The St. Louis Cardinals have traded left-handed pitching prospect Rob Kaminsky to the St. Louis Cardinals in exchange for outfielder/first baseman Brandon Moss, according to Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Dispatch. Chris Cotillo of SBNation was the first to report that a deal was in the works
The Cardinals now has a powerful left-handed bat and a guy that can play multiple positions for them. The 31-year-old Moss is hitting .217/.288/.407 with 15 homers and 50 RBIs in 375 plate appearances this season. Moss will most likely split time with Mark Reynolds at first and take the place of Matt Holliday in left field, who injured his quadriceps muscle last night. Moss will be a free agent following the 2016 season.
The Indians traded second base prospect Joey Wendle to the Oakland Athletics for Moss during the offseason.
Right now this deal looks like a steal for the Indians, who get Kaminsky, who we ranked as the Cardinals second best prospect in our preseason rankings. The 20-year-old prospect has been great this season in High-A ball, posting an ERA of 2.09 in 94 2/3 innings. The young lefty has a strikeout to walk ratio of 2.82:1, which isn’t great but it isn’t bad either.
Overall this looks like a good move by the Indians and a questionable move by the Cardinals, who gave up a top prospect for a struggling utility player.
[poll id=”114″]