(Busch Stadium) Earlier this week, St. Louis Cardinals General Manager John Mozeliak joked that “Flash” was making progress but still needed more time on the disabled list. The speedster he was referring to was Brayan Pena, who was finally able to run without restraint before yesterday’s game.

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“It was all out yesterday because it was a test to see how my knee responded,” said Pena with a smile. “Like I told them, hey remember I’m not Billy Hamilton so 100% for me is like 100%.”

MLB: Spring Training-St. Louis Cardinals at New York MetsWhile not able to catch, Pena has been hitting in the cages and throwing when not rehabbing his knee.

“I can go out there and play first base today. I can go out there and play any other position, but being behind the plate, you have to cross certain…it’s a very tough position. It’s very demanding and at the same time, we don’t want to have any setbacks. We want to be aggressive, but a smart aggressive and it feels like it’s working very well. We’re very happy and very pleased. Especially after what we saw yesterday and the way my knee responded today–there’s no swelling, there’s no soreness, there’s no nothing. Yesterday was all out, so it’s great.”

Pena will run again on Saturday as they continue to build and is hoping to begin more catcher-specific movements in the next few days.

“Right now we’re just doing agility exercises to make sure that my knees are strong and after that, we’ll go to the catching drills,” explained Pena. “Some springs and movement–stuff like that. If I can do that and my knees respond well, knocking on wood, that’s when we’ll move into the last stage and that would be catching and the bullpens, throwing to second, and blocking, and all that. We’re like a month away still, but I feel very good.”

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GRICHUK NOT STARTING

–After leaving last night’s game due to lower back stiffness, Randal Grichuk was not in the lineup for Friday’s game against Colorado.

“He’s doing good,” assured Mike Matheny. “It just tightened up so they’re just going to be cautious and continue to take a look at it.”

The manager added that this was not related to any weight-lifting movements for Grichuk, but rather during a throw on Wednesday.

“He was trying to push through it–but there was no sense to push,” added Matheny. “There are times to push and just didn’t think this was one of those and it really didn’t make sense.”

photo credit: STLBaseballWeekly.com; Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports