(Busch Stadium) The first of several anticipated roster moves took place this afternoon as the St. Louis Cardinals activated Jhonny Peralta from the disabled list. Rookie outfielder Magnerius Sierra was optioned to Springfield (AA) to make room on the 25-man roster.
“I’m feeling good,” said Peralta. “Last couple of weeks, tried to recover and right now I feel really good.”
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The infielder was placed on the disabled list April 17th as negative reactions to medicine for an upper respiratory issue affected his play. Peralta had a rehab assignments at both Palm Beach (A) and Memphis (AAA) where after a 2-8 start, he hit .364 (4-11) in three games with the Redbirds.
“I started feeling better after I stopped the medicine,” said Peralta. “It was different how I played in Palm Beach and now when I played in Memphis I felt more ready to go. That’s how I knew I was ready–I’m healthy.”
However, being healthy will not necessarily equate to playing time as Aledmys Diaz and Jedd Gyorko have settled in on the left side of the Cardinals infield.
“Yeah, it’s certainly a challenge,” said Mike Matheny. “It was a challenge before he left too and I don’t have a great answer, except a lot of times those things take care of themselves. We’ll just kind of watch and see how it plays out, but he gets where we are. It’s not his first time around, but he also he wants to play–needs to play in order for him to feel like he can stay sharp.”
In ten of his 13 seasons, Peralta has had at least 570 plate appearances is used to being a fixture in the starting lineup.
“For me, it’s kind of hard because in my whole career, I haven’t been on the bench,” began Peralta. “But right now, in this situation, I understand. I understand what’s going on and the guys are doing right. Everybody’s doing good on the team, we’re in second place. I understand the situation but it’s kind of hard for me to be on the bench and not play everyday because I know what kind of player I can be.”
“When you see what Jedd Gyorko has done and you see what Diaz has done over the last year, getting playing time is going to be somewhat of a challenge,” said John Mozeliak. “But it does give skipper a little more flexibility to try and manipulate what he’s trying to do on the infield. In terms of everyday plate appearances, I think that’s going to be hard from the get go.”
photo credit: Brian Stull-STLBaseballWeekly.com; Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports
