The Cardinals needed a lift Friday night, and Jimmy Crooks gave them one in the most pressure-packed way possible.
After a rain delay that stretched nearly three hours, St. Louis found itself trailing before Jordan Walker tied things up in the sixth.
The game still needed a finisher, and Crooks delivered it in the bottom of the eighth with a game-winning home run in a lefty-versus-lefty matchup. It was the kind of swing that can change a night for a team - and maybe a player, too.
That’s what made the moment stand out. Crooks has had a rough go at the plate overall, hitting .172/.273/.310 with two home runs and a .583 OPS. But even with those struggles, the Cardinals still see him as one of the top prospects in the system, and the organization still has catcher decisions to sort out for the future.
Friday offered a reminder of why Crooks remains part of that conversation. He came through off the bench, and he did it in a spot where St.
Louis badly needed someone to end it before the weather could create even more problems. With more rain expected later, extra innings would have been a dangerous place to be.
Instead, Crooks ended it. That second home run mattered, not just because it won the game, but because it showed the kind of clutch pop the Cardinals have been waiting to see more often.
He has hit in the minors, and the hope in St. Louis is that this is the kind of breakthrough that can carry over.
The Cardinals will be looking for signs that Friday was more than a one-night jolt. If Crooks can build on it, he could start turning this into a real launching point. For now, though, he made his case the best way possible: with the big blow.
In Other News...
Brendan Donovan Trade Return Suddenly Looks More Interesting For Cardinals
The Brendan Donovan deal looked like a pure future play when it was made, but the Cardinals have now started to see the return take shape in a more tangible way. St. Louis added two more names from that package in the draft, continuing to stock the system with players who fit different lanes of upside and give the front office more than one way to come out ahead.
Andrew Williamson brings left-handed power potential to the outfield mix, while Dawson Montesa adds a hard-throwing arm with a starters toolkit that still has room to develop. Add in the earlier haul from the trade, and the Cardinals suddenly have a deeper group to evaluate than a one-for-one swap would suggest, even if the full value of the move will take time to sort out. [Read more 🡒]
Cardinals Fans Are Hearing Big Things About Their New Pitching Hope
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For a club that has spent real energy building out its pitching pipeline, the reaction around Kuhns matters because it suggests the organization may have found one of the more intriguing names in the class. He arrives in a deep group of Cardinals arms, and the early buzz has been strong enough to put him in a conversation with some of the better young pitchers in the game, which is exactly the kind of attention St. Louis was hoping to generate with this selection. [Read more 🡒]
Cardinals Fans Keep Seeing The Same Trevor Condon Draft Mix-Up
The draft brought a pair of Georgia first-rounders into the spotlight, and it also brought a familiar bit of confusion with it. Charlie Condon, now in the Colorado Rockies system, has been hearing the same assumption since the names started circulating together, even though he and Trevor Condon are separate players who just happen to share a last name, a state and a trip into the first round.
For Cardinals fans, the mix-up has been easy to understand because Trevor Condon is the one wearing the St. Louis draft tag, while Charlie arrived with his own high-profile profile as one of the top players in the class. Charlie has said the brother question comes up often, and the overlap only gets more noticeable when both players are being discussed as major league prospects from Georgia, with their paths now headed in very different directions. [Read more 🡒]