MLB WINTER MEETINGS

December 5, 2023

Oliver Marmol

St. Louis Cardinals

Press Conference

Q. Signing three pitchers, what's your reaction to bringing in three proven veterans who have done it for a long time?

OLIVER MARMOL: Excited about it. Mo and his group I think have done a really good job if you look at the void we had last year and what we've added this year, not only from a skill set standpoint but also when you look at the personalities that are coming into that clubhouse, it's equally as important, and you've added some established guys that have experienced the ups and downs of this game. That's important for our young guys to see.

So you add Sonny, this a high, high competitor. When you're in conversation with him, it's fairly clear that he cares about being really good, but he also wants everybody around him to be elite. That's a good leadership quality to have in that clubhouse.

Lance Lynn, he's an accountability guy. Been around for a while. He's going to make sure things go a certain way, and we're looking forward to that.

Then I can't speak highly enough of Gibby. This is a guy that, I mean, strong clubhouse presence, likes bringing guys alongside of him.

So the three of them together is definitely what we needed.

Q. How do you feel like that is going to impact their presence, (indiscernible) talked about the innings, how do you feel that's going to impact your bullpen, just the way your bullpen might benefit?

OLIVER MARMOL: If you look at the first part of the year, there wasn't a whole lot of length out of our starters. These guys, they eat up a lot of innings. They do it well. Hopefully that carries on into our bullpen not being overused and those guys staying fresh and being able to do their jobs.

Q. You touched on a second ago, but having three proven veterans in your clubhouse, what kind of spread can that have to the rest of the group?

OLIVER MARMOL: When you talk about culture, it's important to have guys that have been around, that aren't only thinking about themselves, they're thinking about the club. Those three guys are known for that.

So it's extremely important. Especially when you have the young guys that we have, you look at our position players, you got Masyn and Walker, and go down that list, and on the pitching side Libby and Thompson and Rom. It's really good to have guys that are at the top of their game, like Sonny, that know how to lead and then guys that have been around, like Lance and Gibby.

So the combination of skill set but also personality is what makes those three moves extremely meaningful for our clubhouse.

Q. You mentioned Libby and Thompson. How are you thinking about their roles in the season as you stand here now?

OLIVER MARMOL: I think it's important for those guys to come in built up to be starters. Because anything could happen in the course of the weeks that you're down in spring. So they will come in to do that, and then we'll evaluate as spring goes and see kind of where they fit in that roster.

But they will come in built up to compete for a starting role.

Q. When you're looking at Mo's projected starters, Lars, Tommy and Jordan Walker, what do you like about that group?

OLIVER MARMOL: That you can run them out there every day and they show up to the clubhouse knowing that they're going to be playing left, center and right. Mo stated that in an ideal world, that's what that outfield looks like.

And I'm excited about it. If you look at our defense, there's a lot of moving parts. We have players with a lot of versatility. And it does give you flexibility, and that's a good thing, but it also -- at times it's tough to get into a rhythm.

So being able to run those guys out there, and not to say that the other guys aren't coming in and competing, anything could happen, but coming up into the clubhouse knowing where you're going to be every day is an important part.

Q. It can be important, and they have been an asset to this club in the past, but would you hope in 2024, knowing that maybe the roster is not finalized, for a little bit more continuity in your everyday lineup this year?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yes, that would be nice. It's good when you have role players that understand that they're role players, and it's good when your everyday guys know exactly where they're going to hit and be every day.

We do have versatility, but sometimes it can be a little bit of a distraction. When we started to run Eddie out there in center every day, we saw a big difference in just overall performance. What he can get to was impressive. He did a really nice job out there. In a perfect world, we're running him out there quite a bit.

Q. Is there a place for you to build back to where you want to get stable defense? Does that come from continuity?

OLIVER MARMOL: No doubt. Perfectly put, it comes from continuity. It's guys being able to know that they're going to be playing that position every day. Now, do they get a day off here and there and you can mix and match? Absolutely. But, yes, we need to get back to playing really good defense. That's been a staple for the Cardinals for a very long time, and last year just wasn't good enough. That's something we're highly focused on.

Q. Was it circumstances, I know some of it was injury, but some of it was choices y'all made that kind of created the scatter?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yeah, I think it's a combination of all of it, when you look at break and spring and wanting to give O'Neill a shot in center, that is part of it, I think that's what you're alluding to, so I'll take that. But some of it was circumstances, injuries. At one point you had Noot and T.O. and Carlson all on the IL, right. So you're mixing and matching out there as best as possible.

So, yes, part of it is personnel, part of it was lack of continuity of just being able to know that you were going to be out there every day.

Q. What were some of the things that your staff and you brought to the front office that you felt you wanted to address that you couldn't, like the game day stuff, if you expand the staff to be sort of able to do more?

OLIVER MARMOL: As far as staffing goes?

Q. Yeah. But particularly, like, the responsibilities. Like, things you felt that maybe were lumped onto one guy or overwhelmed one guy or however you felt maybe slipped because of it?

OLIVER MARMOL: Staffs are growing throughout the league for the right reason. There's a lot more information to go through and figuring out what's simple and actionable.

So, yes, we're continuing to add. We're in the process of that at the moment. But part of it will be on the pitching side to be able to help on the game-planning side of the day-to-day opposition, advancing the opposition, and also certain things on the tipping side as well that could be monitored. Adding somebody to that department is important.

Q. Was it a case of, like, a coach being unable to be everywhere at once, out in the bullpen, as opposed to prepping? Is that kind of what you felt?

OLIVER MARMOL: If you really look back to how we put the staff together, Dusty took the one role, and that position was never really filled. You hired Daniel Nicolaisen, and then on the hitting side, and Packy kind of oversaw a lot of the offense and pitching. But there wasn't someone specific that filled Dusty's role. So it's filling that role again.

Q. With Tommy playing center, do you worry about what that does to his body? He's a guy who he beats up his body pretty good. Do you worry about what that cumulative effect would have on him at the plate or over a full season?

OLIVER MARMOL: I don't. This is a guy that takes care of his body extremely well. I think bouncing around is hard. Playing short a couple days a week, playing second, playing center, but knowing what you -- showing up every day, knowing where you're going to be. I don't worry about him getting beat up and not being able to post. He takes care of himself extremely well.

Q. With Masyn Winn, what did you learn about him in the short time you had him, what do you still need to see and what -- where is he in terms of heading into Spring Training?

OLIVER MARMOL: I love Masyn Winn. His mentality, his skill set, the way he approaches the game, he's constantly wanting to learn, he's open, he's coachable, but his competitive nature is incredible. He doesn't scare. And he came in, he knew that, I mean, the league was tough. And he experienced that, but he never backed down. That's an awesome quality, especially at his age.

I was able to have a good conversation with him two days ago, and he's working hard to make sure that he comes in and offensively he's able to compete. Defensively, we know what he's capable of doing. He had a really good spring with us offensively. He showed that he has the ability to use the whole field and kind of go gap to gap.

So it's in there. I'm not concerned at all with Masyn's offense. I think he's going to come around and be just fine.

Q. When you got to spring last year, there was a competition for Jordan. I think it's fair to say there was (indiscernible) you all wanted him to win. Talking about Masyn, is that a situation that will be similar for him this spring?

OLIVER MARMOL: It's always a competition. He knows it. In his own words, he said, "I know I have to come in offensively and show that I'm capable of handling the league if I want to break camp with you guys."

I think that's correct. Do I want him on our club? Absolutely. I love this kid. The way he competes, he's going to help us win for a long time. But there's certain things he's working on to make sure that the league doesn't overpower him.

Q. A lot has been made kind of about the pitch to contact versus swing and miss the first half. We talked about how you got the guys that you have, and you can't necessarily overnight change them into being different pitchers. How much is that idea with guys like (indiscernible) still part of it and maybe Gibson as well, how much does that tie to what you talked about with the continuity and defense and how those things are really pledged together a little bit?

OLIVER MARMOL: You can't do that overnight. Are we addressing some of it? Yes. But you need to solidify your defense and make sure that that's tight. Because balls are still put in play, and if there's an out, you got to make an out. We gave up way too much last year in a lot of different areas. So making sure that our defense is tight is important.

But, yeah, as we look at the market for bullpen arms, our hope is to kind of get some guys that can miss some bats as well. We'll see.

Q. Movements yesterday, Steven Matz has changed his off-season program to try and be more durable. What reports have you heard from Steven?

OLIVER MARMOL: It's been positive. He did a little bit of it more so this off-season than last off-season to make sure he's ready. All reports on him up to this point have been good. There's some pretty good extensive stats of him being really good. Our hope is that he can start the season that way because it could be extremely, extremely helpful.

Q. When you're going through the different things that you can do to be better defensively, does it look different at all in spring? Do you focus on different things at all?

OLIVER MARMOL: That's the thing, no. The reality is the way we set up our spring is high attention to the details of the fundamentals and defense. And I really do think that when you look at break and camp and giving an opportunity to different people and seeing how the first several weeks went, like that wasn't ideal. It hurt us. Then you had the injuries, and that hurt us as well. We never got into a really good groove defensively. When you look at our infield, I think that we'll be better there, I really do. Our outfield, more continuity, we'll be better there as well.

