A late-offseason economical addition for the Cardinals, who’ve just signed utility man Brad Miller to a big league deal. It has the feel of Cardinals voodoo.
Brad Miller signs with #STLCards team announces. MLB deal. Believed to be for 2M.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) February 12, 2020
Miller, 30, was looking like a long-term, solid utility man dating back to his earlier days with the Mariners and then Rays, but the bat fell way off the last few years, as did his defensive ability in the infield.
But then he quietly had an absurd half-season with the Phillies last year (.263/.331/.610, though a 136 wRC+ because of the homer-heavy environment there), and now the Cardinals get him for a song. He was absolutely hitting the shit out of the ball with Philly (49.4% hard contact rate, 30.8% HR/FB rate), and it would be so very Cardinals for them to get him now as he figures some random power thing out, and they suddenly have one of the best bench bats in the NL.
… or maybe it was a bit flukey and ballpark-driven. Obviously the market was not convinced that anything substantive had changed, hence the late, cheap signing.