wilson (the latter, of course, being a former minor league baseball player himself) tried out to play baseball, any reasonable team would scout them. Even the San Diego Padres drafted Johnny Manziel, who had less of a baseball pedigree than Tim Tebow, and Manziel didn’t turn out to be a very good professional quarterback either.

Funny enough, for the Cardinals, there is precedent for football players-turned-baseball players. Mike Shannon, before his legendary career as a Cardinals player and broadcaster, was a quarterback commit at the University of Missouri. Brian Jordan, a star outfielder in the 1990s, played safety for the Atlanta Falcons for three seasons before his MLB career took off. And Chad Hutchinson, who had an MLB cup of coffee with the Cardinals in 2001, was a star quarterback at Stanford who eventually played briefly for the Dallas Cowboys.

Tim Tebow will almost certainly never played Major League Baseball but it’s probably worth a shot to scout him, as the cost of this is minimal. Anyway, here’s what happened yesterday at VEB.

Tommy Pham

I wrote about Tommy Pham and whether he should be playing more. In short: I don’t know, maybe?

Adam Wainwright

Waino was on Intentional Talk, and Lil Scooter wrote about this.

Prospects

Ebo handled the prospects. Hey, you know who else was a prospect recently? Luke Weaver. There. There’s your incentive.

Oakland Athletics

Craig Edwards wrote about how the Cardinals should destroy the Oakland A’s. As he does. And then mister_manager recapped the Cardinals’ 3-1 victory, fueled by Luke Weaver’s first career MLB win.

Also, in the world of promoted fanposts, this happened. I cannot explain or summarize it. I am not sure if I've had too much to drink to enjoy it or if I've had far too little. Just...it's a sight, man.

It is looking like Alex Reyes will start tonight. It may be awesome and it may be bad but it should certainly be fun!