Q. Along those lines, how do you ideally see things unfolding at second?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yeah, it depends on how a lot of other things play out over the next couple months leading into. So we'll see what our roster looks like, but both of those guys do a really nice job at second base. Gorman turns a really nice double play. Donnie's as steady as they get. I trust both of those guys to play second. I'm not concerned with how that needs to play out, DH. Donnie could still give the guys a break in different positions.

Q. The last day of the season you were pretty candid in your assessment of some stuff that went on in the clubhouse. Curious if the three starters in particular that you signed so far this year, do you think those are guys who are going to make a positive impact?

OLIVER MARMOL: I don't think Mo got it done before December 1st for no reason. They clearly address a lot of the things that we were hoping for, and the three are the absolute perfect fit from a personality standpoint to what we were looking for.

Q. You guys signed starters like Lance Lynn and Kyle Gibson, guys that are innings eaters. Curious how much value that brings to the rest of the staff and maybe the purpose behind it. Just in baseball today, how much value of guys maybe haven't had the most success but can eat innings?

OLIVER MARMOL: It brings a lot of value. There's some things within each one of those guys that we feel like we can -- we're bringing 'em in for a couple reasons. One, personality-wise, great fit; but, two, there's some things that we can really help with that will allow them to perform better as well.

But it also helps your young guys. When you think about growing that next group of players, we got some young arms that are coming. It's good to see what that looks like from guys that have been around for a while. I think it has extreme value.

Q. You talk about culture. A lot of it comes from everyday players, but starting pitchers, a lot of them can only control one day, and it's the rare starter who kind of leads a clubhouse. How does what y'all do manifest? How do you think that manifests as a changed clubhouse?

OLIVER MARMOL: The Cardinals have had a really good culture for a long time. Last year sucked from a performance standpoint. And when you're losing, nothing's fun, okay. What I don't want to do is also blow this up as like, oh, the culture was -- that's far from reality. The conversations that were taking place towards the end of the year were unbelievable.

Like, I wish I could sit here and walk you through the Goldys and Donovans and Eddies and Nootbaars. I can go down the list of what those -- it was incredible as to what this looks like moving forward.

This off-season has been a lot of fun to jump on Zooms with these guys and starting to talk through some of the expectations and accountability.

So, it's not this -- it's not this revamp of culture. You're adding some great personalities that knows what winning looks like, knows what accountability looks like, and they're great fits. But in no way are we talking about a revamp.

Q. You mentioned the notion of the early weeks of the season not going your way and then it manifests into now you're trying to battle back. How eager are you for like the notion of a blank slate with largely the same group, guys that you believe in but just a fresh start?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yes, I'm looking forward to it. We're sitting here and all we've talked about is 2023, right? So I'm looking forward to starting a new year with this group and kicking things over the right way.

Q. Do you spend more time thinking about last year or what's going to potentially happen this year?

OLIVER MARMOL: No, I've gone through that exercise already. Now it's focusing on what we can do to make sure that we don't repeat that and putting things in place to make sure that we get off to a good start starting in Spring Training.

So, no, a lot of my energy is no longer on assessing what happened last year as much as like setting us up for success this year.

Q. A lot of young players who we have seen, the jump from year one to year two is the biggest jump in their career. With Jordan, what do you expect out of him?

OLIVER MARMOL: Jordan's been really good this offseason. Last year -- this is an extremely talented individual. Last year it was clear, I mean, he would come in and say, Man, the game is fast right now. Defensively things are going really quick. I'm trying to slow it down out there. What we'll see is his ability to slow it down. This spring is going to be important for him. But that second year knowing what to expect, it's going to be great for him to just kind of calm the nerves and just be himself. Because he's super athletic. Did he have great year in the outfield? No. As he calms down and settles in, is he athletic enough to be a good outfielder? The answer is yes. I'm not concerned with him coming in and being nervous again. I think he's going to actually be himself and we're going to see a much better player.

Q. When you talk about the staffing, your staff, your coaching staff, the addition of Descalso, what made that such a fit, and how much did past relationships, shared history, factor into that spot?

OLIVER MARMOL: Descalso is a winner, bottom line. He knows what it looks like to win. He holds guys accountable. This game's about people and he's extremely relational, he has good relationships with Contreras and Nolan and Goldy. He has instant credibility when he steps into that clubhouse. The reality is I think one day he's going to manage. This is a -- he's a great communicator, he's very organized, and he leads well. So, I have a good relationship with him and the opportunity presented itself and I wanted to make sure we brought him in.

Q. When you look at the division, it seems like every team is kind of on the upswing, a lot of young talent across the board. Just how are you looking at the division as a whole going into next year and even beyond next year?

OLIVER MARMOL: Good question. I don't focus on it a whole lot, I focus on our guys. If we play our game, at the end of the year, we're usually okay. So, I'm more focused on what we're able to do more so than I am the division at the moment.