Rasmus, Barden picked for Olympics
DOWNTOWN — The Cardinals’ top prospect and one of the team’s top minor-league performers this season have been invited to represent the country at the Summer Games in Beijing next month. Outfielder Colby Rasmus and utility infielder Brian Barden were two of the 23 players named to Team USA on Wednesday.
Rasmus, unanimously considered the team’s top prospect, has been a favorite to play center field for Team USA since his star turn in Double-A last season and follow-up performance in the IBAF World Cup tournament in Taiwan last fall. Batting leadoff, Rasmus powered a U.S. team that included Evan Longoria – who had one of the big hits Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium. Rasmus had a hit in every game in the tournament, hit .382 and led the team in extra-base hits. Team USA won Gold.
Barden is a bit of a surprise pick, but by name only.
The Cardinals grabbed the infielder off waivers last season when they were scrambling for someone who could play shortstop and third base. Barden was available because Arizona couldn’t find a spot for him. At Oregon State, Barden won the college equivalent of the Gold Glove for his play at third base, but when he joined the Cardinals’ major-league team last fall he said he knew his bat was a better fit for the middle infield. His glove plays anywhere.
Barden, his complete stats available here, is hitting .303 with 20 doubles and a .371 on-base percentage for Triple-A Memphis. In all the plundering of the Memphis roster the Cardinals have done this season Barden is arguably the Redbirds’ best player yet to get a major-league promotion this summer.
The official announcement of the team is available here at USA Baseball’s official site.
The team begins play Aug. 13 against Korea. This will be Team USA’s first appearance in the Olympics since the Ben Sheets, Roy Oswalt and Ryan Franklin team won the Gold Medal in the Sidney Summer Games of 2000. The United States did not qualify for baseball in Athens 2004.
All minor-leaguers, those not on the 25-man active major-league roster, were eligible for selection. Any who are promoted between now and the Olympics would have to be replaced by Team USA. Only one college player was selected for the team — San Diego pitcher Stephen Strasburg, the phenom who struck out 23 players in a game and is the early favorite to be the No. 1 pick next June.
The Cardinals were one of eight major-league organizations that had two players named to the roster. Two other Olympians had Cardinal connections. Florida outfielder John Gall was the two-time player of the year within the Cardinals organization yet never could crack the major-league roster for an extended look. Detroit pitcher Blaine Neal was a non-roster invitee to spring training 2006.
The Cardinals had a handful of candidates for the team. Catcher Bryan Anderson, like Rasmus, was on the Gold Medal-winning World Cup team. Double-A pitcher Jess Todd pitched his way into the conversation by earning All-Star invites at two levels this summer.
Team USA has yet to fill one spot on its 24-man roster.
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Derrick Goold said he was going to Mizzou for capital-J journalism, but after growing up in the Time Zone Baseball Forgot he was really drawn to MU sitting between two major-league cities. Goold joined the Post-Dispatch in 2001 after working for The Times-Picayune and Rocky Mountain News, covering sports from LSU to NHL and every level of baseball in between. 
Derrick - One of the errors has been corrected (adding the apostrophe to indicate the possessive on “Cardinals”) but there is still an issue with subject/verb agreement:
The Cardinals’ top prospect and one of the team’s top minor-league performers this season *has* been invited to represent the country at the Summer Games in Beijing next month.
The subject of the sentence is singular: “top prospect”
I honestly haven’t gone through the rest of the article with a fine-toothed comb, but I can if you’re interested.
kopper
And to our esteemed “fellow blogger,” Erik: You may hate the “grammar police,” as you call it, but this is a blog on a major daily newspaper’s website (and the introductory sentence in the article, at that!). I am sure these guys all have a copy of the AP Style Guide on their desk. Errors should not have to be pointed out by readers. That’s what editors/proofreaders are for. I know because I do this for a living.
Kopper –
If you had read the whole article, you’d realize the subject of the first sentence is compound and plural: “top prospect” AND “one of the team’s top minor league performers”. “Top prospect” refers to Rasmus. “One of the team’s top minor league performers” refers to Barden. That is, TWO players have been invited. The subject is plural, and the predicate “have been invited” agrees properly with the subject.
I’ve got no problem with the grammar police, but if you’re going to step up and criticize, you should make sure you’re right.
Seeing Rasmus in September is in the hands of the businessmen. Seeing Rasmus play for the USA should not be a detriment to his standing with the Cardinals. Playing for the USA should not be considered a penalty for Rasmus but an honor. How would it not be fair to the people who are playing for the “club”? The USA will be a team effort. Not like triple AAA where it is every person for himself. If you notice that when Rasmus played for the “team” during the world cup he played exceptionally from the start. Triple AAA and Double AA and the rest are really not team endeavors but individual efforts to get to the next level. Maybe that is why Rasmus struggles a bit at the start of each season. He is looking for the team to play for.
I’ve heard others refer to Barden’s good glove before, but never in terms of his being a good shortstop, plus I’ve never seen any reason to think that the Cards think he has a future with the MLB team. Are the Cardinals upgrading their opinion of this guy? Has he graduated beyond the “AAA roster-filler” category he’s been in for awhile? I think one of the ML team’s 2 biggest problems is crappy offense from the middle infield; it would be awesome to see an internal solution to that.
Playing for Team USA will only impact Colby Rasmus’ major-league time if there is an injury that opens up a spot for him here while he is way over there. Otherwise, I’m told that Rasmus is still in line for a September callup, which means adding him to the 40-man roster and the commitment that goes with that.
The comment referred to in the comments here I believe was about players selected for the Olympics not being asked to play in the Arizona Fall League. Olympic selection would not cost a player September — that, as said here, would be silly and disrespectful — but it would give the team pause before asking a player to then play another round in the AFL.
dg
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I am glad to hear that Olympians will not be punished by playing for their country. I meant no disrespect and I wasn’t trying to give the impression that I agreed with it. I asked out of curiosity because I thought I remembered a comment about it. Can’t wait for the Lud/Raz/Ank outfield.
…good job tom s.
I happy for the Rasmus and Barden. Once again, this exposes the Cardinal’s farm team as one of the best in pro baseball.
Make that.. I’m happy
Word from Colby’s father this morning that Colby got a call from Mo congratulating him on the Olympic team selection and inferring that he may get a September callup.
FWIW, this year’s Olympics are a little weird in that they are starting a little earlier than usual - the Chinese consider “8″ to be a supremely lucky number, so they wanted to make sure the Games started on 8/8/08 this year - which is why it’ll all be done well in time for Colby and/or Brian to get the September callup.
Speaking of Barden… it’s interesting that the Cards removed him from the 40-man roster over the winter, signalling that they didn’t really consider him in their plans - but then this spring determined to have him play short all year at Memphis (to the detriment of D’Angelo Jimenez, who ought to be getting close to his opt-out time) since they’ve apparently decided he doesn’t hit with enough power to be a third baseman.